Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has suggested that Israel was behind the military coup that ousted Egypt’s first democratically elected president, Mohamed Morsi on 3 July, adding that the Turkish government has evidence to prove the Israeli hand in it. The evidence Erdoğan gave for the alleged Israeli involvement was a meeting in France before elections in Egypt in 2011 between an Israeli justice minister and an unnamed intellectual whom he quoted as saying the Muslim Brotherhood would not be in power even if it wins elections. He was speaking to members of his ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party) in Ankara on 20 August.
“What is said about Egypt? That democracy is not the ballot box. Who is behind this? Israel is. We have the evidence in our hands,” Erdoğan said. “That’s exactly what happened.” The evidence Erdoğan was referring to was a video of a press conference by Israeli Justice Minister Tzipi Livni and French philosopher and author Bernard-Henri Levy. A video of the two, dating back to 2011, shows Levy saying: “If the Muslim Brotherhood arrives in Egypt, I will not say democracy wants it, so let democracy progress. Democracy is not only elections, it is also values.” Pressed further as to whether he would urge Egypt’s military to intervene against the Muslim Brotherhood, Levy says: “I will urge the prevention of them coming to power, but by all sorts of means.”