“May Allah grant me the governorship of Jerusalem,” Interior Minister Mustafa Çiftçi told an event on Saturday in the central province of Çorum.
His remarks echoed the common sentiment in Türkiye, which stands for Palestinians in the face of Israeli oppression and occupation of Palestinian lands.
Çiftçi, a former governor, was addressing a meeting of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party) where he hailed how far Türkiye has come under the leadership of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.
“We still have a long way to go to achieve Kızıl Elma,” he said, referring to a Turkish mythological concept of achieving an ultimate goal.
“Just as we have seen the liberation of Damascus, Aleppo and Karabakh, Allah willing, we will witness the liberation of Jerusalem,” he said. The said Syrian cities were liberated by revolutionaries who ousted the brutal Assad regime in 2024 while Azerbaijan retook Armenian-occupied Karabakh in 2022.
