'Israel must apologize to normalize ties'

No apology, no normalization – After delaying the publication of a UN report that probed the events of the Gaza flotilla last May, Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Recep Erdogan said on Friday it was "unthinkable" to normalize ties with Israel unless the Jewish state apologized for the killing of nine pro-Palestinian Turkish activists aboard the Gaza-bound Turkish ship.

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Erdogan also said in the text of a speech to parliament seen by Reuters that lifting an Israeli blockade on the Palestinian territory of Gaza and paying compensation to the victims of the raid were also conditions for the normalization of relations.

The Palmer committee was appointed by UN General-Secretary Ban Ki-moon to investigate the events that led to the death of nine activists onboard the Mavi Marmara.

Last week, it was reported that Israel's representative to the UN inquiry committee Yosef Ciechanover, his Turkish counterpart and other officials were shuttling between Jerusalem and Ankara in an attempt to soften the report's conclusions and improve relations between the countries.

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