Israeli media reported last week that the US had rejected the invitation to participate in the October military drill as Israel had not been invited to the military exercise. Last year, the Turkish military cancelled an international segment of the Anatolian Eagle military training exercise in a move widely seen as a means of excluding Israel from the exercise.
“US officials have not made any statements regarding this issue,” Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu told Today’s Zaman earlier on Friday on a helicopter while en route from Erzurum to Diyarbakır, where Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan was due to hold a referendum campaign rally. The foreign minister explicitly denied speculation that the US would not participate in the war games because Israel was not invited.
The cancellation -- which increased tensions between Israel and Turkey -- was reportedly caused by a delay in the delivery of unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) to Turkey by Israel -- and not by Turkey’s disapproval of Israel’s devastating offensive against the Gaza Strip in the winter of 2008/2009, as many had speculated. But Turkey said it cancelled all military exercises with Israel this year because of Israel’s botched flotilla raid, in which nine Turkish activists onboard the Mavi Marmara were killed by Israeli special forces while attempting to deliver a shipment of humanitarian aid to the Gaza Strip.
