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February 28, 2008
The Kurdish question: The Achilles' Heel of Turkey
[Originally published in Turkish Daily News]
What strikes me these days is not the bold effort the Turkish military is taking against the terrorists of the PKK (Kurdistan Workers Party) in the mountains of northern Iraq. From a Turkish perspective, it is a necessary case of a the-best-defense-is-offense type of operation – something that we are used to. What I find really striking is what took place within our own borders: While our armed forces were cracking down Kurdish separatists, thousands of sympathizers of those separatists demonstrated in the streets or Diyarbakır and Van to denounce “the Turkish onslaught.”
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Posted by Mustafa Akyol at 10:13 AM | Comments (4)
February 23, 2008
The Greatest Turkish Story Ever Sold
[Originally published in Turkish Daily News]
A very informative piece appeared on these pages last week under the title “Decision to abolish headscarf ban hurts Turkey internationally.” Its writer, Dutch commentator Michael van der Galiën, nicely summarized how Europeans like him see this country. “We often think that the majority of Turks are overly religious,” he wrote, “but that they are kept in check by a modern elite.” He added that his fellow Europeans worry that “this elite cannot control these masses much longer,” and fear that “Islamists will take over and the European Union will have a massive problem.”
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Posted by Mustafa Akyol at 10:15 AM | Comments (4)
February 21, 2008
Has The AKP Unveiled Its 'Real Face'?
[Originally published in Turkish Daily News]
A popular line in the Turkish media these days is that the incumbent AKP (Justice and Development Party) unveiled its “real face” by trying to set the veil free in universities. "We knew that these guys were Islamists," some commentators say, "and lo, they are trying to put the headscarf into the campus!"
But why in the world the AKP shouldn’t try to set the headscarf free? Were they supposed to make reforms that would benefit everybody but the conservative Muslims?
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Posted by Mustafa Akyol at 9:31 AM | Comments (3)
February 20, 2008
The Surge Worked In Iraq—and Turkey Is Happy About It
[Originally published in Turkish Daily News]
When U.S. President George W. Bush announced his surge strategy in Iraq, which was based on an increase in the number of American troops deployed in Baghdad and Anbar provinces, on January 10, 2007, very few people were optimistic about its success. Well, I was among that minority. I had never been a supporter of the war, but had also believed that, once it started, the United States should not go home without leaving behind a stable Iraq.
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Posted by Mustafa Akyol at 4:35 PM | Comments (0)
February 15, 2008
The (Turkish) Doctrine of Pre-Emptive Intolerance
[Originally published in Turkish Daily News]
Proverbs are sometimes a good way of getting a sense of a nation's culture. You can especially learn many things about Turkey by looking at it popular maxims. One of them is particularly important vis-à-vis the political mindset. It is short and beautifully simple: “If you give your hand,” it warns, “then you will lose your arm.”
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Posted by Mustafa Akyol at 2:58 PM | Comments (5)
February 9, 2008
Celebrating Turkey's ‘Counter-Revolution' (aka Democracy)
[Originally published in Turkish Daily News]
These days it has become a mantra among secularists that the lifting of the headscarf ban amounts to a "regime change." Even fellow TDN columnist Mr. Yusuf Kanlı, a most reasonable and articulate voice in that camp, was quite strong about this in his piece the other day. "Turkey is facing," he argued, "the most important counter-revolutionary attempt in the republican era."
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Posted by Mustafa Akyol at 9:52 AM | Comments (8)
February 7, 2008
A Politically Incorrect Q&A on The Headscarf
[Originally published in Turkish Daily News]
You must have noticed that allowing university students to wear headscarves on campus is a very controversial topic in Turkey. The proponents of the ban argue that it will be beginning of the end of the secular state. Some portray it as the victory of “dogma” over “reason.” I, instead, think that it is a step toward a more liberal and democratic Turkey. To explain why, I decided to present a little Q&A. Here we go...
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Posted by Mustafa Akyol at 9:13 AM | Comments (2)
February 3, 2008
How Atatürk's Church Became an Ultra-Nationalist Base
[Originally published in Turkish Daily News]
Any quick history of Turkey's founder, Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, will surely include the institutions he created, from İş Bank to Ankara University to the ideology that bears his name. But who knew the story of the little church that he created until it found itself entangled in the alleged ultra-nationalist criminal gang called “Ergenekon”?
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Posted by Mustafa Akyol at 11:00 AM | Comments (10)
February 2, 2008
Nutty Professor Asks For Atheist Tyranny
[Originally published in Turkish Daily News]
I have long used the term “secular fundamentalism” to define the self-styled laïcité of the Turkish Republic. This authoritarian system imposes secularity, a worldview and lifestyle devoid of religion upon its citizens by using state powers. It is the mirror image of religious fundamentalism, which, conversely, imposes religion. In both models, the state has a self-declared ideology, and it tries to shape its citizens according to this dogma. It wants to recreate them in its own image.
In Turkey most secular fundamentalists would shy away from putting this so bluntly. But there are some brave figures who don't mince words.
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Posted by Mustafa Akyol at 11:03 AM | Comments (5)
