The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) is the most moral army in the world, while Turkey is committing “genocide”, Benjamin Netanyahu has said in a spat with Recep Tayyip Erdogan over the war in Gaza.

Israel’s prime minister accused Mr Erdogan of crimes against the Kurds and locking up a record number of journalists after the Turkish president said Mr Netanyahu was no different to Adolf Hitler.

Mr Netanyahu said Mr Erdogan was “the last person who can preach morality to us”.

“The IDF, which is the most moral army in the world, is fighting to eliminate the most abhorrent and brutal terrorist organisation in the world, Hamas-Isis, which has committed crimes against humanity, and which Erdogan has praised and whose leaders he hosts,” he said.

Kurdish militants have been battling for decades to achieve self-rule in south-east Turkey.

Ankara considers the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) to be a terror group and has targeted its members in Iraq and Syria in recent years after pushing large numbers of militants out of the country.

Mr Erdogan had earlier said he would welcome academics and scientists facing persecution for their views on the conflict in Gaza, adding Western countries supporting Israel were complicit in what he called war crimes.

‘He is richer than Hitler’

“They used to speak ill of Hitler. What difference do you have from Hitler? They are going to make us miss Hitler. Is what this Netanyahu is doing any less than what Hitler did? It is not,” he said.

“He is richer than Hitler, he gets the support from the West. All sorts of support comes from the United States. And what did they do with all this support? They killed more than 20,000 Gazans.”

Turkey supports a two-state solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and has criticised Israel’s offensive in Gaza, calling it a “terror state”.

Israeli leaders must be tried in international courts, Turkey has said.

Hamas is a ‘liberation group’

Unlike its Western allies and some Arab nations, Turkey does not view Hamas as a terrorist organisation. Mr Erdogan himself has described it “as a liberation group”. 

Despite its criticism of Israel, Ankara has maintained commercial ties with the country, drawing a backlash from opposition parties and Iran, which supports Hamas.

More than 21,000 Palestinians have been killed since Israel launched its offensive in Gaza, according to the enclave’s Hamas-run health ministry.

Israel has vowed to dismantle the terror group and bring back more than 100 hostages still held by its fighters after its Oct 7 cross-border raid, in which some 1,200 people, mostly civilians, were killed.