Turkey

Turkey, Israel, boycott, Gaza

Erdoğan’s streak came to a screeching Halt as Turkey’s economy pays the price for Years of Policy Mistakes

By Gulcin Ozkan, King’s College London | – (The Conversation) – For many years, it wasn’t the economy that determined voting behaviour in Turkey. The country’s president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, won almost every election he contested despite a deteriorating economic outlook. This is commonly explained by the importance of identity politics in a country that […]

Democracy

Secular Opposition Crushes pro-Islam AKP in Turkey’s Local Elections

Arzu Geybullayeva

( Globalvoices.org ) – Turkey’s local elections which took place on March 31, will go down in history as one of its most surprising. Turkey’s demoralized opposition, namely the [secular] Republican People’s Party (CHP), dominated in what many pundits described as the ruling [center-right] Justice and Development Party’s worst defeat of its 22-year existence. For […]

Israel/ Palestine

No Difference between Netanyahu and Hitler says Erdogan, leader of NATO Member Turkey

Middle East Monitor

( Middle East Monitor ) – There is “no difference” between what Israeli Premier Benjamin Netanyahu is doing in the months-long attacks on Gaza and what Nazi leader Adolf Hitler did decades ago, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said today. At a science awards ceremony in the capital Ankara, Erdogan said: “How do you [Netanyahu] […]

Egypt

Not “Surrounded by Enemies:” Regional Powers Egypt and Turkey retain Ties with Israel during Gaza Conflict despite Critical Rhetoric

Mohamed Jegham

Istanbul (Special to Informed Comment; Feature) – A recent conversation in Israel was reported by The Forward: “‘We are surrounded by our enemies,’ muttered a Jewish history teacher to his student Moshe Klein.” Maybe decades ago this statement had some truth to it, but it is outdated and irrelevant in today’s geopolitical climate. Israel is […]

Featured

Taliban in Tel Aviv: Israel Joins Middle East in Clashing over Gender Segregation, Women’s rights in Public Sphere

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Haaretz reports that at public prayers for Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, at Dizengoff Square in Tel Aviv on Sunday evening, Ultra-Orthodox activists attempted to put up banners as separators to allow for the segregation of male and female worshipers. This action was seen as a provocation by liberal […]

Authoritarianism

How Turkey’s Opposition Elite enabled Erdoğan and Misled Voters

Global Voices

Written bySinan Ciddi ( Globalvoices.org ) – The sources of Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s power are vast. In his over twenty years of rule, he has consolidated power to build himself a loyal bureaucratic system (including the military and law enforcement), a compliant mainstream media landscape, and a government system that positions his dictates […]

Kurds

Amid growing Tension between Russia, Iran and the US, Syria’s Kurds have been Sidelined

The Conversation

By Scott Lucas, University College Dublin | – In north-east Syria, the 12-year conflict is far from over. Russian fighter jets buzz US surveillance drones, threatening to bring them down. Iranian-backed militias occasionally fire rockets at US positions. The Assad regime maintains that it will “regain every inch” of Syria, ending Kurdish autonomy in the […]

Authoritarianism

What Happened To Democracy in Turkey?

Waging Nonviolence

Umut Özkırımlı ( Waging Nonviolence ) – Despite initial skepticism regarding the results of the November 2002 general elections — which saw the decimation of the incumbent coalition and veteran politicians by the newcomer Justice and Development Party, or AKP, and its leader, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan — Western pundits soon hailed Turkey as […]