Ed Ou for The New York TimesTurks and Syrian activists in the border town of Gorentas.
Syria is looking lonelier by the day. The king of Jordan called for Bashar al-Assad to step down, crossing off one more ally in a year that has cost the regime many others. Even Turkey, which for a decade was focused on building alliances with Syria and Iran, has reversed that approach and begun hosting Syrian defectors who attack the Assad regime. What does this change say about Turkey? What will it mean for the region?
The Arab Spring of 2011 further stressed this problem, especially in Libya, and soon Ankara’s policy makers realized that insisting on the “zero problems” policy could put them into the cynical position of having zero problems with dictators.
That is why in Syria — which used to be the A.K.P.’s Exhibit A for “zero problems” — Erdogan and his government did not hesitate to condemn the Assad regime’s brutality and give support to the Syrian opposition. (The religious and cultural affinity between the A.K.P. and the Sunni majority in Syria, which creates the backbone of the Syrian opposition, probably also helped.)
The bottom line is that the A.K.P. presents itself as a democratic force that was able to break Turkey’s decade-old military guardianship. It also takes pride in being admired by other democratic forces in the region, and especially by Islamic-minded yet democratic-leaning parties, like the Ennahda in Tunisia.
That’s why Turkey will continue to be an enthusiastic supporter of the Arab Spring. With its 150-year-old synthesis of Islam and democracy, it will even be, as Ayatollah Shahroudi of Iran put it scornfully, the promoter of “liberal Islam.”
Addressing 'the Kurdish Question'
Ankara Is Trying to Have It Both Ways
14 Readers' Comments
Post a comment »Victoria, BC
November 16th, 2011 4:12 am
There is a lot of suspicion in Arab states towards Turkey and its neo-Ottoman policy. The oppressive Ottoman legacy which came to an end with the First World War is hard to forget.
When bluntly putting the perception of empires role in the world without considering the chronology, is an attempt to put Turks and Turkish related states in the sutuation of authoritarian dictatorship positions.
Ottoman's were opressive towards their multinationalistic constituents and why you are not expressing how the jews were treated while they were always under constant danger of western annihilation.
or
what about the feeling of serbians towards to austria-hungarian empire, or polish towards to russian empire, or african's towards to British and western european empires.
There was a time before democracy's prevail, which was empirealistic age, all empires sustain their status what you are representing as a oppressive domination.
Simply Ottoman's neither infront ,nor behind the their era of empires in sense of human rights or democratization.
Lets do not distort the history. such as Ottomans were the only oppresive regime ever come to surface of earth.
evolve into democracies based on liberal Islam. It has to solve its Kurdish problem.
Its credibility is diminished so long Kurdish issue remain unresolved.
Erdogan is a good leader compared to European and America where timidity
is the hallmark of the leadership. Erdogan has the courage to speak out
clearly and publicly on issues compared to westerners whispering to each other
in the meetings. I prefer speaking to whispering.
I've spent time in Istanbul and with regular Turkish people, and the idea that they are fostering a culture of the burka or whatever seems absurd to me. Far from it, the AKP is if anything most comparable to the "Christian Democratic" parties that arose in Europe after WWII, with an emphasis on tradition, free markets and social justice. These should be America's natural allies in the region and we should encourage this development.
I agree with sailhardy in so far as I do believe the Turks do have to deal with their history, but the oppressively nationalistic political culture was the product of prior secular regimes backed by the military (in which nationalism was used as a counterweight to Islam), not the AKP which has been in power for only the last decade. It's actually the domestic opponents of the AKP who would be most likely to deny the Armenian genocide, support harsh press laws and generally glorify the activities of the "Young Turks" who promulgated the conditions that led to the Armenian issue. Conflating all Turks is no more enlightening than conflating all Americans. That said, when we are speaking of events nearly a century in the past, I would assert that they are not the most important issues facing Turkey. That sounds harsh, but the participants are mostly long-dead and are about as relevant to modern Turks as our Indian Wars are to modern Americans (ie, something to be vaguely ashamed of, but not as important as getting a decent job).
Anyway, very interesting topic, NYTimes. Turkey is going to remain an important ally of the United States; we simply have too many interests in common for this to be otherwise.
And, why is it that everytime there is any sort of news about Turkey your likes put comments about World War I. Do you think Armenians were all innocent. They joined forces with Russians and fought against their own empire. They formed gangs to kill innocent civilians. Nobody likes a traitor.
They optimizing maintaining order with a good level of personal freedom ...as a secular - non repressive nation of Muslim culture ..The destruction of the Ottoman Empire by British opportunists post WW1, and the concoction of newly manufactured nations ...Jordan , Syria , Lebanon , Israel ...etc created a legacy of chaos that continues til today .
The future of the Middle East is obscure....but.... "Her Saba Taza Bir Baslangictir " ....
"Every day is a new beginning "