Foreign Minister Gideon Sa’ar plans to propose on Sunday a cabinet resolution to officially recognize the genocide against the Armenian people during the final years of the Ottoman Empire, his office announced Thursday, in a move that will no doubt provoke rival Turkey.

Armenians have long sought international recognition of the killings in the early 20th century, which reportedly left some 1.5 million of their people dead, as a genocide. Turkey — the Ottoman Empire’s successor state — strongly rejects the allegation that the massacres, imprisonment and forced deportation of Armenians amounted to genocide.

Jerusalem has previously refrained from recognizing the World War I atrocities as genocide over fears it could harm its relationship with Ankara. However, with ties deteriorating sharply since Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan rose to power, particularly following the Hamas-led October 7, 2023, massacre in Israel and the ensuing war in Gaza — where the Turkish leader has claimed genocide, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu last year said for the first time that he recognized the genocide.

“Despite extensive and........

© The Times of Israel