President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan accused the West of Islamophobia and rebuked Israel for targeting Christians during Pope Leo XIV’s pilgrimage to Turkey, even as the pontiff sidestepped calls from religious freedom analysts to address the persecution of Christians in Turkey.
“The Israeli government has been bombing civilian settlements, including churches, mosques, hospitals, and schools, for months,” Erdoğan asserted on November 27, 2025. “I would like it to be known that we have always appreciated the resolute stance of our esteemed guest and his predecessors, especially regarding the Palestinian issue.”
“We have always appreciated the resolute stance of our esteemed guest and his predecessors, especially regarding the Palestinian issue.”
Turkey’s president blamed Israel for shelling “the Church of the Holy Family, the only Catholic church in Gaza,” claiming that “for a thousand years, people of every race, religion, sect, and origin have lived freely without any concern or oppression in these lands that have been our homeland.” He stressed: “Our biggest debt to the Palestinian people is justice, and the way to pay this debt is to immediately implement the two-state solution vision based on the 1967 borders.”
Erdoğan then turned to “rising Islamophobia in the West.” Turkey’s Communications Directorate said that he sought to highlight how hate speech has “now reached a level that can no longer be ignored.”
Pope Leo reiterated Erdoğan’s stance while flying on to Beirut, telling reporters that “the only solution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict is the establishment of a Palestinian state. We all know that at this time Israel still does not accept that solution, but we see it as the only solution.” Leo did not speak about the plight of the Kurds in Turkey. The Kurds remain the largest people without a nation and experience severe repression in Turkey.
In Turkey, the pontiff drew criticism for visiting the Blue Mosque, honoring Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, who conducted genocide against Armenian Christians prior to becoming president and the Kurds after he established the Republic of Turkey, and also for visiting the Diyanet, Turkey’s religious affairs directorate, while neglecting to stop at Hagia Sophia, the basilica next door that Erdoğan reconverted to a mosque in 2020.
“Pope Leo’s visit to Atatürk’s mausoleum is highly offensive to Armenians,” Stephan Pechdimaldji, a grandson of survivors of the Armenian genocide, tweeted. “Atatürk continued the actions of the Young Turks, who were responsible for the 1915 Armenian genocide,” he wrote in Newsweek. Although Turks expect foreign heads of state to visit Atatürk’s mausoleum, not all do. German Chancellor Adolf Hitler praised Atatürk as his “star in the darkness” and “later acknowledged that Atatürk was his inspiration in the aftermath of World War II,” political scientist Anzhela Mnatsakanyan tweeted, noting that Atatürk was “responsible for the genocides” of Armenian, Greek, and Assyrian Christians. Historian Stefan Ihrig’s book, Atatürk in the Nazi Imagination, elaborates upon the Turkish dictator’s role as a model for Hitler.
Retired U.S. diplomat Alberto Miguel Fernandez criticized Leo’s decision to visit the Diyanet, noting that Erdoğan empowered the body to turn churches into mosques and encourages “second-class status for non-Muslims back home in Turkey.”
“Pope Leo’s insensitivity to the atrocities of October 7 and his push for a Palestinian state without insisting on dismantling Hamas does not bode well for the future.”
“We live in interesting times when we have a pope who appeases an authoritarian leader like Erdoğan, who has openly called for Israel’s destruction, while many Sunni Muslim leaders in the Arab world are warning about the Islamization of Europe,” Tomas Sandell, director of European Coalition for Israel, lamented. “Pope Leo’s insensitivity to the atrocities of October 7 and his push for a Palestinian state without insisting on dismantling Hamas does not bode well for the future.”
However, Thibault van den Bossche, advocacy officer at the European Centre for Law and Justice, said that Leo’s visit “unfolded under the banner of diplomatic prudence and powerful symbolism, yet without relinquishing clear messages in favor of Christian unity and respect for religious minorities.” “During his meeting with the Armenians, he chose cautious language, referring to the ‘tragic circumstances’ of the early twentieth century—refraining, unlike Pope Francis, from using the word ‘genocide,’” Bossche observed. Leo “urged that the rights of all—citizens and foreigners, rich and poor—be protected, sending a clear, if diplomatically phrased, message in favor of religious freedom and the protection of Christian minorities.”
In a report released on November 24, the European Centre for Law and Justice urged the pope to address the “legal, institutional, and social hostility” facing Christians and Jews in Turkey, which portrays them as “alien, subversive, or instruments of foreign influence.” Unfortunately, Leo XIV missed the opportunity.
