WASHINGTON — US President Donald Trump on Wednesday praised Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who he suggested could have entered the war on the side of Iran because he doesn’t like Israel.

“He was a prime candidate to go into the war with Iran — maybe on the Iran side, because he’s not a big fan of Israel,” Trump claimed, even though Turkey gave no indication that it was preparing to enter the US-Israel war against Iran and even came under Iranian fire at one point.

“I asked him to stay out. He stayed out,” Trump told reporters in the Oval Office.

“Erdogan is a great leader, a very strong person… Everything I’ve ever asked from him, he’s done.”

The remarks from Trump came as Erdogan and other senior Turkish officials have recently ramped up threats against the Jewish state, with Turkey’s interior minister calling earlier this month for the country to “liberate” Jerusalem.

Erdogan, who has long been a vociferous critic of Israel, stated days later that Israeli “aggression” posed a threat to the whole world and must be stopped, as he claimed Israeli strikes in Lebanon and Syria were a threat to Turkey.

While Israel’s relations with Turkey, which were once the Jewish state’s strongest with any country in the region, have drastically deteriorated following Erdogan’s rise to power, they have........

© The Times of Israel