ANKARA (Reuters) Turkey’s foreign minister said on Thursday (March 16) that Dutch anti-Islam politician Geert Wilders’ views were shared by all rival parties and were pushing Europe toward “wars of religion,” irrespective of his failure to win Dutch elections.

Dutch center-right Prime Minister Mark Rutte fended off the challenge of Wilders to score an election victory hailed across Europe by governments facing a rising wave of nationalism.

RELATED: Dutch PM Rutte fends off anti-Islam Wilders

However, the reaction in Ankara — which has been locked in a deepening row with the Netherlands after the Dutch barred Turkish ministers from speaking to rallies of overseas Turks — was less sanguine.

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“Many parties have received a similar share of votes. Seventeen percent, 20 percent, there are lots of parties like this, but they are all the same,” Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said at a rally in the southern city of Antalya.

“There is no difference between the mindsets of Geert Wilders and social democrats in the Netherlands. They all have the same mindset. … That mindset is taking Europe to the cliff. Soon wars of religion may and will start in Europe.”

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Turkey on Monday suspended high-level relations with the Netherlands after it cited public safety in banning ministers from addressing expatriate Turks in a campaign for a referendum that would give President Tayyip Erdogan sweeping new powers.

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Erdogan, who is counting on the backing of overseas Turks in the April 16 vote, accused the Dutch government of acting like “Nazi remnants.”