Turkey has decided to maintain its military unmanned aerial vehicle programme with Israel despite what government officials have described as the worst crisis with Israel in 20 years.
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Erdogan has expressed outrage over the killing of nine passengers, at least four of them Turks, during an interception operation by the Israeli Navy of the six-vessel humanitarian flotilla that sought to break the siege of the Gaza Strip last week.
"Three joint military exercises scheduled with Israel were cancelled," Erdogan said. "Turkey’s hostility is as strong as its friendship is valuable."
However, government officials said this week that the Heron program is marked as a military priority and will not be affected. They said five out of the six Herons were being deployed on a nearly daily basis.
"Nobody should expect us to declare war on Israel because of this incident," Turkish Deputy Prime Minister Bulent Arinc said, adding the Turkish Defense Ministry would not block the delivery of Israeli UAVs to Ankara's military. Turkey has already paid most of the $190 million for the procurement of 10 Heron UAVs from the state-owned Israel Aerospace Industries and Turkish Defense Minister Vecdi Gonul IAI has already delivered six Heron medium-altitude, long-endurance UAVs for his forces. He said the Herons, with an endurance of up to 50 hours, have been deemed operational.
The Heron project, awarded to IAI and Elbit Systems in 2005, has undergone more than two years of delays amid interoperability difficulties with a reconnaissance payload developed by Turkey's military-owned Aselsan. Officials said IAI solved the problem by ordering a larger engine to accommodate the Aselsan payload.
Reports in the US media suggest Turkey's Defence Industry Undersecretariat is planning a review of other military projects with Israel. It said this includes a proposed joint upgrade of Turkey's F-4 and F-16 fighter-jet fle
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