NEW ZEALAND’S government, and in particular its prime minister, Jacinda Ardern, have been much praised for their response to the appalling massacre of 50 people on March 15th in two mosques in the city of Christchurch. Ms Ardern has done everything she can to stress that the slain Muslims represented New Zealand—“us”—and the gunman a hateful ideology that has no place in the country. So it is odd that she felt compelled to announce on March 20th that she is sending her foreign minister, Winston Peters, to Turkey, to “confront” comments made by the Muslim-majority country’s president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Mr Erdogan has used the attack to score political points and whip up his conservative base ahead of local elections in late March. At appearances around Turkey, he has repeatedly described the mosque killings as part of a wider conspiracy against Turkey and Islam. In an interview on March 18th, he went so far as to accuse the West of preparing the Christchurch killer’s online manifesto, which included calls to expel Turks from Europe and to kill Mr Erdogan. “There is a very serious group behind this,” he said. “Because why does the West keep silent? Why does the Western media keep silent? They found it, they prepared it, and they handed it to him.”

Despite protests by New Zealand and others, Mr Erdogan has continued to show footage of the massacre at election rallies attended by tens of thousands of people and broadcast around the country. During recent rallies, crowds were treated to a video that juxtaposed partially blurred scenes of the carnage in Christchurch with screenshots of a European Parliament resolution urging the suspension of Turkey’s accession talks with the EU, and footage of a leader of the Turkish opposition referring to “terrorism rooted in the Islamic world”. Facebook and YouTube have been taken to task for providing the Christchurch killer with the tools to reach millions of viewers. Mr Erdogan has allowed him to reach millions more. The perpetrator behind the attack could not have dreamed of a better platform.

Australia—the killer’s homeland—is also incensed. At a recent campaign appearance, Mr Erdogan warned that Australians hostile to Islam would “return in coffins” if they visited Turkey. Australia’s prime minister, Scott Morrison, has demanded that he withdraw the comments, and has said the country is considering its travel advice for Australians visiting Turkey.

Mr Erdogan has also resumed his war of words with Benjamin Netanyahu, Israel’s prime minister, in which the two have accused one another of a litany of human-rights violations. Most recently, Turkey’s president slammed the Israeli leader’s son for referring to Istanbul as Constantinople. “The statements by Netanyahu’s son and the New Zealand terrorist are the same,” Mr Erdogan said. “They are fed by the same source.” An MP from Mr Erdogan’s ruling party picked up the thread. The Christchurch attack, he tweeted, was part of a “project by Zionist hands to pit the Muslim and Christian worlds against one another.” It is a confrontation Mr Erdogan seems to relish—especially when an election is looming.