We have some moron here asking for "proof" of a mindset. And when he gets more than enough of that, he comes up with ridiculous semantics to (unsuccessfully) try and save face.
Some feel Muslim groups in the region are working harder than ever to re-establish an Islamic caliphate, or Islamic state. When Muhammed died 14 centuries ago, the Muslim world needed someone to take the prophet's place. "The caliphate was the leadership of Islam after the death of Muhammad the prophet of Islam," explained Islamic expert Moshe Sharon. The last caliphate was located in Istanbul, Turkey. For 400 years, Istanbul and the Topkapi Palace was the political center of the Muslim world. From there, the Turkish sultans ruled the Ottoman Empire as caliphs from 1517 until the empire fell after World War I. But in 1924, the Turkish leader Attaturk abolished the caliphate. Since then, many Muslims have dreamed of its return. "The major aim of the caliphate is to rule the world and this can be done under the leadership of one caliph and he himself only can declare a holy war, a jihad," Sharon explained. Click play to watch Chris Mitchell's report, followed by comments from CBN News Terrorism Analyst Erick Stakelbeck. Some believe a restored caliphate will precede the Islamic messiah. While they may disagree on tactics, many modern Islamic groups share the goal of restoring the caliphate. They include the Taliban, al Qaeda, Hamas, Hizb ut-Tahrir, and the granddaddy of them all, the Muslim Brotherhood. "The Muslim Brotherhood was set up in 1928, four years after the disbanding of the Muslim caliphate by Ataturk," said Kenneth Timmerman, president of the Foundation for Democracy in Iran. "And their specific mission was to restore the caliphate just four years later." "They've been pursuing that mission ever since," he continued. "Their goal remains to set up one world Islamic government." The Brotherhood now has a foothold in Egypt where after the fall of the Mubarak government, it became the country's most organized political party. "What the Muslim Brotherhood would like to see is a strong, powerful Islamic government armed with nuclear weapons," Timmerman added. "Whether those are supplied by Pakistan or Iran doesn't matter, and they would be gradually eliminating Christian and Jewish influence, Christian and Jewish governments," he said. Another potential power player who wants to restore the caliphate is Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan. "I think Erdogan clearly sees himself as the founder of the new caliphate, the world Islamic government with Turkey at its center," Timmerman said. "I think this is what's behind him offering to send the Turkish navy, for example, to protect a quote 'peace flotilla' that would come to Gaza," he said. "I'm sure that in his heart that [Erdogan] is dreaming about the re-establishment of the caliphate," Sharon added. "He behaves like it. He can easily push this area into a great war." Because of the threat of war and rise of Islam, many feel the so-called "Arab spring" is a misnomer. "I wouldn't call it an Arab Spring," Sharon said. "It's far from being an Arab Spring. It's the same kind of winter." http://www.cbn.com/cbnnews/world/2011/October/Arab-Spring-Feeding-Push-for-Islamic-Caliphate/
You make it virtually impossible to take you seriously. NMS made perfectly valid points. Using the name of a bridge to argue a new caliphate is emerging? Linking to an article from the freeking CBN? Your credibility on this matter is....decidedly underwhelming. Whatever you're smoking, put it down.
You should google some more before you talk again. Clearly, you are clueless on this matter. Maybe you should get out more. If you are intellectually unable to grasp the symbolism of this, then I can't help you. If the German chancellor were to call a bridge (italics added just for you) "Adolf Hitler Bridge", then the international community and Germans would be outraged, and rightly so. Your knowledge on this matter appears to be...unbelievably underwhelming. Next time, inform yourself before you join a discussion that you have no clue about. Here is some help for you about Erdogan: http://www.slate.com/articles/news_...armenians_or_well_hurt_them_again.single.html Maybe you prefer Slate as a source to whatever CBN is. I can give you tons more sources. But you seem to rather run your mouth than learn.
And perhaps you, as a leftist, will also like to read the Huffington Post: The Megalomania of Erdoğan the Magnificent LONDON--It was the first time young Turks would march on the streets of Istanbul, when it was still known as Constantinople. On a hot spring night 105 years ago, a movement of student activists, nationalists and secularists rose up against the autocratic rule of Sultan Abdulhamid II, who was the 99th caliph (or, religious leader) of Islam and 34th sultan of the 600 year-old Ottoman Empire. Their demand was simple: restore the short-lived constitution that the sultan had suspended in 1878, which granted greater freedom to Turkish citizens. Cowed, Abdulhamid quickly capitulated, reconvening Parliament and initiating what came to be known as the Second Constitutional Era in Turkey. It was too much for the Islamic traditionalists in the Turkish military, who overtook their officers in March of 1909 and marched through the streets demanding restoration of Islamic sharia law. As the Young Turks fled, one writer feared that "Turkey seemed poised to go down an Islamist path." But it was not to be. Within ten days, democratic reformists had recaptured Constantinople. The Islamic rebels made their last stand at Taksim military barracks on the city's European side before surrendering to reform-minded troops, including a young officer named Mustafa Kemal. For Kemal--later known as Atatürk, founder of modern, secular, democratic Turkey--the Taksim barracks would serve as a reminder of the dangers of Islamic fundamentalism. It is no accident that the protests that began in Istanbul before spreading to 78 Turkish cities the past two weeks were sparked by Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan's plans to build an exact replica of the Taksim barracks (torn down in 1940) on the same spot where it once stood, razing a popular park in the process. While two very different Turkeys encircle the Istanbul stand-offs of 1909 and 2013, the issue at the heart of both is the same: should Turkey--which is 99 percent Muslim--be ruled by the laws of God or the laws of men? This is not a question that can be resolved by tear gas or water cannon, no matter how much misery Erdoğan's riot police reign down on protesters. This is a battle for the very soul of modern Turkey itself, one that will ultimately determine whether the long-time NATO member and U.S. ally will stay on Atatürk's secular path or become a Turkish version of Egypt's Muslim Brotherhood. Throughout his career in Turkish politics, the megalomaniacal and deeply Islamic Erdoğan--who has called himself both "the imam of Istanbul" and "a servant of Shari'a"--has never really hidden where he stands. As he once said during his decade-long tenure as Istanbul's mayor, "our only goal is an Islamic state." He believes, as he thundered in a mid-1990s speech posted on YouTube, "one cannot be a Muslim and secular. For them to exist together is not a possibility." The real surprise is how willfully blind Western governments have been to Erdoğan's true intentions, reflected in an absurd editorial that recently ran in a leading American newspaper that observed "for the past few years, there has been a general optimism about Turkish democracy in Western capitals." For the 48% of Turkey that did not support Erdoğan's re-election to a third term in 2011--as well as the 50% that did, based in part on his successful stewardship of Turkey's economy--there is no such confusion over whether Erdoğan sees himself, as the Economist asked this week, as "Democrat or Sultan." In the words of journalist Ron Ben-Yishai, Erdoğan's clear goal is to bring about "a return to the Ottoman Empire's glory days." After all, does this sound like the record of a secular democrat? As has been expressed repeatedly in this space, since taking power in 2003, Erdoğan's Islamist Justice and Development Party has imprisoned more journalists than any nation on earth. For good measure, it has also incarcerated more than 2,800 students, most for the crime of exercising free speech. Similar offenses have led to more than 20,000 complaints filed against Turkey's government in the European Court of Human Rights. Having once publicly read an Islamic poem that includes the lines, "the mosques are our barracks, the domes our helmets, the minarets our bayonets, and the faithful our soldiers," Erdoğan has used public funds to build more than 17,000 mosques while announcing plans to create a super-mosque overlooking Istanbul. Last month, to celebrate the 560th anniversary of Istanbul's conquest by the Ottomans, Erdoğan broke ground on a third Bosphorus Bridge linking the Asian and European sides of the city, naming it after the controversial conquering Sultan Selim I--who adopted Sunni Islam as the official religion of the Ottoman Empire, and then ordered the murder of 45,000 Alevites for not being Muslim enough. Along the way, he has ordered the separation of boys and girls in primary and secondary schools; lowered the age requirement for religious schools to 11 while tripling enrollment; and ruled that tens of thousands of graduates of Islamic madrassas have the equivalent of college degrees so they can be hired for high civil service posts. What upsets secular Turks the most is what Turkish scholar Seyla Benhabib calls Erdoğan's "moral micromanagement of people's private lives." Saying he wants to create a "pious generation," Erdoğan has spoken out in favor of keeping men and women apart on beaches; supported announcements last month urging subway passengers to refrain from kissing in public; and led the passage of surprise legislation to ban the sale of alcohol while publicly calling Atatürk a "drunkard." After famously overturning a 90-year ban on headscarves in public, Erdoğan also called on all Turkish women to have three children while restating his opposition to day-care centers, interpreted by the Economist as "women should have babies and stay home." One wonders if that bit of wisdom came up during Erdoğan's visit last month to the White House, where President Barack Obama publicly asked--again--for the prime minister's advice on raising daughters while praising him for his "courage" and "friendship." For a leader that has preferred the company of Iran, Syria, Hamas, and Hezbollah the past ten years--rebuking the U.S. on Iran's nuclear program while severing Turkey's seven-decade long friendship with Israel--it's puzzling why Obama continues to refer to the Turkish prime minister as his most trusted ally. Erdoğan is precisely the kind of Islamic fundamentalist that Ataturk warned against, and the very reason he entrusted Turkey's military with the responsibility of safeguarding the nation's secular traditions. Four times in 90 years, the military led coups to do just that--most recently in 1997, when it forced Erdoğan's mentor, Nekmettin Erbakkan, to resign. At times, it has performed its job too zealously. For those who wonder why the military has been silent the past two weeks, it is a measure of the prime minister's brilliance that he found a way to use Turkey's hopeless bid to join the European Union to his advantage. Acting on the EU's insistence that Turkey bring its military under greater civilian control, Erdoğan castrated military leaders, eventually throwing one in five of the nation's generals and half of its admirals in jail on specious charges, while placing Islamic loyalists in leadership positions. For good measure, in 2010, he also led the passage of new constitutional amendments to take power away from the other guardian of secular power in Turkey--the judiciary--giving his party control over judicial appointment while investing it with the power to "investigate" judges. Which is why secular Turks took to the streets two weeks ago: it's the only forum for redress they have left. If nothing comes of the protests--the prime minister insists he will now build a mosque at Taksim Square, in addition to the Ottoman barracks--at least woke the West to the reality that Turkey is a long way from the secular democracy we've known for 90 years. As Erdoğan undertakes a high-profile campaign to bring the most extensive changes to Turkey's political system since Ataturk--re-writing the Turkish Constitution to give the President more power while brilliantly working to end a 30-year war with Kurdish separatists to win the support he needs to pass it--he will be in position to run for President in 2014, just as he is term-limited out as Prime Minister. If this month's protests don't derail those efforts, there is no telling what Turkey will look like--or who it will be allied with--by the end of two likely terms of an Erdoğan presidency in 2024. But the question of whether Turkey will be ruled by the laws of God or the laws of man will be made moot--because in the mind of Erdoğan the Magnificent, who truly sees himself as the reincarnation of rulers like Suleiman who served as both political and religious leaders, they are one in the same. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/stanley-weiss/the-megalomania-of-erdoan_b_3437350.html
I never said anything about Erdogan; just that your examples were dumb and your hostility towards NMS was childish.
And you were wrong on both counts. If you are so concerned about hostility, you might want to consider who started the exchange: And asking for "proof" of a mindset is a dumb question to begin with. I provided plenty of evidence, so did Not In My House. If you do not understand said evidence (like not understanding the symbolism of naming a bridge in context) or didn't read it, then just stay quiet.
Possibly. "He started it" doesn't exactly help you overcome the accusation of being childish. How intimidating. The evidence you have presented is quite alarming. I'll restate that I never argued it did not exist, just that linking a bridge naming to a new caliphate was quite a stretch.
^I can't even see any of this stuff, and I can already see how it went. predictable. I don't like how Erdogan is reacting now, and I never really liked the guy anyways, but I didn't even need to click the thread to know that some people are going to take his actions and project the wildest fantasies upon it. then recoil and strike back personally against anyone who objects. Personally, it's not worth anybody's time to debate that kind of tactic---thin arguments wrapped very thickly in personal insults---but to each their own. it is amusing sometimes, I guess.
Again, if you don't know that this is part of a pattern, you don't understand that it is not a stretch at all. The naming of symbolic public property and institutions certainly means something. There are plenty of other examples like this: An earthquake destroyed a school that was named after Atatürk, the secular founder of today's Turkey. Erdogan hates this guy because Erdogan is an Islamist and against secularity. Erdogan called this guy a drunkard. When the school was re-built, it was named after Erdogan's mother. That's what dictators do, and it always has an anti-secular and pro-Islamist and egocentric slant. Regarding the symbolism of naming the bridge: http://www.opendemocracy.net/emre-caliskan-simon-waldman/which-sultan-is-erdogan Which sultan is Erdogan? It is a sad state of affairs when an elected official is likened to a modern-day Ottoman sultan; however, the comparison is both startling and striking. With continuing protests and demonstrations across Turkish cities, activists, commentators and analysts are increasingly refering to Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan as a modern-day sultan. As students of the Ottoman Empire’s rich 800 years of history, we wonder which of the Empire’s 39 sultans does Erdogan most closely resemble? The first on our shortlist of most likely contenders is Selim I (1512-1520), better known in the west as Selim the Grimm. His reign was marked by conquest. Before embarking on his invasion of Egypt, Syria and the western part of Persia, Selim renewed treaties with European powers in order to prevent opening a second military front. Selim’s most important capture was the holy cities of Mecca and Medina earning him the dual title of Caliph, leader of the Islamic community, alongside that of Sultan. Islam became a central feature of Ottoman life. Men of Islamic learning were brought into the Ottoman bureaucracy and Selim oversaw the establishment of multiple religious schools and institutions. Under Selim’s rule the Empire’s demographic balance also become predominantly Sunni. It was marked by crackdowns and massacres against Anatolian Shias, particularly the Alevi community which makes up between 10-20 per cent of modern day Turkey. Erdogan’s likeness to Selim is remarkable. Erdogan payed homage to Selim by naming Istanbul’s controversial third bridge across the Bosphorus after him. Erdogan, like Selim, also understands the importance of relations with the west notably the US, NATO and the EU. But it is the Middle East that has been Erdogan’s main focus. (...) Yes, you did, by claiming that my credibility on this subject is not there, while not presenting anything that would make you qualified to judge that.
Intern, do your research. Islamist Erdogan has imprisoned more journalists - among many other bad things he has done - than ANY OTHER CURRENT LEADER ON THE PLANET.
Erdogan seems rather complex; almost like a ruler who has become convinced that his successes are all due to his personal involvement. His shift in policies from when he was mayor and his first term, to his 2nd and 3rd terms is quite alarming. And frankly bizarre. (Manchurian?) I don't profess to be an expert on Erdogan or Turkish politics. However I would not read your posts as authoritative literature on the subject either. And of course your credibility is questioned - you've made it a point to consistently argue (in one form or another) that Islam is unwilling to "share the stage" with western ideals. In many, many ways I agree with you. But your too biased sometimes and it colors your posts. Here's hoping that Turkey can retain it's secular government. I want to go back and visit again without my wife donning an abaya.
Fittingly, they were arrested under "anti-terrorism" laws. Just like how Assad in Syria refers to the rebels as "terrorists". Consequently, whenever I hear someone say "fight the terrorists", I'm inclined to think they actually mean "submit to the state". Sorry - I digress.
It's not bizarre, he has never made a secret of his Islamist beliefs. This quote (a poem he cited) is from his time as Mayor: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/europe/2270642.stm You are free to read it as whatever you want, but if you just look at Erdogan's quotes and actions, they speak for themselves. And it is a good thing that some people in Turkey are waking up and speaking up against this. When Hitler came to power, appeasement policies by leaders of other nations only helped him to become what he became. I am speaking the truth. Just because some people can't handle the truth and the D&D is predominantly (or at least more outspokenly) leftist/Muslim doesn't make me "too biased". Agreed. But at this point, it's not about "retaining" its secular government. It's about regaining it.
At the same time many of his actions were decidedly (and to a certain extent, surprisingly) pragmatic. Wikipedia provides a number of good examples. This all shifted following his 1st term, and was probably exasperated by the stalled talks to join the EU. (Interesting article on the subject) Also, for the record, he was imprisoned for that poem. Ironic. They do. And as of late, I would concur with your concerns. Like I said, it's difficult to reconcile Erdogan of the late 90s / early 2000s with Erdogan today. "The truth is rarely pure and never simple." Oh good grief.
Only goes to show that I have been right all along. Just because leftists wanted to close their eyes to what this guy has been up to from the start doesn't mean I wasn't right from the start.
Not really. Are you right to be concerned? Absolutely. Are you right to claim, as one of your quoted articles does, that Erdogan's likeness to Selim the Grim is "remarkable"? Nope.
Yes I am. The way of thinking is the same and the goals are the same. The difference is that there are other powers nowadays curtailing the possibilities Erdogan has to implement the agenda. Erdogan constantly goes exactly as far as he can go without endangering his power.
So why has he imprisoned all these journalists? Why has he been supporting terrorist organization Hamas? And Spoiler Why is he wearing tasteless jackets?
