Ankara, March 19: Two Arab channels will soon start airing a Turkish television series on the plight of Palestinians that angered Israel, an official from the production company said Friday.
The 13-episode “Separation: Palestine in Love and In War” has been sold to MBC, a Saudi-run pan-Arabic news and entertainment channel, and to a Dubai channel, said Zafer Kaya Okay, art director at the Istanbul-based Cagla Productions.
MBC plans to begin the series on Saturday, he said, while the Dubai channel would follow suit in the near future.
The series was first broadcast by Turkey’s state television in October, infuriating Israel, which said the programme incited “hatred against Israel” and was “not worthy of being broadcast even in an enemy state.”
The first episode showed Israeli forces as shooting innocent Palestinian civilians. Israeli soldiers were shown killing a new born baby girl and an elderly man on his way to pilgrimage in Mecca.
Muslim-majority Turkey has been a military ally of Israel since 1996 but relations between the two have been tense since Israel’s war on Gaza in early 2009, which Turkey vehemently criticised.
In January this year, bilateral ties became tense again over another television series depicting the adventures of a Turkish secret agent which Israel said depicted Jews as “baby-snatchers and war criminals.”
Israeli Deputy Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon gave the Turkish ambassador a public dressing down over the series, prompting Ankara to threaten to recall the envoy. Tensions were resolved after Israel issued a formal apology.
—Agencies