The results of new municipal elections in Turkey <a href="https://english.almayadeen.net/news/politics/chp-s-mansur-yavas-garners-60--of-votes-in-ankara--99-8--vot">may indicate</a> that Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, a harsh critic of Israel, may be in trouble in future presidential elections.
Two major parties exist in Turkey, the Justice and Development Party (AK), headed by Erdogan, and the Republican People’s Party (CHP). The election on Sunday in the two major cities of Istanbul and Ankara featured the mayors of the two cities, both of whom belong to the CHP, successfully defending their positions from candidates from the AK. Ankara mayor Mansur Yavas of the CHP won over 60% of the votes.
In addition, in 35 of Turkey’s 81 provinces, the CHP <a href="https://english.almayadeen.net/news/politics/chp-leads-in-35-turkish-cities--akp-only-24-with-99--votes-c">won</a> in the municipal elections; the AK won in only 25. That represented the first time in 20 years the CHP led AK in local elections.
“Voters have chosen to change the face of Turkey,” CHP chairman Ozgur Ozel stated. &#8220;They want to open the door to a new political climate in our country.&#8221;
“Unfortunately, we have not obtained the results that we wanted,” Erdogan acknowledged.
According to analysts quoted by <a href="https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog_entry/foreign-minister-katz-turkish-voters-punished-erdogan-for-attacking-israel/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Times of Israel</a>, Turkish voters have become disenchanted with Erdogan because of roughly 70% inflation and an economic slowdown.
The significance of the two major cities voting for the CHP is that Ankara is the political capital of the nation and major financial centers reside in Istanbul.
In late December, Erdogan compared Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to Hitler, prompting Netanyahu and other leading Israeli officials to fire back.
<a href="https://www.aei.org/op-eds/erdogan-projects-his-own-genocidal-intent-onto-netanyahu/">Speaking</a> in Ankara, Erdogan once <a href="https://www.aei.org/op-eds/erdogan-projects-his-own-genocidal-intent-onto-netanyahu/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">said</a>, “A Muslim could not commit genocide; he is not capable of it.” He also <a href="https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/turkeys-erdogan-says-israeli-pm-netanyahu-no-different-hitler-2023-12-27/">declared</a>, “They used to speak ill of Hitler. What difference do you have from Hitler? They are going to make us miss Hitler. Is what this Netanyahu is doing any less than what Hitler did? It is not.”
That catalyzed this <a href="https://twitter.com/netanyahu/status/1740039502423265747?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">response</a> from Netanyahu: “Erdogan, who is committing genocide against the Kurds and who holds the world record for imprisoning journalists who oppose his regime, is the last person who can preach morality to us. The IDF, which is the most moral army in the world, is fighting to eliminate the most abhorrent and brutal terrorist organization in the world, Hamas-ISIS, which has committed crimes against humanity, and which Erdogan has praised and whose leaders he hosts.”
Israeli President Yitzchak Herzog <a href="https://twitter.com/Isaac_Herzog/status/1740050924037460046">added</a>, “I strongly condemn and utterly reject the words of Turkish President Erdogan. In all of human history, the Holocaust stands alone in its horror and enormity, and his words are deeply offensive to every Jew around the world, and to the memory of the millions of Jews who perished at the hands of the Nazis. The command ‘Never Again’ remains an imperative for the State of Israel — the nation state of the Jewish people — which is committed to the safety and protection of every Jew. There is no struggle more just than the war against the terrorist organization Hamas, which brutally and barbarically murdered Jews, as well as Muslims, and those of other faiths and nationalities.”

TOPSHOT-TURKEY-POLITICS-MUNICIPAL-VOTE

Erdogan’s Party Loses Significant Elections In Turkey

Israel

Recep Tayyip Erdogan

Turkey

After hard-line Islamist Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan compared Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to Hitler, Netanyahu joined other leading Israeli officials to fire back.
Speaking in Ankara on Wednesday, Erdogan, who once <a href="https://www.aei.org/op-eds/erdogan-projects-his-own-genocidal-intent-onto-netanyahu/">said</a>, “A Muslim could not commit genocide; he is not capable of it,” <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2023/12/27/turkeys-erdogan-says-netanyahu-no-different-than-hitler-as-gaza-is-bombed" target="_blank" rel="noopener">declared</a>, “They used to speak ill of Hitler. What difference do you have from Hitler? They are going to make us miss Hitler. Is what this Netanyahu is doing any less than what Hitler did? It is not.”
That catalyzed this response from Netanyahu: “Erdogan, who is committing genocide against the Kurds and who holds the world record for imprisoning journalists who oppose his regime, is the last person who can preach morality to us. The IDF, which is the most moral army in the world, is fighting to eliminate the most abhorrent and brutal terrorist organization in the world, Hamas-ISIS, which has committed crimes against humanity, and which Erdogan has praised and whose leaders he hosts.”
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
Erdogan, who is committing genocide against the Kurds and who holds the world record for imprisoning journalists who oppose his regime, is the last person who can preach morality to us.
The IDF, which is the most moral army in the world, is fighting to eliminate the most…
&mdash; Benjamin Netanyahu &#8211; בנימין נתניהו (@netanyahu) <a href="https://twitter.com/netanyahu/status/1740039502423265747?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 27, 2023</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
Israeli President Yitzchak Herzog added, “I strongly condemn and utterly reject the words of Turkish President Erdogan. In all of human history, the Holocaust stands alone in its horror and enormity, and his words are deeply offensive to every Jew around the world, and to the memory of the millions of Jews who perished at the hands of the Nazis. The command ‘Never Again’ remains an imperative for the State of Israel — the nation state of the Jewish people — which is committed to the safety and protection of every Jew. There is no struggle more just than the war against the terrorist organization Hamas, which brutally and barbarically murdered Jews, as well as Muslims, and those of other faiths and nationalities.”
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
I strongly condemn and utterly reject the words of Turkish President Erdogan.
In all of human history, the Holocaust stands alone in its horror and enormity, and his words are deeply offensive to every Jew around the world, and to the memory of the millions of Jews who perished…
&mdash; יצחק הרצוג Isaac Herzog (@Isaac_Herzog) <a href="https://twitter.com/Isaac_Herzog/status/1740050924037460046?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 27, 2023</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
Israel’s UN Ambassador Danny Danon also had a few words:
<blockquote>
It would be prudent that a leader of a country that committed a heinous genocide against the Armenian people refrain from preaching morality to others. Erdogan has made himself the representative of the Hamas terror organization in Turkey and his statements are entirely disconnected from reality. I would suggest that he stop spouting his hollow slogans and instead show the world how much he actually cares by announcing a concrete number of Gazan families that he is willing to assist by accepting them into his country.
</blockquote>
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-width="500" data-dnt="true">
It would be prudent that a leader of a country that committed a heinous genocide against the Armenian people refrain from preaching morality to others. Erdogan has made himself the representative of the Hamas terror organization in Turkey and his statements are entirely… <a href="https://t.co/Cmz8H1d0rL">pic.twitter.com/Cmz8H1d0rL</a>
&mdash; Danny Danon 🇮🇱 דני דנון (@dannydanon) <a href="https://twitter.com/dannydanon/status/1740020535654801640?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">December 27, 2023</a></blockquote>
<script async src="https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8"></script>
Comparing Israel’s surgical actions in Gaza to the mass genocide perpetrated by Hitler is ludicrous; Hitler led a movement to exterminate all of the Jews in Europe, eventually killing six million of them, including one million children. The Nazis went so far as to claim anyone with any trace of Jewish blood be exterminated, a sentiment regarding killing all Jews that has been <a href="https://www.algemeiner.com/2023/11/21/hamas-threats-to-cut-off-heads-slit-throats-and-slaughter-every-jew-on-the-planet-were-ignored-in-2019/">echoed</a> by the terrorist group Hamas.
Meanwhile, Israel has lost <a href="https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/2023-12-27/ty-article/idf-officer-two-soldiers-killed-in-gaza-fighting/0000018c-a9d9-dbb4-af9f-edf9d3d90000">498 soldiers</a> since the October 7 massacre, a figure roughly equivalent to the United States losing 17,000 soldiers. The Israelis, rather than truly committing genocide by decimating Gaza from the air, have sent their soldiers at the risk of their lives into Gaza to reduce the loss of civilian life.

Bibi

Erdogan Compares Netanyahu To Hitler. Bibi, Other Israeli Officials Strike Back.

Benjamin Netanyahu

Hamas

After Turkish leadership warned that they would crack down on online “disinformation,” several Turkish YouTubers were arrested for interviewing their fellow citizens about the nation’s currency crisis.
Since this time last year, the Turkish lira has lost 50% of its value against the dollar amid policymakers’ unorthodox monetary policies — meaning that citizens are dealing with diminishing purchasing power and widespread price uncertainty.
<a href="https://www.insider.com/turkey-arrests-youtubers-who-ask-the-public-about-finances-2021-12">Business Insider</a> reported:
<blockquote>YouTuber Hasan Köksoy, who runs the YouTube channel Kendine Muhabir (which translates to Self Correspondent), said in a tweet translated to English that he was taken out of his bed &#8220;like a terrorist&#8221; and arrested &#8220;for handing a microphone to the public.&#8221;
Arif Kocabıyık and Turan Kural were also arrested, according to the local news outlet Turkey Purge, which monitors human rights abuses in the country. On their respective YouTube channels, the men have been interviewing people about the nation&#8217;s economy and its impact on their finances. A fourth YouTuber, Mehmet Koyuncu, tweeted that he was not arrested but that police contacted him. 
Turkey Purge reported the YouTubers were accused of &#8220;denigrating the state and government.&#8221;</blockquote>
The arrests follow Turkish leaders’ warnings about crackdowns on social media usage. Business Insider added:
<blockquote>In a recent speech, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan called social media one of the &#8220;main sources of threats to today&#8217;s democracy&#8221; and said he would be cracking down on internet media to &#8220;fight disinformation and propaganda,&#8221; with sentences of up to five years in prison, Al Jazeera reported.
Critics say this could tighten restrictions on free speech. Human rights organization Freedom House&#8217;s 2021 Freedom on the Net report, which analyzes internet freedom worldwide, labeled Turkey as &#8220;not free,&#8221; noting widespread filtering or removal of online content that was critical of the government. 
According to the Stockholm Center for Press Freedom, 72 journalists are currently in prison in Turkey and 89 are awaiting trial.</blockquote>
Erdogan’s crackdown on “disinformation” mirrors the policy of other repressive regimes across the world.
After widespread anti-government protests in Cuba, the island’s communist government <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/cuba-passes-misinformation-law-calling-online-criticism-of-the-government-cyberterrorism">passed</a> legislation treating “misinformation” as “cyberterrorism.” Citizens had been uploading photos and videos of the protests to social media, drawing international attention to the government’s repressive policies. 
Last year, the Chinese Communist Party <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/citing-ccp-influence-biden-warns-americans-about-doing-business-in-hong-kong">enacted</a> the “Hong Kong National Security Law” — which, according to the Biden administration, tightened penalties for “secession” and “subversion.” Despite widespread protests that garnered international attention, the law gutted individual rights for citizens of Hong Kong — and led the Biden administration to warn about the “growing risks” of conducting business in the city.
The Biden administration itself, however, is <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/alarmed-and-suspicious-senators-tell-biden-to-explain-crackdown-on-misinformation">engaging</a> in censorship. White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki said earlier this year that users “shouldn’t be banned from one platform and not others” if they post “misinformation online.” She also revealed that the Biden administration is “flagging problematic posts for Facebook that spread disinformation.”
President Biden also <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/biden-says-these-12-people-are-responsible-for-most-covid-misinformation-never-says-who-they-are">alleged</a> that Facebook is “killing people” by allowing a particular group of users to spread their views about COVID-19.
“These twelve people are out there giving misinformation. Anyone listening to it is getting hurt by it. It’s killing people. It’s bad information,” Biden said. “My hope is that Facebook, instead of taking it personally, that somehow I’m saying Facebook is killing people, that they would do something about the misinformation, the outrageous misinformation about the vaccine.”

Erdogan in Russia

Turkish YouTubers Arrested For Speaking About Rampant Inflation As Nation Cracks Down On ‘Disinformation’

In a call with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on Friday, President Joe Biden told the Turkish leader that he plans to recognize the mass killing and displacement of more than 1.5 million Armenians that occurred over a hundred years ago as genocide, according to a report from <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-04-23/biden-tells-erdogan-he-will-call-armenian-massacre-a-genocide">Bloomberg</a>.
The White House did not discuss the topic of Biden’s potential declaration in a statement regarding Biden’s first call of his term with Erdoğan. The White House <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-04-23/biden-tells-erdogan-he-will-call-armenian-massacre-a-genocide">said</a> that Biden told the Turkish president that he is interested in a “constructive bilateral relationship with expanded areas of cooperation and effective management of disagreements.”
<a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2021/04/23/world/europe/armenia-genocide-turkey-biden.html">The New York Times</a> reported that Biden is set to make the official declaration on Saturday, likely upsetting Turkish leaders like Erdoğan who have pushed back on using the term “genocide” to describe what happened to the Armenians. On Wednesday, <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/biden-poised-to-recognize-armenian-massacres-as-genocide-officials-say-11619048891">The Wall Street Journal</a> reported that officials said Biden is expected to describe the deportation, starvation, and massacres of Armenians at the hands of the Ottoman Turks beginning in 1915 as genocide.
In early 2019, Erdoğan <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-04-23/biden-tells-erdogan-he-will-call-armenian-massacre-a-genocide">reportedly</a> said in a Twitter post that “the relocation of the Armenian gangs and their supporters, who massacred the Muslim people, including women and children, in eastern Anatolia, was the most reasonable action that could be taken in such a period.”
Erdoğan said in a statement Thursday that Turkey &#8220;will continue to defend truths against the so-called Armenian genocide lie and those who support this slander with political motivations,&#8221; <a href="https://www.npr.org/2021/04/23/989915018/what-it-means-for-the-u-s-to-call-the-atrocities-against-armenians-genocide">NPR</a> reported.
<a href="https://cqrcengage.com/aaainc/genocide">The Armenian Assembly of America</a> states that April 24th is the day that the Armenian Genocide is commemorated around the globe. The group includes the importance of acknowledging the massacre as genocide on their website, writing, “Unequivocally affirming the Armenian Genocide would honor the more than 1.5 million Armenians who were massacred. It would also serve to remember this proud chapter in America&#8217;s history of helping to save the survivors. We must remember atrocities to prevent them from occurring again.”
According to the online <a href="https://www.britannica.com/event/Armenian-Genocide">Encyclopedia Brittanica</a>, the Armenian Genocide refers to the efforts to deport and kill massive numbers of Armenian subjects of the Ottoman Empire by the Young Turk government during World War I (between 1914 and 1918). Armenians claim that the campaign was a deliberate venture to destroy the Armenian people and, therefore, was an act of genocide. However, the Turkish government has pushed back on calls to recognize the events in those terms. It has conceded that atrocities occurred, but there was no official extermination policy that was carried out against the Armenians as a unit.
President Reagan was the only president to speak of the devastating events as genocide in a declaration remembering the horrors of the Holocaust. In 1981, President Ronald Reagan <a href="https://www.reaganlibrary.gov/archives/speech/proclamations-april-22-1981">stated</a>, “Like the genocide of the Armenians before it, and the genocide of the Cambodians which followed it — and like too many other such persecutions of too many other peoples — the lessons of the Holocaust must never be forgotten.” Many of Reagan’s successors have made claims that they would recognize the Armenian genocide when they are elected, but none have officially done so. On April 24, presidents have released statements commemorating the day of remembrance, but none since have referred to it as “genocide.”
As reported by <a href="https://www.wsj.com/articles/biden-poised-to-recognize-armenian-massacres-as-genocide-officials-say-11619048891">The Wall Street Journal</a>, at the end of his presidential campaign, Biden’s campaign said that he would “recognize the Armenian genocide and make universal human rights a top priority for his administration so that such a tragedy can never again occur.”
On Armenian Genocide Remembrance Day last year, Biden put out a <a href="https://medium.com/@JoeBiden/statement-by-vice-president-joe-biden-on-armenian-genocide-remembrance-day-78500cb4dd1c">statement</a> regarding the commemoration of the tragedy.
Biden <a href="https://medium.com/@JoeBiden/statement-by-vice-president-joe-biden-on-armenian-genocide-remembrance-day-78500cb4dd1c">stated</a>, “Today we remember the atrocities faced by the Armenian people in the Metz Yeghern — the Armenian Genocide…We must never forget or remain silent about this horrific and systematic campaign of extermination. And we will forever respect the perseverance of the Armenian people in the wake of such tragedy.”
His statement continued, “It is particularly important to speak these words and commemorate this history at a moment when we are reminded daily of the power of truth, and of our shared responsibility to stand against hate — because silence is complicity. If we do not fully acknowledge, commemorate, and teach our children about genocide, the words ‘never again’ lose their meaning. The facts must be as clear and as powerful for future generations as for those whose memories are seared by tragedy. Failing to remember or acknowledge the fact of a genocide only paves the way for future mass atrocities.”

883414A7-53ED-44C0-96E5-79B90DDF12A7_1_201_a

Report: Biden Tells Turkish President Erdogan He Will Recognize Armenian Genocide

Armenians

Biden Administration

Joe Biden

On September 27, a century-old conflict reignited when Armenia’s Muslim-majority neighbor, Azerbaijan, launched an unprovoked military incursion into the ethnic, indigenous-Armenian populated enclave of Artsakh — better known by its Russian-Persian name of Nagorno-Karabakh. The coordinated attack, involving artillery and aerial strikes, targeted civilian settlements, placing the region’s capital Stepanakert in its crosshairs.
According to the <a href="https://armenpress.am/eng/news/1031655.html">latest report</a> from the Defense Ministry of Artsakh, Armenia’s death toll continues to climb, exceeding 604 people. Azerbaijan has not reported on its casualties.
Shortly after the attack began, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey announced his full support of Azerbaijan and their campaign to conquer ethnic Armenian territory, calling for Armenia to withdraw from the disputed region.
Erdogan’s support for Azerbaijan’s attack goes beyond vocal enthusiasm. Since the fighting began, Turkey has armed and deployed <a href="https://english.alarabiya.net/en/News/world/2020/09/29/Turkey-sent-700-to-1-000-Syrian-mercenaries-to-Azerbaijan-Reports">Syrian mercenaries</a> — including Islamic <a href="https://armenpress.am/eng/news/1031734/">terrorists,</a> actions which were <a href="https://www.jpost.com/breaking-news/syrias-assad-says-turkeys-erdogan-main-instigator-in-nagorno-karabakh-644704">confirmed</a> by Syrian President, Bashar Al-Assad. The Turkish state has denied such involvement, despite further photographic <a href="https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/36955/satellite-images-confirm-turkish-f-16-fighters-secretly-deployed-to-azerbaijan">evidence</a> of Turkey supplying Azerbaijan’s air force with F-16 Viper fighter jets.
In an <a href="https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/armenia-azerbaijan-conflict-turkey-drones">interview</a> with one Turkish news channel, Azerbaijani President, Ilham Aliyev praised Turkish drone technology, stating, “Thanks to advanced Turkish drones owned by the Azerbaijan military, our casualties on the front shrunk… these drones show Turkey’s strength. It also empowers us.”
In order to better understand this eruption of violence between Armenia and Azerbaijan, and why it may present an existential threat for Armenia itself, it is important to understand the wider history of this conflict.
The origins of the Armenia-Azerbaijani conflict over Artsakh are rooted in Soviet history, tracing back to the dissolution of the Russian Monarchy in 1917. Shortly after the Bolshevik uprising that ousted the Tsar, Armenia and its neighbors in the Caucasus region – all of whom were previously part of the vast Russian Empire – attained collective independence as a single South Caucus state known as the Transcaucasian Democratic Federative Republic (TDFR). Due to inevitable internal conflicts, however, such independence was short-lived; the TDFR soon divided into the Democratic Republic of Georgia, the Democratic Republic of Armenia, and the Azerbaijan Democratic Republic.
Between 1918 and 1920, three historically Armenian regions in this area (which had also become home to large Turk populations following nomadic Turkic conquests of the Armenian homeland) — Nagorno-Karabakh (Artsakh), Nakhichevan, and Zangezur — became battlegrounds in Armenia’s attempt to regain parts of its ancestral homeland from Azerbaijan’s expansionist grip.
In 1920, the Soviet Union shuffled the regional map yet again. Zangezur remained within Soviet Armenia, while Nakhichevan and Nagorno-Karabakh were placed under Soviet Azerbaijan as “autonomous oblasts.” Some say that this was part of Joseph Stalin’s divide and conquer strategy. However, other scholars claim that the annexation of Nagorno-Karabakh and Nakhichevan to Soviet Azerbaijan recognized the political realities of the day. Turkey had committed the Armenian Genocide and were determined to further weaken what was left of Armenia, and were lobbying the Soviets for generosity in favor of a nation which shared with Turkey a common ethnicity and language, Azerbaijan. Then again, others say that the Soviets favored Azerbaijan’s oil reserves over Armenians’ ancient presence and rich history in the South Caucasus.
Over the next few decades, skirmishes between the Soviet states of Armenia and Azerbaijan stalled, shuddering to a standstill under Soviet rule. However, as the Iron Curtain began to decay in the late 1980s and into the early 1990s, the once frozen dispute over Nagorno-Karabakh began to thaw.
Fearing the fate of Nakhichevan’s Armenian residents — who, under aggressive Azeri rule, had been ethnically cleansed from their indigenous Christian-Armenian homeland — Nagorno-Karabakh pursued confederacy with Soviet Armenia in 1988. However, under Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev’s rigid policies, the region descended into chaos as war broke out between Armenia and Azerbaijan.
When the Soviet Union collapsed just three years later, Armenia and Azerbaijan emerged as newly independent states, with tensions rapidly escalating. Armenia-backed Nagorno-Karabakh (which the native Armenian inhabitants call Artsakh) faced an Azerbaijan aided by mercenaries and volunteers from its Muslim-majority compatriots, Afghanistan and Chechnya, and heavily supported by Turkey, which some believe had a plan of attacking Armenia in 1993.
After the death of tens of thousands of people, and the displacement of many more, Russia successfully mediated a cease-fire in May of 1994. Armenians miraculously won the war, with Artsakh becoming a de-facto republic while also gaining a large “buffer zone” territory which was not part of its Soviet boundaries.
A victim of its geography, Armenia remains nestled between, at best, apathetic neighbors to the North and South: Georgia, who even today refuse to support Armenia against the onslaught of Azeri aggression out of fear for its own sovereignty; and Iran: the Shia-Muslim theocracy which would be hard-pressed to rally behind a Christian nation against another Shia-Muslim state. To its East and West, Armenia lies sandwiched between enemies: Turkey — the nation directly responsible for carrying out a genocide against the Armenian people in 1915 — and Azerbaijan — a nation of indigenous Turks with the same genocidal ambitions.
Except for an unsuccessful attempt by Azerbaijan to enter the region in 2016, a nominal truce between Armenia and the Azeris had remained stable for decades — until now.
Despite fervent pleas from world powers in support of de-escalation or a cease-fire, Azerbaijan, with Turkey’s support and ardor, has been relentlessly pursuing their military campaign against Artsakh, and by extension, Armenia.
Turkey and Azerbaijan are waging their campaign against Artsakh and Armenia on two fronts. On one front, they attack Armenia militarily, seeking to destroy its people and raze its cities. On the second front, they seek to undermine and delegitimize the plight of the Armenian people through the dissemination of propaganda. While <a href="https://surfshark.com/blog/azerbaijan-starts-blocking-media">censoring social media</a> within their own borders, Azerbaijan blurs reality, attempting to paint itself as a feeble victim against some supposed Armenian aggression. Funneling money and influence into the Western world, Azerbaijan and Turkey have succeeded in silencing celebrities such as Sir Elton John and <a href="https://www.latimes.com/entertainment-arts/music/story/2020-10-07/cardi-b-armenia-fundraiser-twitter-apology">Cardi B</a>, both of whom had initially voiced their support for the Armenian people on social media, but later succumbed to surmounting pressure from Azerbaijan and withdrew their statements.
While reams of Turkish propaganda flood social media with misinformation, certain truths cannot be refuted. The indigenously Armenian enclave of Artsakh, with a population of just 150,000 and the Christian, democratic state of Armenia, with a population dwarfed by its diaspora, is outmanned and outgunned by the oil-rich and militarily advanced forces of Turkey and Azerbaijan, with a net population of over 100 million. It is an existential crisis for Armenia: one people descended from the survivors and victims of the 1915 Armenian Genocide is facing annihilation at the hands of a people descended from the very perpetrators of the 1915 Armenian Genocide.
Delivering a speech on the eve of the Second World War and the Holocaust, Adolf Hitler ruminated on the forgotten genocide of the Armenian people, invoking their neglected ruin under the fog of war before embarking on his own campaign of mass-slaughter. It is precisely because history callously forgot the Armenians that today, as the prospect of yet another genocide threatens Armenia, Turkey and their Azerbaijani proxy similarly ponder, “Who, after all, today speaks of the annihilation of the Armenians?”
Harry Khachatrian is a Canadian computer engineer and a contributor at The Daily Wire. Find him on <a href="https://twitter.com/Harry1T6" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?hl=en&amp;q=https://twitter.com/Harry1T6&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1513617344022000&amp;usg=AFQjCNHh2pXFSex2266c4GY1YE3A-Q6Ykw">Twitter</a>.

TURKEY-ARZERBAIJAN-ARMENIA-PROTEST

Violent Conflict Explodes Between Armenia and Azerbaijan. Here’s What You Need To Know.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan converted another historic Christian church into a mosque on Friday, continuing his trend of reverting secularized museums into Muslim houses of worship as they existed under Ottoman rule.
Istanbul&#8217;s Church of the Holy Saviour in Chora, which has been a museum since 1945, was first built in the 4th century as a monastery outside the walls of then-Constantinople, the capital of the eastern Roman Empire. Throughout the centuries, the building was expanded and rebuilt, and most of the present structure dates to the 11th century, according to the <a href="https://www.jpost.com/middle-east/after-hagia-sophia-turkeys-historic-chora-church-also-switched-to-mosque-639465" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Jerusalem Post</a>.
The former church was turned into a mosque when the Ottoman Turks conquered the city in 1453 and plastered over its 14th-century Byzantine <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chora_Church#/media/File:Chora_Christ_south_coupole.jpg" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">mosaics</a> and frescoes, which depict Jesus Christ, the Virgin Mary, and other biblical characters. They were uncovered again when the mosque became a museum.
As the Jerusalem Post reported, Erdogan&#8217;s edict &#8220;did not say when the first Muslim prayers would be held at Chora, or what arrangements would be made for the Christian artworks there&#8221; but noted that the Turkish president&#8217;s recent reopening of the historic <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/after-80-years-as-a-museum-turkey-orders-the-hagia-sophia-become-a-mosque" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Hagia Sophia</a> for Muslim prayers involved concealing Christian images in what was once the largest church in Christendom.
Orthodox Archbishop Makarios, Primate of the Greek Orthodox Church of Australia, released a <a href="https://greekcitytimes.com/2020/08/22/a-message-from-his-eminence-archbishop-makarios-chora-monastery-conversion/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">statement</a> condemning Erdogan&#8217;s action, saying in part:
<blockquote>I was deeply saddened to learn of the decision of the Turkish authorities to convert the historic Chora Monastery in Constantinople into an Islamic mosque. It is a decision that intensifies our frustration and concern, given the recent desecration of the Church of Hagia Sophia, which is the universal symbol of Orthodoxy and Christianity.
Unfortunately, the Turkish political leadership insists on following a path of disrespect for religious monuments of the Orthodox Church but also displays contempt for monuments that constitute a part of the world’s cultural heritage. There are currently more than 3500 mosques in Constantinople. There is no need for another one to be added to the list as most of them are empty.</blockquote>
Makarios went on to describe Erdogan&#8217;s actions as an insult not just to the Orthodox, but to all Christians around the world.
Erdogan has shown intolerance toward religious minorities in Turkey, especially Christians. In 2016, he plunged his country into a diplomatic spat with the U.S. when he imprisoned American pastor Andrew Brunson for two years on trumped-up charges of undermining the government. When Brunson&#8217;s case drew the attention of President Donald Trump, the response from the U.S. shook world markets.
During an interview with the <a href="https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/i-think-were-very-close-freed-pastor-andrew-brunson-urges-young-american-christians-to-prepare-for-persecution" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Washington Examiner</a> upon the release of his <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Gods-Hostage-Persecution-Imprisonment-Perseverance/dp/0801094879" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">memoir</a> last year, Brunson warned that he sees persecution gathering on the horizon for American Christians:
<blockquote>Andrew Brunson elsewhere <a href="https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/pastor-andrew-brunson-astounded-at-the-speed-with-which-the-us-is-imploding-and-predicts-persecution" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/pastor-andrew-brunson-astounded-at-the-speed-with-which-the-us-is-imploding-and-predicts-persecution&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1570992287169000&amp;usg=AFQjCNEDSX2HRxztd3m7cqjPb4OBBwVp6Q">said</a> he has been &#8220;astounded at the speed with which the U.S. is imploding&#8221; and how anti-Christian sentiment has surged during just the few years he was isolated. &#8220;The whole Trump election and everything that happened afterward, I knew very little about it. So when I came back to the states and just started reading and following news, it was just such a contrast to the environment that we had been in even four to six years ago.&#8221;
&#8220;It seems that the culture has become more overtly hostile,&#8221; he said, pinpointing how large corporations are now joining the media and political classes to push positions that often oppose biblical teaching. A segment of elite society has long regarded Christians sneeringly, he said, but opposition is now bubbling up everywhere and &#8220;is now spread to where it&#8217;s more of a grassroots thing that is growing.&#8221;
“There is a turning in our culture that used to have more respect for Christianity, and that is now becoming unpopular,” Andrew Brunson observed, explaining how young people are increasingly rejecting God and religion entirely. &#8220;And Christians are portrayed as being bigots, racist, and basically evil. And so, for someone to stand publicly as a Christian — especially a young person — they&#8217;re going to get a lot of pushback from their peers.&#8221; [&#8230;]
“It is becoming increasingly difficult for people to stand for Jesus publicly, to stand unapologetically for him, to stand for the things that the Bible teaches is true,” Andrew Brunson said. Much of the battle rages over how truth and morality are defined, and he foresees the clashing worldviews leading to a point where Christians in the West might be called to suffer for their faith as he has.</blockquote>
Related: <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/grace-church-cannot-thumb-its-nose-l-a-county-seeks-tens-of-thousands-in-fines-for-pastor-john-macarthur" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">‘Grace Church Cannot Thumb Its Nose’: L.A. County Seeks Tens Of Thousands In Fines For Pastor John MacArthur</a>

Erdogan Hagia Sophia

Turkish President Erdogan Converts Another Historic Christian Church Into Mosque

Christianity

Islam

Religion

Once the spearhead of the Ottoman Empire, Turkey has again risen to prominence — but for all the wrong reasons. Turkey has prevailed as NATO’s worst ally, disrespecting its core tenets as well as its members’ security interests. It has championed terrorism and has ethnically cleansed the Kurds, forcefully <a href="https://foreignpolicy.com/2019/12/16/kurdish-commander-mazloum-abdi-trump-prevent-ethnic-cleansing-kurds-turkey/">displacing</a> 300,000 in northern Syria and purging <a href="https://www.jpost.com/Middle-East/New-sanctions-show-Turkeys-double-standards-on-terror-608376">24</a> Kurdish mayors from office in Turkey. Turkey’s utter disregard for NATO’s <a href="https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/126169.htm">purposes</a> — including collective defense and, arguably, promotion of regional stability — and its terrorism warrant a “cold Turkey” expulsion from NATO.
While the North Atlantic Treaty does not stipulate whether expulsion is an available remedy, it is <a href="https://www.justsecurity.org/66574/can-turkey-be-expelled-from-nato/">likely</a> so. This is because Article 60(b) of the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties — which governs the interpretation of international treaties — <a href="https://www.justsecurity.org/66574/can-turkey-be-expelled-from-nato/">notes</a> that material breaches of a treaty, which can justify grounds for a member’s expulsion, include “the violation of a provision essential to the accomplishment of the object or purpose of the treaty.” According to Just Security, violating NATO’s underlying principles, but more so its “object and purpose,” can amount to a material breach that can <a href="https://www.justsecurity.org/66574/can-turkey-be-expelled-from-nato/">legitimate</a> Turkey’s expulsion.
Turkey deserves expulsion for challenging NATO’s principles, but also for its failures as a purported geopolitical “ally.” In <a href="https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2019/10/turkey-and-nato-troubled-relationship/599890/">1974</a>, Turkey violated arguably NATO’s foremost object and tenet — <a href="https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/topics_110496.htm">Article V</a>, a collective defense provision maintaining that an <a href="https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/126169.htm">attack</a> on any NATO member is an attack on all — by attacking Greece, then a NATO member, over control for Cyprus. Turkey still occupies Cyprus’s north and is the only country to <a href="https://www.cnn.com/travel/article/northern-cyprus-travel/index.html">recognize</a> “the self-proclaimed Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus as legitimate.” This invasion alone, which displaced <a href="https://www.thenationalherald.com/210640/cyprus-turkish-invasion-anniversary-brings-calls-to-resume-unity-talks/">200,000</a> Cypriot-Greeks, can be invoked to initiate Turkey’s expulsion. Turkey has also defied NATO’s founding purposes, to counter de facto Russian <a href="https://history.state.gov/milestones/1945-1952/nato">aggression</a> and <a href="https://www.history.com/topics/cold-war/formation-of-nato-and-warsaw-pact">expansion</a>, by recently procuring a Russian air defense system. Thus, Turkey has demonstrated a dual allegiance to NATO’s historic competitor. Turkey has also undermined <a href="https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/126169.htm">regional stability</a>, <a href="http://syriatimes.sy/index.php/news/regional/45793-libyan-army-spokesman-turkey-transports-a-number-of-daesh-and-jabhat-al-nusra-terrorists-from-syria-to-libya">deploying</a> ISIS and Hayat Tahrir al Sham to fight in Libya, and has refused to aid NATO allies in times of need, denying the U.S. use of the Incirlik Airbase during the Iraq War. A failed NATO ally, Turkey has initiated internal war, has sided with NATO’s historic adversary, and has slighted its allies during key operations.
Turkey’s sponsorship of terror is also overwhelming. In part, this is because Turkey’s prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, has long championed jihadists and fundamentalists like <a href="https://www.memri.org/reports/memri-archives-turkish-president-erdo%C4%9Fans-past-close-relations-afghan-warlord-gulbuddin">Galbuddin Hekmatyar</a>. An “Afghani jihad leader,” “Specifically Designated Global Terrorist,” and “Al Qaeda ally,” <a href="https://www.memri.org/reports/memri-archives-turkish-president-erdo%C4%9Fans-past-close-relations-afghan-warlord-gulbuddin">Hekmatyar</a> offered bin Laden shelter in Afghanistan, and “pledged allegiance to the spiritual leader of the Taliban” to attack American troops. Yet, a young <a href="https://www.memri.org/reports/memri-archives-turkish-president-erdo%C4%9Fans-past-close-relations-afghan-warlord-gulbuddin">Erdogan</a> can be <a href="https://www.memri.org/reports/memri-archives-turkish-president-erdo%C4%9Fans-past-close-relations-afghan-warlord-gulbuddin">found</a> sitting beside Hekmatyar’s feet. Erdogan was also a “<a href="https://ahvalnews.com/muslim-brotherhood/turkey-becomes-biggest-muslim-brotherhood-backer-world">pupil</a>” of Necmettin Erbakan, the founder of Turkish Islamism and Turkey’s former prime minister. <a href="https://www.counterextremism.com/extremists/necmettin-erbakan">Erbakan</a> founded Turkish affiliates of the Muslim Brotherhood, such as the Welfare Party, and has praised Hamas.
Not surprisingly, Erdogan has advanced his masters’ fundamentalism — harboring, exporting, and financing terror. Turkish <a href="https://www.jpost.com/Middle-East/New-sanctions-show-Turkeys-double-standards-on-terror-608376">authorities</a> allow <a href="https://www.counterextremism.com/threat/hamas">Hamas</a> to coordinate attacks from Istanbul, while also <a href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2019/12/17/hamas-plots-attacks-israel-turkey-erdogan-turns-blind-eye/">allowing</a> Hamas officials to “freely” enter “without fear of arrest.” Shortly after hosting Ismail Haniyeh, Hamas’s leader, Erdogan <a href="https://www.timesofisrael.com/barkat-asks-us-to-sanction-turkey-after-report-of-hamas-assassination-plot/">saluted</a> Hamas: “We will keep on supporting our brothers in Palestine.” In fact, ties between Hamas and Erdogan’s Turkey are so <a href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2019/12/17/hamas-plots-attacks-israel-turkey-erdogan-turns-blind-eye/">strong</a> that “Turkish intelligence agents also maintain close contact with [Hamas] operatives.”
Erdogan has also <a href="https://ahvalnews.com/muslim-brotherhood/turkey-becomes-biggest-muslim-brotherhood-backer-world">provided</a> safe haven and funding to members of the <a href="https://www.counterextremism.com/threat/muslim-brotherhood">Muslim Brotherhood</a>, from which <a href="https://www.counterextremism.com/threat/hamas">Hamas</a> emerged. Under Erdogan and his AKP, a Brotherhood-linked political party, <a href="https://ahvalnews.com/muslim-brotherhood/turkey-becomes-biggest-muslim-brotherhood-backer-world">Turkey</a> has become the “biggest Muslim Brotherhood backer in the world,” even outpacing <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/cope-academia-and-think-tanks-must-boycott-qatar">Qatar</a>, and has “been handed … a leading position in the [Brotherhood] movement, due to [its]success.” Having provided a safe haven for dozens of Brotherhood figures, Erdogan has <a href="https://ahvalnews.com/muslim-brotherhood/turkey-becomes-biggest-muslim-brotherhood-backer-world">sheltered</a> “some the movement’s most powerful and influential figures.”
Turkey also <a href="https://www.jpost.com/Middle-East/New-sanctions-show-Turkeys-double-standards-on-terror-608376">safeguards</a> and <a href="http://syriatimes.sy/index.php/news/regional/45793-libyan-army-spokesman-turkey-transports-a-number-of-daesh-and-jabhat-al-nusra-terrorists-from-syria-to-libya">deploys</a> ISIS fighters. According to the head of Iraqi military intelligence, Lt.-Gen. Saad al-Allaq, Turkey currently <a href="https://www.jpost.com/Middle-East/New-sanctions-show-Turkeys-double-standards-on-terror-608376">harbors</a> “nine [of ISIS’s] alleged terror leaders” and “top financiers.” It has become home to ISIS recruitment <a href="https://www.jpost.com/Middle-East/New-sanctions-show-Turkeys-double-standards-on-terror-608376">cells</a>, and is a refuge to which many ISIS members fled after losing territory. In Turkey, ISIS has <a href="https://www.jpost.com/Middle-East/New-sanctions-show-Turkeys-double-standards-on-terror-608376">planned</a> prison breaks and attacks. <a href="https://www.jpost.com/Middle-East/New-sanctions-show-Turkeys-double-standards-on-terror-608376">ISIS</a> procurement agents and ISIS-affiliated companies also operate from Turkey, and Abu Bakr al Baghdadi was found just miles from its eastern border — suggesting that Turkish intelligence likely condoned nearby ISIS activity.
Most shocking, however, has been Turkey’s direct <a href="http://syriatimes.sy/index.php/news/regional/45793-libyan-army-spokesman-turkey-transports-a-number-of-daesh-and-jabhat-al-nusra-terrorists-from-syria-to-libya">deployment</a> of <a href="https://www.almasdarnews.com/article/turkey-is-smuggling-daesh-terrorists-to-libya-lna/">troops</a> from ISIS and <a href="https://www.csis.org/programs/transnational-threats-project/terrorism-backgrounders/hayat-tahrir-al-sham-hts">Hayat Tahrir Al Sham</a>, a Salafi-jihadist group whose predecessor was <a href="https://www.csis.org/programs/transnational-threats-project/terrorism-backgrounders/hayat-tahrir-al-sham-hts">Jabhat Al Nusra</a> (an Al Qaeda affiliate), in the Libyan Civil War. Reinforcing Libya&#8217;s Government of National Accord, which <a href="https://thefederalist.com/2019/08/15/qatar-state-sponsor-terrorism/">Qatar</a> — one of the world’s largest sponsors of terror — also backs, Turkey’s military has also accepted a military <a href="https://www.jpost.com/Middle-East/New-sanctions-show-Turkeys-double-standards-on-terror-608376">escort</a> from Hayat Tahrir al Sham in Syria. Hence, Turkey not only embraces terrorism, but exports it as well.
Turkey’s ties to terror also involve financing, including  “<a href="http://trumanproject.org/home/doctrine-blog/the-gray-list-turkeys-financing-of-terrorism/">indiscriminate funding</a>” to “al-Q[ae]da based groups in the region, specifically those in the Syrian Civil War.” Turkey remains the only NATO country to be <a href="http://trumanproject.org/home/doctrine-blog/the-gray-list-turkeys-financing-of-terrorism/">gray-listed</a> by the Financial Action Task Force (<a href="https://www.fatf-gafi.org/about/">FATF</a>), an intergovernmental body committed to “combating money laundering, terrorist financing and other related threats to the integrity of the international financial system.” Funding, exporting, and harboring terror amongst many groups, Turkey champions terror and warrants long-overdue sanctions.
Through violating its duties as a NATO member, and through its strong affiliations to terrorist groups — Hamas, ISIS, Hayat Tahrir al Sham, and arguably, the <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-designating-muslim-brotherhood-terrorist-josh-hammer">Muslim Brotherhood</a> — Turkey emerges as candidate for the worst NATO ally in the history of the alliance. Having legal grounds to expel Turkey expulsion, NATO must now do so — and it must do so swiftly in order to protect its integrity.
&nbsp;
Jordan Cope is currently a law student at the University of Texas at Austin, where he also completed his undergraduate degree. Having graduated with a B.A. in international relations, Jordan also minored in Middle Eastern studies and can speak Arabic and Hebrew. He has also published research on the security implications of Palestinian foreign aid. He can be followed <a href="https://twitter.com/JordanCope12">@JordanCope12</a>.

Recep Tayyip Erdogan in London

COPE: Expel Erdogan, His Terror, And His Ethnic Cleansing From NATO

Al Qaeda

Europe

Foreign Policy

Islamic State (ISIS)

Middle East

NATO

Radical Islam

Radical Islamic Terror

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s visit to Washington last week was contentious, as a heated debate raged over whether President Donald Trump should meet with the Islamist dictator. Critics questioned the timing of the White House meeting, coming as the Turkish military prosecutes attacks against Syrian Kurdish forces, and remains notorious as the world’s largest jailer of professional journalists.
But one element which was largely ignored in the discussion — and yet might impact Trump’s view of his Turkish counterpart the most — is the outsized role played by Erdogan’s government in meddling in U.S. domestic relations, particularly in his backing of American Muslim groups.
These organizations are among those most vociferously opposed to the president and nearly all his policies — from immigration and border security to moving the U.S. embassy to Jerusalem. These groups also routinely slander the president as a white supremacist.
Working jointly under the banner of the U.S. Council of Muslims Organizations (USCMO), American Muslims groups like the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), the Muslim American Society (MAS), and other domestic Muslim groups “collaborate and coordinate” with the Turkish government, according to researcher Ahmet S. Yahyla in a special report for The Investigative Journal. What is most notable about these organizations is a shared heritage in the Muslim Brotherhood, an international Islamist movement which Erdogan publicly supports.
In the last several years, the link between Turkey’s government and U.S. Brotherhood-linked groups has grown deeper. Both CAIR and MAS have increasingly featured Turkish leaders and topics at their conferences and events. A November 2nd CAIR-Los Angeles event in Anaheim sponsored by Turkish Airlines faced dozens of Kurdish-American protestors angry over the group’s continued support for Turkish persecution of Kurdish minorities. Researchers have pointed out anti-Armenian propaganda being distributed by Turkish-sponsored booths at MAS events.
This collaboration between Turkey and American Muslim Brotherhood was most public in the December 2017 protest against the president’s decision to move the U.S. embassy in Israel to Jerusalem. The USCMO joined the Turkish American National Steering Committee (TASC) — led by Erdogan’s cousin, Halil Mutlu — in denouncing the decision outside the White House.
During the rally, Mutlu declared that Erdogan was, “my president, your president, president of the ummah (the worldwide community of Muslim believers),” as the crowd applauded. According to hacked emails published by Wikileaks and noted in Yahyla’s report, in 2016 TASC was part of a network of Turkish organizations facing investigation by the FBI over questions of foreign influence.
Mutlu came under media scrutiny in October after the Daily Caller publicized that he had made a $1500 donation to the campaign war-chest of Rep. Ihlan Omar (D-MN). Omar, a leading member of the “Squad” of freshman Democrats with whom President Trump has repeatedly tangled on a wide variety of political issues, is a frequent keynote speaker for CAIR and MAS events.
In 2019, Omar, together with fellow “Squad” member Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) and Rep. Andre Carson (D-IN), attended a CAIR-organized event at the Turkish government-affiliated Diyanet Center of America, a massive mosque complex located in Maryland.
Omar has been repeatedly criticized for casting votes favorable to the Turkish government, including as one of only 11 votes against a House resolution recognizing the Armenian genocide, and in vocally opposing sanctions on the Turkish military over allegations of war crimes against the Kurds in Northern Syria.
Omar has also been noted for her frequent denunciations of Turkey and the Muslim Brotherhood’s shared enemies, most notably in her vocal stance against Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates&#8217; joint campaign in Yemen against the Iranian-backed Houthi rebels.  The Intercept recently reported on a meeting held in Turkey between Iranian al-Quds force officers and high-level Muslim Brotherhood leaders wherein the two groups discussed cooperation in Yemen.
Omar’s ties to Erdogan predate her time in Congress. That includes a <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/report-ilhan-omar-met-2017-infamous-islamist-josh-hammer">2017 meeting</a> with the Turkish president in New York during a U.N. conference, while Omar was still a Minnesota assemblywoman.
There is much about Turkey’s recent behavior with which foreign policy, national security, and human rights experts might take umbrage. But these complaints have fallen upon deaf ears, thanks in part to the American public’s fatigue with the Middle East more generally.
But Turkey’s efforts to bankroll American Islamist efforts, including seeking political influence and meddling in the larger domestic agenda of the president, could help spur a broader American rejection of Turkish bad behavior.
&nbsp;
Kyle Shideler is the Director of the Counter-Islamist Grid (CIG), and writes at CounterIslamist.org

Erdogan

SHIDELER: Authoritarian Turkey Utilizes American Islamist Groups For Domestic Political Meddling

CAIR

Ilhan Omar

The enigmatic Gulf emirate of Qatar, which is obscenely wealthy due to its fortuitous location above the world&#8217;s largest natural gas field, has a longstanding problem with Sunni jihadism. The wealthy petrochemical sheikh minority of the <a href="https://dailycaller.com/2019/08/03/qatar-travel-ban-billionaires-slaves-trapped-middle-east/">majority slave state</a> Qatari populace is, along with Recep Tayyip Erdogan&#8217;s Turkey, disproportionately responsible for funding and exporting more radical Sunni Islamism than any other cloistered clerisy the world over. The Qatari ruling class <a href="https://www.meforum.org/57690/ensconced-doha-islamists">proudly hosts</a> Islamist cleric Yusuf Al Qaradawi, the <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-designating-muslim-brotherhood-terrorist-josh-hammer">Muslim Brotherhood</a>&#8216;s de facto global caliph, and has long been the preeminent state <a href="https://www.haaretz.com/middle-east-news/palestinians/.premium-hamas-officials-expect-30-million-transfer-from-qatar-within-several-days-1.7222696">bankroller</a> of Hamas in the Gaza Strip.
Pro-terror network <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-al-jazeeras-disgraceful-holocaust-denying-josh-hammer">Al Jazeera</a> also serves as a state-run Qatari propaganda outfit, and it is the evil bile spewing from Al Jazeera&#8217;s airwaves that led more moderate Sunni Gulf states, such as Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates, to boycott and embargo Qatar in 2017. Counter-jihadist activist David Reaboi <a href="http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2019/feb/17/qatar-a-hospitable-base-for-the-muslim-130932598/">put it well</a> at The Washington Times in February:
<blockquote>Al Jazeera is the world’s most successful, sophisticated and influential state-directed information operation.
It is remarkably aggressive in service of Qatar’s foreign policy interests, which include four key elements: (1) undermining the stability of its neighbors, especially Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates; (2) promoting Islamists like the Muslim Brotherhood in vulnerable, Western open societies; (3) financially and diplomatically supporting violent terrorist groups like Hamas, al Qaeda and the Taliban; and (4) assisting the world’s largest state sponsor of terrorism, Iran, in evading US sanctions as it seeks to develop nuclear weapons.</blockquote>
Now, according to an <a href="https://www.foxnews.com/world/qatar-iran-attack-vessels-intelligence-allies">exclusive Fox News report</a> from this past weekend, Qatar — which, despite alienating its fellow Sunni Gulf states, maintains a cozy relationship with the <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/hammer-iranian-revolution-forty-years-old-stand-josh-hammer">terror-supporting</a> Iranian mullahs — has once again revealed its true colors for the world to see. As reported by Benjamin Weinthal, Fox News obtained a report alleging that &#8220;Qatar had advance knowledge on an Iranian attack on four commercial vessels in the Gulf of Oman in May and may have failed to warn its U.S., French, and British allies.&#8221; In other words, Qatar duplicitously sided with the world&#8217;s number one state sponsor of terrorism over its purported Western &#8220;allies.&#8221;
The only thing that is surprising about such Qatari duplicity is that anyone in the West is still surprised by it. Qatar has long been the proverbial <a href="https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/04/qatar-is-the-weakest-link-in-an-arab-nato/">&#8220;weakest link&#8221;</a> of the Sunni world, utilizing aggressive governmental lobbying, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/04/fashion/qatar-luxury-fashion-national-museum-blockade.html">outlandish flaunting</a> of its petro-infused wealth to sic more A-list politicos onto its dole, and intensive funding of American <a href="https://www.brookings.edu/center/brookings-doha-center/">think tank</a> and higher education institutions to inculcate an insidious pro-Qatar message. As reported by the <a href="https://dailycaller.com/2018/12/16/qatar-georgetown-texas-university/">Daily Caller</a>, Qatar was the number one foreign state funder of U.S. institutions of higher education from 2011 t0 2016 — surpassing some states even hundreds of times its size, such as China.
Weinthal&#8217;s report ought to serve as a much-needed wakeup call for the more sclerotic elements of our bipartisan foreign policy ruling class. That ruling class is oftentimes overly deterred from meaningfully cracking down on Qatar by the U.S. military presence at Qatar&#8217;s Al Udeid Air Base. But it is ultimately myopic to permit our military&#8217;s presence at Al Udeid to pose an impregnable barrier to attempt to rein in this tiny but destructive nation. It is long past time for policymakers and the chattering class alike to arrive at the conclusion that Qatar is not our friend — at all.

Doha, Qatar

HAMMER: Terror-Funding Qatar Once Again Proves It Is Not America’s Friend

Al Jazeera

Iran

Qatar

Saudi Arabia

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan told media Wednesday that he returned a letter from President Donald Trump warning him not to be a &#8220;fool&#8221; and use a partial pullout of the American military to attack Kurdish forces during a &#8220;limited incursion&#8221; into northern Syria.
The Turkish president also took the opportunity at an Oval Office meeting to spread propaganda targeting Kurds, according to <a href="https://www.axios.com/newsletters/axios-am-b8fb6d1a-60e5-4e73-833d-4475b13db7c3.html">an exclusive report from Axios</a>.
Lawmakers from both sides of the aisle &#8212; including Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell &#8212; expressed concern earlier this week, about the White House meeting between President Donald Trump and Erdogan, apparently fearing that the meeting could descend into a bizarre display between the two leaders, but remained hopeful that discussions would be productive.
&#8220;Although I have expressed concerns about granting President Erdogan such an honor in light of his recent actions, I hope the meeting produces better behavior from this important NATO ally,&#8221; McConnell told media Wednesday, <a href="https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2019/11/13/after-syria-attack-trump-welcome-turkeys-erdogan-white-house/2563828001/">according to USA Today</a>. &#8220;I share my colleagues&#8217; uneasiness at seeing President Erdogan honored at the White House.&#8221;
McConnell&#8217;s concerns were, apparently, warranted. During a joint news conference between Trump and Erdogan, Erdogan claimed that he returned a threatening letter from Trump, warning him not to be a &#8220;fool&#8221; or a &#8220;tough guy&#8221; back to the president, undermining American efforts to exert some control over Turkey&#8217;s incursion into Syria.
<a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-11-13/erdogan-says-he-gave-trump-back-letter-warning-not-to-be-fool?utm_campaign=socialflow-organic&amp;utm_source=twitter&amp;utm_content=middleeast&amp;utm_medium=social">Bloomberg News reports</a> that &#8220;[Erdogan] returned the letter during a meeting at the White House earlier on Wednesday.&#8221;
President Donald Trump did not refute the allegation, but said, instead, that he was a &#8220;big fan&#8221; of the Turkish leader.
As the press conference kicked off, however, there were other signs that Turkey might not be listening to American warnings.
&#8220;At the outset of the news conference, Erdogan delivered a more than 10-minute long monologue, a few minutes longer than Trump’s opening remarks, while the U.S. president fidgeted at his lectern,&#8221; Bloomberg continued. &#8220;Erdogan complained about Kurdish forces in Syria allied with the U.S. that he considers &#8216;terrorists&#8217; as well as a Turkish cleric, Fethullah Gulen, whom Erdogan blames for fomenting a 2016 coup.&#8221;
Gulen lives in Pennsylvania, and the United States has repeatedly refused to extradite him to Turkey.
Erdogan&#8217;s diatribe did not end there, however. He also criticized a Congressional resolution recognizing the Armenian Genocide &#8212; blocked Thursday morning by Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) after Graham took a meeting with Erdogan &#8212; and pushed the President to call on a Turkish reporter, whom, it appears, Turkey had placed among the press pool.
“A friendly person from Turkey, friendly,&#8221; Erdogan said, when asked to select a reporter for a question. &#8220;Only friendly reporters. We like to see, there aren’t too many of them around.”
That reporter asked President Trump why he hosted Kurdish leaders at the White House, calling them “terrorists.&#8221;
Trump laughed off the incident, but the question has darker connotations. Erdogan has cracked down on press freedom in his home country, jailing journalists who question his leadership.
Weirder still, Axios reports that during the White House meetings, Erdogan pushed Members of Congress to watch propaganda videos about the Kurdish Army, leaving some legislators confused.
&#8220;An Oval Office meeting with Turkey&#8217;s President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan yesterday took a dark turn when Erdoğan pulled out his iPad and made the group watch a propaganda video that depicted Kurds as terrorists,&#8221; Axios reported. Senators present called the video &#8220;unpersuasive,&#8221; according to the national security news outlet, and legislators &#8220;in the meeting took turns pushing back on Erdoğan, while Trump sat back and watched, intervening occasionally to play traffic cop.&#8221;

Donald Trump Welcomes Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan To The White House

Turkey’s Erdogan Says He Gave Back Warning Letter From President Trump

Kurds

On Wednesday, the United States House of Representatives passed <a href="https://www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-joint-resolution/77/text?q=%7B%22search%22%3A%5B%22actionDateChamber%3A%5C%22116%7CH%7C2019-10-16%5C%22+AND+%28billIsReserved%3A%5C%22N%5C%22+OR+type%3A%5C%22AMENDMENT%5C%22%29%22%5D%7D&amp;r=43&amp;s=1">H.J. Res. 77</a>, titled: &#8220;Opposing the decision to end certain United States efforts to prevent Turkish military operations against Syrian Kurdish forces in Northeast Syria.&#8221;
The resolution, which passed 354 to 60 (129 Republicans voted for the resolution along with 225 Democrats), reads in part:
<blockquote>Whereas thousands of Syrian fighters, including Syrian Kurds, fought courageously with the United States against the brutality of ISIS throughout Syria, liberating nearly one-third of Syrian territory from ISIS’ so-called “caliphate”&#8230;
Whereas Turkey has historically threatened, forcibly displaced, and killed Syrian Kurds, including during military operations in the Afrin District&#8230;
Whereas, during the counter-ISIS campaign in Syria, the SDF captured thousands of ISIS fighters, including foreign terrorist fighters from around the world who pose threats to our allies in the region &#8230; Whereas the SDF has warned the United States and international community that a Turkish incursion into Northeast Syria would significantly decrease the SDF’s ability to combat ISIS and to continue providing security and management for ISIS detainees and their family members&#8230;
Whereas an abrupt withdrawal of United States military personnel from certain parts of Northeast Syria is beneficial to adversaries of the United States government, including Syria, Iran, and Russia: Now, therefore, be it
Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That Congress—
(1) opposes the decision to end certain United States efforts to prevent Turkish military operations against Syrian Kurdish forces in Northeast Syria;
(2) calls on Turkish President Erdogan to immediately cease unilateral military action in Northeast Syria and to respect existing agreements relating to Syria;
(3) calls on the United States to continue supporting Syrian Kurdish communities through humanitarian support, including to those displaced or otherwise affected by ongoing violence in Syria;
(4) calls on the United States to work to ensure that the Turkish military acts with restraint and respects existing agreements relating to Syria; and
(5) calls on the White House to present a clear and specific plan for the enduring defeat of ISIS.</blockquote>
Lawmakers on both sides of the aisle have condemned President Trump’s decision to pull American troops from northern Syria, allowing Turkish forces to move into the area.
On October 6, the White House released an <a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefings-statements/statement-press-secretary-85/">official statement</a>, which noted that following a phone call between Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan and President Trump, &#8220;Turkey will soon be moving forward with its long-planned operation into Northern Syria.&#8221;
The press release went on to state that the U.S. military would &#8220;not support or be involved in the operation.&#8221;
The president defended the move in a tweet: &#8220;As I have stated strongly before, and just to reiterate, if Turkey does anything that I, in my great and unmatched wisdom, consider to be off limits, I will totally destroy and obliterate the Economy of Turkey (I&#8217;ve done before!). They must, with Europe and others, watch over the captured ISIS fighters and families. The US has done far more than anyone could have ever expected, including the capture of 100% of the ISIS Caliphate.&#8221;
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
&#8230;.the captured ISIS fighters and families. The U.S. has done far more than anyone could have ever expected, including the capture of 100% of the ISIS Caliphate. It is time now for others in the region, some of great wealth, to protect their own territory. THE USA IS GREAT!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) <a href="https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1181232251390042118?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 7, 2019</a></blockquote>
During a <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/trump-orders-u-s-forces-withdraw-further-syria-esper-says-n1065516">recent interview</a>, Secretary of Defense Mark Esper stated that approximately 1,000 American troops will be withdrawn from northern Syria. <a href="https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/trump-orders-u-s-forces-withdraw-further-syria-esper-says-n1065516">NBC News</a> reports that according to two U.S. military officials, only 300 troops are set to remain at the al-Tanf garrison located near Syria’s southeast border with Lebanon and Iraq.
The Turkish advance has led to death and chaos in the area.
The <a href="http://www.syriahr.com/en/?p=144050">Syrian Observatory for Human Rights</a> claims that more than 250,000 civilians have been displaced in the days following the Turkish advance, and as many as 71 civilians have been killed.
<blockquote>The death toll among the Syria Democratic Forces, military councils and internal security forces since the start of the Turkish military operation on Wednesday afternoon have risen to 158, while the number of deaths among Syrian factions loyal to Ankara and the pro-Turkey cells killed in the attacks and clashes with the SDF during the same period reached 128&#8230;</blockquote>
The <a href="https://www.apnews.com/7e90fd08a89e49d9bcae6a85a131a64a">Associated Press</a> reports that &#8220;hundreds of Islamic State families and supporters escaped from a holding camp in Syria amid the fighting between Turkish forces and the Kurds.&#8221; The camp is located in the subdistrict of Ain Issa.
Amidst the chaos of the Turkish advance into Syria, there are fears that Kurdish forces currently guarding thousands of ISIS detainees might have to abandon their posts in order to join the fight, possibly giving the detainees room to flee their cages.
During a <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/watch-gen-mattis-says-isis-will-resurge-if-we-dont-keep-the-pressure-on">recent interview</a> with ABC’s &#8220;This Week,&#8221; former Secretary of Defense Gen. James Mattis appeared to echo such fears, saying that &#8220;if we don’t keep the pressure on, then ISIS will resurge.&#8221;
One of President Trump’s loudest critics on this issue has been Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), who, during a Wednesday interview on CBN, said he would become the president’s &#8220;worst nightmare&#8221; if things didn’t change.
&#8220;I am looking to President Trump to change this. I will do anything I can to help him, but I will also become President Trump’s worst nightmare,&#8221; Graham told host Pat Robertson. &#8220;I will not sit along the sidelines and watch a good ally, the Kurds, be slaughtered by Turkey and watch Iran move into Syria and become another nightmare for Israel. This is a defining moment for President Trump. He needs to up his game.&#8221;
Graham added that if the United States pulls out of Syria, the Islamic State (ISIS) will return and Iran will &#8220;take over.&#8221; The Senator then implored Trump to be more like Reagan and less like Obama, and &#8220;stand up to Erdoğan,&#8221; or face losing in 2020.
<iframe loading="lazy" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/Xi2pHRw71VY" width="720" height="385" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen"></iframe>
Also on Wednesday, Trump addressed Graham, <a href="https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/trump-says-lindsey-graham-would-like-to-stay-in-the-middle-east-for-the-next-thousand-years">saying</a>: &#8220;Lindsey Graham would like to stay in the Middle East for the next thousand years with thousands of soldiers and fighting other people’s wars. I want to get out of the Middle East.&#8221;
But Graham isn’t the only Republican lawmaker questioning the president.
Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) has also condemned Trump’s move, saying that while we cannot stay in &#8220;foreign theaters forever &#8230; we still have major national security interests in Syria.&#8221;
The senator stated that ISIS cannot be allowed to regroup, adding:
<blockquote>It would also be DISGRACEFUL if we sat idly by while Turkey slaughters the Kurds, as public reports suggest that Turkish leader Erdogan explicitly told President Trump he intends to do. Kurds risked their lives—for many years—to fight alongside us.
Our enemies and rivals (Iran, Russia, etc.) don’t abandon their allies; if we want allies to stand with America in the future, we shouldn’t either. Honorable nations stand by their friends.</blockquote>
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet">
Our enemies and rivals (Iran, Russia, etc.) don’t abandon their allies; if we want allies to stand with America in the future, we shouldn’t either. Honorable nations stand by their friends.
— Senator Ted Cruz (@SenTedCruz) <a href="https://twitter.com/SenTedCruz/status/1181275477815824384?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">October 7, 2019</a></blockquote>
On Thursday, Sen. Graham and Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-MD) introduced <a href="https://www.lgraham.senate.gov/public/_cache/files/558353c0-2323-4ea1-8545-637af1cbf7e0/graham-van-hollen-turkey-sanctions-bill-outline.pdf">legislation</a> that would severely sanction Turkey as a whole, as well as Turkish leaders specifically.
Graham and Van Holden’s legislation includes sanctions against those who would engage in the sale of military equipment or services with Turkey, and &#8220;prohibits the sale of U.S. defense articles, services, technology, [and] materials to the Turkish Armed Forces &#8230; [as well as] ammunition sales and transfers to the Turkish Armed Forces,&#8221; reads the summary text from Sen. Graham’s website.

Trump and Erdogan.

House Votes Overwhelmingly To Condemn Trump’s Military Pullback In Turkey

Donald Trump

Lindsey Graham

U.S. House of Representatives

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Editor&#8217;s Note: This piece was originally <a href="https://www.investigativeproject.org/8116/turkey-assault-on-kurds-the-silence-of">published</a> by IPT News, the author&#8217;s employer&#8217;s <a href="https://www.investigativeproject.org">site</a>.
A stateless people comprised of a <a href="https://rlp.hds.harvard.edu/faq/kurds-turkey" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://rlp.hds.harvard.edu/faq/kurds-turkey&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1570897649640000&amp;usg=AFQjCNHzOrEz6yyzTXlSLfTiDu3ECJtPiA">large number of Sunni Muslims</a> is being bombarded by a country with an overwhelming military advantage. It&#8217;s the kind of thing that normally has American Islamist groups organizing protests and lighting up social media feeds.
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But this time, the aggressor is Turkey&#8217;s authoritarian leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan — a man who has positioned himself as a defender of Hamas and a patron for Muslim Brotherhood leaders who sought refuge from Egypt&#8217;s military rulers. Erdogan is now bombing Kurdish targets in northern Syria and has sent his troops into the country.
The Kurdish Red Crescent <a href="https://twitter.com/RojavaIC/status/1182372582672289792" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://twitter.com/RojavaIC/status/1182372582672289792&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1570897649640000&amp;usg=AFQjCNEFIYWtAWvjidk90BRQdOHF-L9nAQ">claims</a> there have been at least 11 civilian deaths, including an 11-year-old girl, and an additional 28 wounded. Erdogan&#8217;s invasion <a href="https://www.timesofisrael.com/over-60000-displaced-in-turkish-assault-on-syria-monitor/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.timesofisrael.com/over-60000-displaced-in-turkish-assault-on-syria-monitor/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1570897649640000&amp;usg=AFQjCNG4oTRYIPZLlikC1Fx7ayCfhlVmcw">displaced</a> at least 60,000 people, many of whom have nowhere to go.
American Islamists, normally not shy about Middle East conflicts, are largely silent about Turkey&#8217;s unprovoked bombing of Kurds, Syriac Christians, and Arabs. When Israel has launched defensive operations to stop Hamas and other Gaza-based terrorists from raining rockets on civilians in southern Israel, the same groups are <a href="https://www.investigativeproject.org/4454/latest-palestinian-israeli-conflict-exposes" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.investigativeproject.org/4454/latest-palestinian-israeli-conflict-exposes&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1570897649640000&amp;usg=AFQjCNHnJw50Ni-JgvN3xNnyWgD2C9q1Mw">quick to condemn</a>, organize protests and social media campaigns, and demand U.S. government action.
Kurdish victims fail to generate similar concern. <a href="https://twitter.com/AliAlleile/status/1182046718440939521" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://twitter.com/AliAlleile/status/1182046718440939521&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1570897649640000&amp;usg=AFQjCNHPIM8fMUJyJab-wdVimWvWxsr33Q">Images on social media</a> show Turkish bombing and shelling of civilians all along Syria&#8217;s northern border. Civilians in the town of Kobane, who withstood a 2014 ISIS onslaught, found themselves <a href="https://twitter.com/ChuckPfarrer/status/1182084149215203334" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://twitter.com/ChuckPfarrer/status/1182084149215203334&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1570897649640000&amp;usg=AFQjCNGBTNiowsBzx17nWguro8Rg8NI4YA">under attack</a> Thursday by Turkish artillery.
Turkish artillery hit civilian areas of the northwestern Syrian town of Qamishli — where the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) headquarters is located — on Wednesday and Thursday, Kurdish Twitter sources <a href="https://twitter.com/ypg_bim/status/1182305405394968577" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://twitter.com/ypg_bim/status/1182305405394968577&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1570897649641000&amp;usg=AFQjCNFjeo3nFG6FaFA1kazPOG_iM6ACvg">reported</a>. Video showed <a href="https://twitter.com/quincythepup/status/1182287554898468864" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://twitter.com/quincythepup/status/1182287554898468864&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1570897649641000&amp;usg=AFQjCNHRw8OFHsIqNSGJrUJJLysQ_Ke45Q">explosions</a> in the town and <a href="https://twitter.com/M__Delal/status/1182283912715915264" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://twitter.com/M__Delal/status/1182283912715915264&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1570897649641000&amp;usg=AFQjCNERaEq2Ku4_WjkvzeybA4vHCyIRKg">civilian casualties</a>. Qamishli&#8217;s inhabitants are a mixture of Kurds, who are mostly Sunni Muslim, and Syriac Christians.
An ISIS sleeper cell <a href="https://twitter.com/HogerHamo1/status/1182657755519373314" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://twitter.com/HogerHamo1/status/1182657755519373314&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1570897649641000&amp;usg=AFQjCNHEwXP7WPOfp6gVbZkiLMCOnzaLiw">detonated</a> a car bomb on Friday in Qamishli&#8217;s restaurant district. Casualty figures were not immediately available.
Turkey claims it is conducting an anti-terrorist operation against the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), from which the largest SDF faction the People&#8217;s Protection Units (YPG) descends. But the PKK&#8217;s ideology has moved away from revolutionary Marxism and now supports autonomy within Turkey, American Enterprise Institute scholar Michael Rubin <a href="https://nationalinterest.org/feature/its-time-acknowledge-pkks-evolution-42482" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://nationalinterest.org/feature/its-time-acknowledge-pkks-evolution-42482&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1570897649641000&amp;usg=AFQjCNGD-9YWmFWuq7X9cSrAStXNY74uSA">argued</a> in January. Erdogan initially sought peace with the PKK before turning against it in 2015.
&#8220;To refuse to acknowledge let alone appreciate the evolution of the PKK and to refuse to recognize the achievements and stability of Syrian Kurdish governance against the backdrop of a horrendous civil war not only does an injustice toward the Kurds, but it also signals that in order to achieve their basic human rights, they must fight to the death in Turkey,&#8221; Rubin <a href="https://nationalinterest.org/feature/its-time-acknowledge-pkks-evolution-42482" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://nationalinterest.org/feature/its-time-acknowledge-pkks-evolution-42482&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1570897649641000&amp;usg=AFQjCNGD-9YWmFWuq7X9cSrAStXNY74uSA">wrote</a>.
Turkey&#8217;s offensive has united political voices in the United States, primarily because the Kurds proved to be the only reliable fighting force ally against ISIS. In contrast, Arab militias backed by the West inevitably turned their weapons over to ISIS, al-Qaeda, or other jihadists. Kurdish forces successfully routed ISIS over the past few years with the help of American military advisers and airpower.
Western powers promised the Kurds a state of their own following World War I, but that failed to materialize. Kurds are spread out across Turkey, Syria, Iraq and Iran. The PKK has fought a decades-long war with Turkey for autonomy and self-governance. Kurds are <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/17/magazine/17turkey-t.html?ex=1361854800&amp;en=df64cf85326e2103&amp;ei=5124&amp;partner=permalink&amp;exprod=permalink&amp;mtrref=en.wikipedia.org&amp;gwh=6069AD76255067BD0C21A0601D75C415&amp;gwt=pay&amp;assetType=REGIWALL" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.nytimes.com/2008/02/17/magazine/17turkey-t.html?ex%3D1361854800%26en%3Ddf64cf85326e2103%26ei%3D5124%26partner%3Dpermalink%26exprod%3Dpermalink%26mtrref%3Den.wikipedia.org%26gwh%3D6069AD76255067BD0C21A0601D75C415%26gwt%3Dpay%26assetType%3DREGIWALL&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1570897649641000&amp;usg=AFQjCNG8xzeyJfxRNwgqdQbVc4m5JGhFlA">denied</a> their language and identity by Ankara, which <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-29702440" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-29702440&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1570897649641000&amp;usg=AFQjCNHsKMq04dbLMbK_PM6iUF0L6lj7jw">belittles</a> them as &#8220;Mountain Turks.&#8221;
But American Islamists do little to seek justice for the oppressed Kurdish people. The Council on American Islamic Relations (CAIR) thus far has been silent about Turkey&#8217;s assault. The same is true for the Islamic Society of North America, the Islamic Circle of North America, and American Muslims for Palestine (AMP).
AMP Executive Director Osama Abuirshaid actually defended the invasion.
&#8220;The Turkish military incursion into Syria does not please us as Arabs,&#8221; Abuirshaid <a href="https://www.facebook.com/search/top/?q=osama%20abuirshad&amp;epa=SEARCH_BOX" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.facebook.com/search/top/?q%3Dosama%2520abuirshad%26epa%3DSEARCH_BOX&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1570897649641000&amp;usg=AFQjCNEnZ8kriJ-mA1NI0eMEyifzGmeZGA">wrote</a> on Facebook, &#8220;but Turkey is practically forced to, and it has — to this very day — been the one who stood with the Syrian people the most.&#8221; He claimed Turkey &#8220;is trying to prevent the establishment of a &#8216;Kurdish Israel&#8217; along its southern borders.&#8221;
The leader of the U.S. Council of Muslim Organizations (USCMO) — <a href="https://www.investigativeproject.org/4313/american-islamist-coalition-launches-with-empty" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.investigativeproject.org/4313/american-islamist-coalition-launches-with-empty&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1570897649641000&amp;usg=AFQjCNE6-vD4caA5MrlHKFQsjDfdBUkelA">an umbrella group</a> of &#8220;major national American Muslim organizations&#8221; — also declared support for the Turkish invasion.
&#8220;What a travesty, progressive media wants to protect YPG, a terrorist affiliate of PKK, while innocent Syrians are slaughtered daily! Only Turkey carried the burden to host millions of Syrians and protect them. Who&#8217;s [sic] agenda &amp; interest is served here? We are watching!&#8221; USCMO Secretary General Oussama Jamal <a href="http://archive.is/OKXNM" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=http://archive.is/OKXNM&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1570897649641000&amp;usg=AFQjCNHUP5wvmPOS1EfeJK2FQdxO1WoODg">tweeted</a> on Tuesday.
CAIR-Los Angeles chapter Executive Director Hussam Ayloush was the only CAIR official to speak about the invasion.
&#8220;Dear Western politicians/commentators and sudden experts on Syria, did it occur to you to ask how the 12 million refugess [sic] feel about Turkey establishing a safe zone in Syria that&#8217;s free from Assad and terrorists?&#8221; Ayloush <a href="https://twitter.com/HussamA/status/1182194162084536320" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://twitter.com/HussamA/status/1182194162084536320&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1570897649641000&amp;usg=AFQjCNHFwBBo6Fij8i-nNlDY6u7NViEYjw">asked</a>.
That safe zone involves resettling Syrian refugees from other parts of Syria who live in Turkey, Erdogan said last month in a United Nations speech. Jihadists also reportedly are <a href="https://twitter.com/Raman_Ghavami/status/1182328821984501761" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://twitter.com/Raman_Ghavami/status/1182328821984501761&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1570897649641000&amp;usg=AFQjCNHL2_e1BoQFNTTEeOz0Kv-8Lvv6cw">involved</a> in the invasion force alongside the Turkish standing army.
Last month, U.S. Islamist leaders <a href="https://www.investigativeproject.org/8089/us-islamists-effusively-praise-erdogan-in-new" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.investigativeproject.org/8089/us-islamists-effusively-praise-erdogan-in-new&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1570897649641000&amp;usg=AFQjCNFTwwf5PZX2hlPXPPTp-YH-3m55-w">effusively praised</a> Erdogan. CAIR Executive Director Nihad Awad and former Muslim American Society President Esam Omeish were photographed huddling near the Turkish leader.
Jamal called Erdogan &#8220;a wonderful human-being with patience, love, worries and cares for Muslim ummah.&#8221; Brooklyn Imam Siraj Wahhaj called for Turkey to lead the world&#8217;s 1.6 billion Muslims at an event sponsored by the Turkish American National Steering Committee.
These are the same Islamists who also <a href="https://www.dailywire.com/news/litwin-islamists-are-exploiting-conflict-kashmir-oren-litwin">have been noisy</a> about India&#8217;s revocation of the special status of the territory of Jammu and Kashmir.
&#8220;We have to reject Hindu supremacy and assert that if India wants to be a democracy, it has to live up to the standard of a democratic state,&#8221; AMP Chairman Hatem Bazian <a href="https://www.facebook.com/iphobiacenter/videos/vb.262202317276845/2187568438015157/?type=2&amp;theater" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.facebook.com/iphobiacenter/videos/vb.262202317276845/2187568438015157/?type%3D2%26theater&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1570897649641000&amp;usg=AFQjCNFknlOY-mVB2iJciEdvCTdyUa424Q">said</a> at a September 29 rally on Kashmir posted on AMP&#8217;s Facebook page. &#8220;India has become one of the largest purchasers of weapons. Supremacy is always used as militarism in a way that&#8217;s used to assert its right to rule. India has been spending massively. When we say that we are for peace and for justice, we are against weapons of mass destruction, against using nationalism as a way to kill and separate people.&#8221;
Bazian has made no mention of the Turkish invasion.
The SDF, which consists of Kurds, Arabs, and Syriac Christians, bent over backwards to convey to Turkey it was not a threat. SDF soldiers <a href="https://www.militarytimes.com/flashpoints/2019/09/03/us-backed-syrian-kurds-to-remove-fortifications-from-turkish-border-as-part-of-safe-zone-deal/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.militarytimes.com/flashpoints/2019/09/03/us-backed-syrian-kurds-to-remove-fortifications-from-turkish-border-as-part-of-safe-zone-deal/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1570897649641000&amp;usg=AFQjCNGiXXnd4sdJzg2lddtQvDTMK8hWSQ">pulled back</a> from defensive positions along the Turkish-Syrian border in the weeks leading up to the invasion.
None of it was enough for Erdogan, who is determined to strike out at the very people who helped defeat ISIS. Apparently, that&#8217;s just fine with American Islamists.
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John Rossomando is a senior analyst at the <a href="http://www.investigativeproject.org/">Investigative Project on Terrorism</a>.

ROSSOMANDO: U.S. Islamists Are Silent About Erdogan’s War Crimes in Syria

Syria

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