Thousands of jubilant Turks welcomed their prime minister home on Friday, thronging the airport here and chanting “Turkey is proud of you!” after he publicly confronted the Israeli president during a heated debate on the Gaza war, Thursday at the Davos World Economic Forum. “I did what I had to do,” Recep Tayyip Erdogan told reporters at the airport. “I cannot remain apathetic when it comes to these things, it's just not in my nature. I am duty-bound to defend the honor of my country.” Erdogan said he was not “at heart a diplomat but a politician.” “The conqueror of Davos,” one banner at Erdogan's airport welcome in Istanbul. During the Davos panel debate, President Shimon Peres had launched a fiery defense of his country's offensive in Gaza over the past month, and with a raised voice and pointed finger, questioned what Erdogan would do if rockets were fired at Istanbul every night. Erdogan, visibly angry, responded as he sat next to Peres at the debate, which also included United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon and Arab League chief Amr Moussa: “President Peres you are older than me and your voice is very loud,” Erdogan said. “The reason for you raising your voice is the psychology of guilt. I will not raise my voice that much, you should know that. When it comes to killing you know very well how to kill. I know very well how you hit and killed children on the beaches.” He then walked out of the room. As Erdogan made the front page of newspapers across Europe and the Middle East, Peres's office rejected claims by Turkish officials that the Israeli president had apologized. “This claim is untrue,” said Israeli presidency spokeswoman Ayelet Frish, adding that the two leaders had “a friendly conversation” afterwards. “I am confident and trustful that we are going to be able -- within a period of time -- to come back to business as usual in our relations,” Israeli Ambassador Gaby Levy told reporters in Ankara. “It is in the interest of both countries to start trying to calm down and move forward,” he said. In Tehran, influential Iranian cleric Ayatollah Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani applauded Erdogan's action, saying “Mr. Erdogan made a very good move.” Despite the hero's welcome from party supporters, Erdogan came under criticism from the opposition and foreign policy experts, who accused him of casting Turkey as a Hamas supporter and dealing a blow to ties with Israel. “Mr Erdogan ruined the international prestige of Turkey. Supporting the Palestinian cause is one thing, but supporting Hamas is something else,” said Onur Oymen, deputy chairman of the main opposition CHP party. The influential Turkish army, which has a series of cooperation accords with the Israeli military, signalled that close relations would continue, stressing “national interests.”
