This Week, Turkey Went a Long Way Toward Becoming an Islamic Republic
“My people are going to learn the principles of democracy, the dictates of truth, and the teachings of science. Superstition must go. Let them worship as they will, every man can follow his own conscience provided it does not interfere with sane reason or bid him act against the liberty of his fellow men.” — Mustafa Kemal Atatürk
Hardly surprising, deeply upsetting, and geostrategically catastrophic, it’s official. Turkey has now passed over towards being an Islamist state. That turning point is marked by a tiny event of gigantic importance.
Fazil Say is an internationally acclaimed Turkish classical pianist. He has performed with prestigious symphony orchestras such as the New York Philharmonic, Berlin, Israel Philharmonic, France, and Tokyo, and is a European Union cultural ambassador. The Turkish state is now going to put him on trial, as an Istanbul court has accepted the prosecutor’s charge, which amounts to heresy. Specifically: he is accused of insulting Islam because of tweets he sent.
Say suggested that since the Koran says there are rivers of drinks in heaven, that makes it sound like a pub, while the beautiful women available there make it sound like a brothel. A number of his tweets are quoted here. That’s his crime — writing a couple of sentences to describe his thoughts.
We are not talking of someone criticizing Say or disagreeing with him. We are talking about the power of the Turkish state being used to charge a man with a crime and to send him to prison for exercising free speech. True, they are only asking for a sentence of eighteen months in prison, but once the precedent is set their ambitions will expand.
There are already hundreds of political prisoners in Turkey today who have been in prison for over three years without any trial. Now, if criticizing Islam in Turkey is a crime, Turkey is not a secular state. And with all of those innocent people already thrown in jail by the regime on trumped-up charges of treason and terrorism, Turkey is no longer a democratic state, either. (For a study of the conspiracy charges — actually a wave of repression and intimidation seeking to quell opposition to Turkey’s fundamental transformation — see this detailed article by Gareth Jenkins in MERIA Journal.)
This is the country that the Obama administration views as a role model for other Muslim-majority countries. In fact, though, Turkey is going down the same road of repression. In Saudi Arabia, a young man was recently indicted, extradited back from Malaysia, and put on trial for a similar offense. But we know where Saudi Arabia stands. Islamists in Egypt wanted to do the same to a leading Christian businessman for posting a picture of Mickey and Minnie Mouse in “Islamic” garb.
They acted too soon, while the military is still in power. Let them try it again in a few months.
The military/economic assistance accorded to the Turks since the 1980′s by Israel and its supporters has proved myopic to sat the least…
A word of friendly advice from a regional old timer professor: Don’t set things up in Azerbaijan the same way, other wise in twenty years, you will be writing today’s article for Azerbaijan as well.
Any chance of a military coup, or have the purges made that impossible now too?
Unfortunately it seems the military has decayed form within!
“The only thing that would save Turkey is if the current regime gets voted out of office before things go beyond a point of no return, and such an electoral defeat is not on the horizon.”
Erdogan has gone from strength to strength because the demographics are in his favor. (Economic growth based on borrowed money hasn’t hurt him either.) The seculars and liberals of Turkey’s western regions are having smaller families than the more Islamic “conservatives” that predominate in the center and east of the country. So the imbalance is growing. But in another generation yet another demographic transformation will be undeniable, for Turkey’s ethnic KURDS are reproducing at higher rates than ethnic TURKS.
“for Turkey’s ethnic KURDS are reproducing at higher rates than ethnic TURKS.”
I fully expect the Turks will exercise their Armenian option to forestall that outcome.
This is a very racist remark. I as an ethnic Turk have many non-racist Armenian friends. I won’t get into what happened to MY family during those times, but to state that all Turks are in favour of violent solutions is at least as Racist as Hitler’s remarks on the Jews.
Regarding the GAST ARBEİTER remark by somebody who’s evidently German:
1. Turkey should not join the EU because the EU is a failed attempt to bring harmony and peace to those who nearly destroyed the world 60 years ago. You would fair better with Greece…
2. The Gast Arbeiter have not adjusted to the Germany way of life because Germany actively pursued a policy of alienating the Turks in order to prevent them from staying long term in the first place (I know because I witnessed it). Only after it became evident that they were not “disposible” (Germans are Germans, one war doesn’t change their way of thinking) have they started the rhetorics of assimilation (something which for some reason they see as a racist act in other contries but endorse in their own)…
So what if Turkey becomes an Islamic state? I am hoping that a second term Obama engineers a US-Turkish-Iranian alliance against Israel
What an absolute scumbag…
Not especially erudite, but you don’t deserve more.
And you would want that why? Do you want more Islamic terrorist scumbags on this planet because that is what that kind of an attack would do? In fact, the Islamic terrorist scumbags would be the ones from Iran instigating such an idiotic and irrational attack. Such an attack on Israel would likely bring the downfall of ALL civilization, period, because than there’d be NO ONE to stop Islamic terrorist scumbags to come after the rest of the world if Israel were to actually fall, especially if America were to be allied with those Islamic terrorist scumbags as you apparently want America to be. Get a clue, please.
Turkey is pretty much the case in point that proves GWB’s policy of advancing “freedom” wrong.
Given the choice, the people of the Middle East want Islamism and Shariah Law, not “freedom”.
Who knows if that will be the case 50 years from now but in the meantime we have to put up with this crap.
You may be right, but Turkey is not the example. Remember Turkey was pulled headlong into the Western world internally, not by external forces. One wonders whether not letting them in the EU was prescient or a blunder.
Christian missionaries have known the trend for years, liberal muslims are probably in denial that the wind of Islamo-Fascism will not blow on them very soon.
Bush was right on that. Where he was wrong was on the Religion of Peace thing: he should have had very clear in his mind that Isklam was evil and dangerous (something Jefferson figured by doing something as simple as reading the Koran) and set as the long term objective to have Muslims abandoning Islam in droves and as the short term ione to split the Muslim world and specially increase the tensions betweens Arabs and non-Arabs. As überherrensvolk the Arabs have more incentives to remain Muslim so they will be a tough nut to crack while by playing on resentment about Arab arrogance or islamic supression of local cultures it could lead to rejection of evrything Arab and specially Islam.
Instead, within weeks of the Taliban leaving Kabul the administration was inviting Gulf companies to particupate in the reconstruction of Afghanistan. We had former Taliban telling of Al Quaida people rapting Afgahan women and how they had fought them and instead of seizing the opportunity to show Al Quaida we were reintroducing the fox between the hens. Another example: a couple of years later an Afghan working in the Gulf was tortured and murdered by his employer. He was frealeased because of “lack of evidence”. He had had the whole scene filmed and he was been released on “lack of evidence”. Of course we did nothing for Afgahans knowing about it. Or for TV anchors asking why the Hadj has such abusive prices making it a major loss of revenue for piss-poor countries like Afgahanistan or Bangla Desh and a highly profitable business for Saudi Arabia. Sooner or later tresentment about price would have translated about resntment about the Hadj. But the Bush administration did nothing about it because it never understood that the enemy was not AL Quaida but Islam.
Those were not even Fazıl Say’s own words, he was quoting Omar Khayyam!
“We are talking about the power of the Turkish state being used to charge a man with a crime and to send him to prison for exercising free speech.”
“Great” Britain is doing the same thing and to a woman no less.
http://www.dianawest.net/Home/tabid/36/EntryId/2133/Liberty-Lost.aspx
“Back in 2001, Britain’s political parties signed a fantastic pledge. They agreed to say nothing to “stir up racial or religious hatred, or lead to prejudice on grounds of race, nationality or religion.”
This gag order did more than keep the parties polite. Vital issues – from massive immigration and multiculturalism to their eradicating effects on British civilization – were officially banned. Thus, such concerns became impermissible thoughts. Not that such issues weren’t already thoughtcrime, as George Orwell would have put it. But this unprecedented pledge turned “violators” into political lepers.
I thought of that elite code of cowardice this week when a London judge sentenced a 42-year-old British secretary named Jacqueline Woodhouse to 21 weeks in jail. Her crime? An expletive-laden rant about immigration, multiculturalism and the disappearance of British civilization. Not in so many words. But that was the unmistakable gist of Woodhouse’s commentary one January night on the London Underground.”
“He [that would be Muhammad, the founder of Islam and Islam's "Perfect Man"] declared undistinguishing and exterminating war, as a part of his religion [that would be Islam, not "Islamism", nor "Radical Islam", nor "Islamofascism", nor "Hijacked Islam", but ISLAM!], against all the rest of mankind.” (John Quincy Adams)
My friend writes me it’s from “Unsigned essays dealing with the
Russo-Turkish War, and on Greece”. (John Quincy Adams)
“In the seventh century of the Christian era a wandering Arab, of the lineage of Hagar, the Egyptian, combining the powers of transcendent genius with the preternatural energy of a fanatic and the fraudulent spirit of an impostor, proclaimed himself as a messenger from Heaven, and spread desolation and delusion over an extensive portion of the earth. Adopting, from the sublime conception of the Mosaic law, the doctrine of one omnipotent God, he connected indissolubly with it the audacious falsehood, that he was himself his prophet and apostle. Adopting, from the new revelation of Jesus, the faith and hope of
immortal life, and of future retribution, he humbled it to the dust by adapting all the rewards and sanctions of his religion to the gratification of the sexual passion. He poisoned the sources of human felicity at the fountain, by degrading the condition of the female sex, and the allowance of polygamy; and he declared undistinguishing and exterminating war as a part of his religion against all the rest of mankind. The essence of his doctrine was violence and lust; to exalt the brutal over the spiritual part of human nature….While the merciless and dissolute dogmas of the false prophet shall furnish motives to human action, there can never be peace upon the earth, and good will towards men.”
Was it not JQ Adams that issued the troops to “the shores of Tripoli” or was that Jefferson?
Jefferson.
Barbary Wars during Jefferson’s presidency. Barbary Pirates were an earlier version of the idiots today off the coast of Somalia, taking hostages and collecting, reportedly, egregious ransoms. Plus ça change…
In March 1785, Thomas Jefferson and John Adams went to London to negotiate with Tripoli’s envoy, Ambassador Sidi Haji Abdrahaman (or Sidi Haji Abdul Rahman Adja). Upon inquiring “concerning the ground of the pretensions to make war upon nations who had done them no injury”, the ambassador replied:
“It was written in their Koran, that all nations which had not acknowledged the Prophet were sinners, whom it was the right and duty of the faithful to plunder and enslave; and that every mussulman who was slain in this warfare was sure to go to paradise. He said, also, that the man who was the first to board a vessel had one slave over and above his share, and that when they sprang to the deck of an enemy’s ship, every sailor held a dagger in each hand and a third in his mouth; which usually struck such terror into the foe that they cried out for quarter at once.”
First Barbary War
“”How dreadful are the curses which Mohammedanism lays on its votaries! Besides the fanatical frenzy, which is as dangerous in a man as hydrophobia in a dog, there is this fearful fatalistic apathy. The effects are apparent in many countries. Improvident habits, slovenly systems of agriculture, sluggish methods of commerce, and insecurity of property exist wherever the followers of the Prophet rule or live. A degraded sensualism deprives this life of its grace and refinement; the next of its dignity and sanctity. The fact that in Mohammedan law every woman must belong to some man as his absolute property – either as a child, a wife, or a concubine – must delay the final extinction of slavery until the faith of Islam has ceased to be a great power among men. Individual Moslems may show splendid qualities. Thousands become the brave and loyal soldiers of the Queen; all know how to die; but the influence of the religion paralyses the social development of those who follow it. No stronger retrograde force exists in the world. Far from being moribund, Mohammedanism is a militant and proselytizing faith. It has already spread throughout Central Africa, raising fearless warriors at every step; and were it not that Christianity is sheltered in the strong arms of science – the science against which it had vainly struggled – the civilization of modern Europe might fall, as fell the civilization of ancient” Rome.
Winston Churchill, 1899
It will be interesting to know if the EU once it has achieved full power over the member states will go ahead with the merger with Turkey. Welcome to hell.
As we watch Turkey return to Islamism, whatever that is, a good question to axe is: why? The answer is in the holy scriptures themselves, the Ko-Ran, the Hah-Deaths and the sacralized histories. The various codes of the Sharia, and Islam’s awful 1,400 yr history are sourced from inside the scriptures. Moslems regard the Ko-Ran as written, the veritable word of God, that cannot be expanded, shrunk or changed in any way by mere humans.
Islam is at its basis a corrective belief system predicated on the assumption that other religions got it wrong, and God is enraged by that, and the duty of every Moslem is to help fix the mistake. That’s why all the Moslem violence, which has run unbroken since about 623 AD, and shows no sign stopping, now or ever.
That’s why the terrible contents of the scriptures and the facts of the 1,400 history are seldom publicly discussed. Infidel people are scared. And well they should be.
I am wondering how much longer it will be before Turkey leaves NATO? The Turks have not been good NATO allies recently because of their anti-American positions on almost everything, from Israel to Iran. And I will never forgive the Turks for when we were going to invade Iraq in 2003 and they refused to let our troops pass through Turkey into Iraq. This was a very low blow and certainly no act of friendship from a NATO ally. And with the Soviet Union gone and with the United States building up its own relationships with former Soviet republics, there is no real need to have Turkey in NATO if it doesn’t want to be there and is an unreliable ally. Just shows you that all Muslim countries eventually turn away from the West to re-claim their Islamic roots. Which is why no Islamic country will ever be a major world power. Even Saudi Arabia would be nothing if it wasn’t for their oil. As we have seen time and again, any nation that embraces Islam and Sharia Law above all else and is determined to shut out ideas from the rest of the world is doomed to failure.
Say suggested that since the Koran says there are rivers of drinks in heaven, that makes it sound like a pub, while the beautiful women available there make it sound like a brothel.
I thought it was “rivers of wine” in the Koran, which is, ironically enough, in sharp contrast to modern Islam’s prohibition against alcohol.
I guess that’s the ugly translation thing again, “scholars” debating whether it is white raisins or virgins.
I thought you reclined on bejeweled couches and were waited on by virgins (or raisins) who re-hymenated overnight.
Doesn’t one of the Sura allow sex during Ramaden (whew!) and another grant Mohammed permission to have sex with his adopted (or foster) son’s wife?
Allah seemed focused on facilitating Muslims’ sex life, in the current life and in the afterlife.
Islam is a misogynistic, anti semitic, Arab supremacist, hate and death cult obsessed with sex. Read the Koran its all in there. Unlike the Bible which is a largely historical book and written by men in praise of God and is ‘descriptive’. The Koran claims for itself and Muslims claim it to be the ‘Actual and UNALTERABLE’ words of their God. The Koran lays down a cradle to grave rigid and PRESCRIPTIVE set of rules including rules on ‘How to Beat your WIFE’ and ‘How to treat your SLAVE’ and ‘How to wipe your Ass using the correct number of stones’ and as the ACTUAL and UNALTERABLE word of their Satanic God therefore leaves no scope whatsoever for REFORMATION. It is also claimed to be for ‘ALL men for ALL time’ so playing the ‘historical’ card as an excuse as Muslims always try to do just does not hold up.
“This week, Turkey went a long way towards becoming an Islamic Republic”
Applied to Iran or Turkey’s current turn from the enlightened thinking of an Ataturk, “Islamic Republic” seems like an oxymoron.
I had a turkish roommate who carried a framed picture of ataturk in her luggage. as soon as she unpacked, that picture was displayed.
it’s a terrible tragedy what has happened since erdogan took power. the world, as usual, sat by silently while he put the opposition in jail and imprisoned most of the journalists.
thanks, obama, for cozying up to this vile skank dictator and considering him your bff.
I suppose, at this point, barry, you’ve never met an islamic fascist who you don’t like.
good observation, it says something about Obama’s psyche.
This in from the newswire.
Surely Mr. Rubin something must be askew. Madonna has just invited an Israeli rock group to warmup for her show at the Turk Telecom Arena in Istanbul.
Indeed, Madonna told fans about her desire for peace in the Middle East saying it was not possible to enjoy her music (and presumably her queenship) without wanting an end to violence.
In other news Turkey Prime Minister Recap Erdogan accused the Jewish state of “killing innocnent people, children, babies, women and the elderly in the masses” at the World Economic Forum (God help us if the Jewish state goes after the camels, goats, donkey carts and the Shador factories).
I’m sure Madonnas ‘Desires’ far outway those of Mr. Erdogan, afterall she is a STAR and as today’s AT editorial cartoon notes ‘She cares more than you do and you know it’.
A sad time for Kamel Attaturk and his people.
Madonna’s….”outweigh”.
Islam is a gutter religion suitable for monkeys and sub-humans.
‘But now in Turkey that fight is a distinctly uphill one’ Indeed. One thing is for sure, the success of Erdoğan is directly correlated to Turkish economy. Once the economy start going down hill he is finished. The Turks already are feeling the burden of inflation and they are not too happy. We are already seeing the rumbling among the young. Just few days ago students in Istanbul and Marmara Universities got involved in brawl and ended up with more than few simple injuries. As one who lived through 1960 coup d’etat, I can say for sure that Erdoğan is overpaying his hand just Menderes did in 1960. I know times are different, but Turkey’s problems still the same, especially the tension with 20 million Kurds still bad as were in 1960 and not getting any better. The Turks by nature are very nationalistic but not religious fanatics as their government. Since 1920 No prime mister ever completed a third term in office, and I don’t believe Erdoğan will be the one who will.
Good grief man, do you think he and his cronies would have any trouble fixing an election now the Army, police and judiciary are under his thumb and he has an army of goons?
make that ” now that the army…”.
To all you turkey fans Islamic Turkey is going to be her down fall,look around point one successful Islamic nation. You’re against Israel ,why because it proves that you couldn’t produce anything on the same piece of land for hundreds of years and Israel is a power house today after only sixty years. You fools you’ll never learn boycott won’t make you stronger nor smarter just the opposite it proves once more how weak,stupid and childish you are. Baby you’re losers and no blame game will ever, EVER make you look good,after all this is part of your illusion looking good without putting any effort.
This is inevitable. Since Attaturk the Turkish Army has been the protector of secularism and the Turkish Constitution. Once Erdogan was able to not only arrest leaders of the army, on fairly specious charges, but to not have an immediate coup the army was no longer either willing or able to continue in its duty to protect the Constitution.
I love Turkey and its people, but I despise what its government is becoming.
I agree with Libertyship that the biggest strategic issue is now, “when do we kick Turkey out of NATO?”
On the other hand, NATO is also a loser, so the question may be moot. But we cannot hold to our ideals and have defense agreements with Islamic Republics.
It was Europe’s insistence on the Turkish military’s subjugation that allowed this to occur.
That is why the MUSLIM TROJAN HORSE that is Islamic Turkey should never ever be allowed to join the EU. Its bad enough that , because of American lack of foresight, that they are members of NATO and all the military disclosures that entails. Turkey is also gaping gateway for Muslims in to the heartland of Europe. They already have a huge contingent at the heart of the EU where the post war ‘GAST ARBEITERS’ imported to fill Germany’s manpower shortages post WWII have proved to be impossible to get rid of and are now very unwelcome proliferating Gast’s indeed.
The modernizations of Ataturk and his favorite son, Ataboy, were for naught, evidently.
By now ANY one with any power of observation knows what Islam is. As Winston Churchill observed “No stronger retrograde force exists in the world.”
So, what are to do about Islam before it devours civilization as we know it? I don’t know, but I have some suggestions.
For Dealing With Muslims Already In Non Muslim Countries:
First, stop All Islamic immigration to non Islamic countries.
Second, second make Muslims already in Western countries obey Western laws. No exceptions for Any Islamic tradition.
Next, deport All Muslims who will not swear allegiance to their adopted country.
Then, bulldoze any Mosque that preaches jihad, even once.
Freedom of religion is not a suicide pact.
For Dealing With Muslim Countries
First, isolate Islamic countries as completely as possible by becoming energy independent by using our own oil and gas and whatever else is feasible.
Second, do as little business as possible with any Islamic country; make them support themselves.
Then, When their countries implode from starvation, disease, and violence, offer them NO humanitarian assistance whatsoever, no food, no medicine, nothing unless they renounce Islam and destroy their Mosques and Korans.
Sound preposterous? Of course it does, but the scary thing is that this plan has an infinitely better chance of succeeding than what is being done now by trying to make Muslims like and accept us.
Trying to make Islam friendly to the rest of the world is like trying to find a beneficial form of cancer.
Dont worry…the turkey – Iran war is coming soon to a tv station near you. After all, someone has to inherit the spoils of syriafe
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