Israel says offshore gas secure after Turk challenge

Israel can defend the gas fields recently discovered in its waters and wants to develop them, Energy Minister Uzi Landau has said after Turkey vowed to boost naval patrols in the eastern Mediterranean in a deepening diplomatic feud. “Israel can support and secure the rigs that we are going to have in the Mediterranean,” Landau said at a security conference on Sunday when asked if the warship challenge floated last week by Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan could pose a threat. “That’s the simple answer that I can give,” he said. Erdogan has said Turkey would make its presence felt in the eastern Mediterranean at a time when Israel is looking to exploit the two offshore gas fields and partner with Cyprus to build energy facilities. Landau, whose formal title is national infrastructure minister, said no country had challenged Israel’s ownership of the Tamar and Leviathan natural gas fields, which Israel considers a potential pipeline to energy independence.“It hasn’t been claimed even by Lebanon and the Turks, too, as far as I’m aware,” Landau said. Texas-based Noble Energy and its Israeli exploration partners said the Leviathan prospect, 130 kilometers off the Port of Haifa, was the world’s biggest deep-water gas find in the past decade. Finance Minister Yuval Steinitz has said Israel could earn at least $150 billion in gas revenues.