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November 30, 2008
Terror In The Name of Islam, Once More
[Originally published in Hürriyet Daily News]
It has become tough to watch the global breaking news as a Muslim. Once in a while a bomb goes off, or gunmen fire their weapons, in some part of the world killing innocent people. And the people who do this butchery very often act in the name of Islam. For a more than a billion Muslims who, like me, think that human life is sacred and invaluable, this evil committed in the name of our faith is a big disgrace.
The recent attack on Mumbai, the financial capital of India, once again gave me that feeling of shame.
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Posted by Mustafa Akyol at 4:42 AM | Comments (11)
November 27, 2008
Deluding The Americans about The Anti-Americans
[Originally published in Hürriyet Daily News]
Soner Çağaptay is a senior fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy. He is also a prolific author, whose commentaries about Turkey appear quite frequently in prestigious newspapers and magazines. When you read them, you can’t help but sense what appears to be his strong political orientation against the Justice and Development Party, or AKP, which has governed Turkey since 2002. The takeaway message, it seems, is that the AKP is perilously Islamist and is taking the country away from its secular principles. The second message is that Mustafa Kemal Atatürk and his authoritarian “single party” regime is the best thing that ever happened to the Turks.
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Posted by Mustafa Akyol at 4:32 PM | Comments (5)
November 21, 2008
There Is A God. So Stop Worrying and Enjoy Your Life
[Originally published in Hürriyet Daily News]
My column neighbor Burak Bekdil, with whom I often disagree, had an interesting piece last month titled “I give up... No Panama hats or alcohol!” By using sharp examples and witty stories, he was basically questioning the level of acceptance that religious-freedom-seeking Turks are ready to grant to those who seek freedom from religion.
“I am not an atheist, but I am very curious...,” he was asking, “...would the Istanbul Municipality agree to run ads on its buses that would read, ‘There is probably no God. Now stop worrying and enjoy life'?”
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Posted by Mustafa Akyol at 10:37 PM | Comments (5)
November 20, 2008
The Turkification of Turkey
[Originally published in Hürriyet Daily News]
Turkey’s Defense Minister Vecdi Gönül made the headlines recently with his remarks on the history of the country’s nation-building process. "One of the great achievements of Atatürk... is the population exchange between Greece and Turkey," he said, speaking at the commemoration of the death of the country’s founder. "Could Turkey be the same national country had the Greek community still lived in the Aegean or Armenians lived in many parts of Turkey?"
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Posted by Mustafa Akyol at 5:29 PM | Comments (1)
November 16, 2008
Why Atatürk Became a God
[Originally published in Hürriyet Daily News]
In recent years, the more moderate and reasonable Kemalists are asking themselves a curious question: How in the world has Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, Turkey’s founder, who devoted himself to fighting "dogmatism" become a dogma himself? How has such a bold champion of "science and reason" turned into the symbol of a rigid, irrational, insensible ideology that impedes the country’s progress, including its candidacy for the European Union?
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Posted by Mustafa Akyol at 8:00 PM | Comments (0)
November 13, 2008
A Heretical Idea: Atatürk is No God
[Originally published in Hürriyet Daily News]
Since its release on the anniversary of the Turkish Republic, Oct. 29, Turkey’s pundits have been hotly debating “Mustafa,” a documentary by Can Dündar, columnist for daily Milliyet and popular voice of the moderate left. The Mustafa in question is Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, Turkey’s founder, the film intends to show his “human side,” often neglected or even hidden in modern Turkey.
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Posted by Mustafa Akyol at 3:29 PM | Comments (10)
November 7, 2008
The Obama Nations
[Originally published in Hürriyet Daily News]
WASHINGTON - In his recent book, “The Obama Nation,” conservative pundit Jerome Robert Corsi was criticizing the growing popularity of the then Democratic presidential candidate. If he wants to keep on, he might now consider writing a sequel: “The Obama Nations.” For now not just millions of Americans, but also billions of foreigners are inspired by the hope that the African-American president-elect spreads.
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Posted by Mustafa Akyol at 2:48 PM | Comments (2)
November 5, 2008
The Right Man at The Right Time
[Originally published in Hürriyet Daily News]
WASHINGTON – On the very last night of his tireless, 21-month-long campaign for the presidency, Senator Barack Obama, who is now appropriately termed “President-elect,” spoke to a huge crowd in Manassas, Virginia. In a vast open field, he found almost 100,000 people who had been waiting for hours to hear his voice. And I was among them.
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Posted by Mustafa Akyol at 4:32 PM | Comments (0)
November 3, 2008
The Campaign of Change and Hope
[Originally published in Hürriyet Daily News]
VIRGINIA - The young African-American lady at the national headquarters of the Democratic Party in Washington DC is like a commander in chief. As groups of young and dedicated supporters of Barack Obama line up in front of her booth, she gives them orders to follow. “You need to go all the way to Richmond,” she says to a group of five, “Barack needs you there.”
This is one of the hundreds of spots throughout the United States at which Obama supporters are organized for “canvassing,” i.e., door to door lobbying for the presidential elections. Other presidential candidates, including Obama’s rival John McCain, have used canvassing too, but many political commentators agree that the Obama campaign has been the most efficient one in American political history in rallying and organizing so many people on such a big scale.
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Posted by Mustafa Akyol at 4:42 PM | Comments (0)
November 1, 2008
Footnotes To History From 'Turkey's Kissinger'
[Originally published in Turkish Daily News]
WASHINGTON – The U.S. capital is very cold these days, but its politics are as hot as they can be. In just 72 hours, the world’s only superpower will elect its new leader and the presence of this historic election is felt everywhere. Whether America will continue with Bush politics, in the mantle of McCain-Palin, or make a fresh start with Barack Obama, is the top question on almost everybody’s minds.
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Posted by Mustafa Akyol at 6:47 PM | Comments (2)
