Melania sent a letter to Putin. Now, Turkey has a message for her
Turkey’s first lady, Emine Erdoğan, has publicly urged US first lady Melania Trump to speak out against the deaths of Palestinian children after the latter made an open plea to Russian President Vladimir Putin about the children of Ukraine.
In a letter that US President Donald Trump handed to Putin during their Alaska meeting, his wife implored the Russian president to restore the “melodic laughter” of Ukrainian children following international outcry over their abduction by invading forces.
Melania Trump has been sent a message by Turkey’s Emine Erdogan, urging her to think of the children of Gaza.Credit: AP
But now Turkey, an open critic of Israel, is pressing the US to adopt a similar stance against Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, as global pressure intensifies over the death toll in Gaza and images of starving Palestinian children.
“I have faith that the important sensitivity you have shown for the 648 Ukrainian children ... will be extended to Gaza as well,” Erdoğan wrote, stressing that 18,000 Palestinian children are said to have died since the conflict began following the Hamas terrorist attack on October 7, 2023.
In her August 15 letter to Putin, Melania Trump urged Putin to agree that a child’s innocence “stands above geography, government and ideology”.
“Undeniably, we must strive to paint a dignity-filled world for all – so that every soul may wake to peace, and so that the future itself is perfectly guarded,” the US first lady wrote.
Emine Erdoğan alongside her husband, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, the Turkish president.Credit: Getty
Seizing on this sentiment, Erdoğan said: “This right is not the privilege of any geography, race, ethnic identity, religious group or ideology,” adding that standing with the oppressed is a fundamental responsibility of humanity.
In the letter, published by the presidency and on Erdoğan’s official X account, Turkey’s first lady also compared the concept of the “unknown soldier” to the “unknown baby”, and echoed a previous warning from the UN that Gaza was becoming a “graveyard for children”.
The White House has been contacted for comment.
Friday’s open plea came the same day as the Integrated Food Security Phase Classification said famine was occurring in Gaza City, and was likely to spread to the southern cities of Khan Younis and Deir al-Balah without a ceasefire and an end to restrictions on humanitarian aid.
A Palestinian girl struggles to get donated food at a community kitchen in Gaza City.Credit: AP
Netanyahu labelled the report an “outright lie”, while the US ambassador to Israel, Mike Huckabee, said on X that “tons of food has gone into Gaza but Hamas savages stole it”.
Netanyahu has repeatedly denied that Israel has a starvation policy, but also acknowledged earlier this month that “deprivation” was occurring in the strip, blaming Hamas.
International condemnation, including from Australia, has been fuelled by reports of Palestinians being gunned down at aid delivery depots.
On Sunday, Al-Awda Hospital and two witnesses told the Associated Press that four Palestinians were killed when troops opened fire on a crowd heading to a site run by Israeli-backed US contractor Gaza Humanitarian Foundation in the Netzarim corridor area.
As Israel gears up for its incursion into Gaza City, residents of the Jabaliya refugee camp north of the city said they endured heavy explosions overnight.
“There have been non-stop explosions and strikes in the past days,” one Palestinian man said.
Sixty-four people had been killed and nearly 300 injured in Israeli attacks in the past 24 hours, the territory’s Hamas-run health ministry said on Sunday.
With Reuters, AP
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