Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan has done nothing to stop the advances of the Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL) jihadi group rampaging through Iraq and Syria while killing scores of innocents. Instead of helping desperate Kurdish and Syrian refugees of the Islamic State’s offensive on the Turkish border city of Kobani, the country’s military has been focused on bombing Kurdish positions within its own country.
As this plays out, the refugees of Kobani are reportedly being arrested by the hundreds because they would rather escape to Turkey than leave their fate in the hands of the Islamic State.
Erdogan, who has for some time been known to espouse pro-Islamist, pro-Muslim Brotherhood, anti-semitic sentiments, has taken a liking to an Islamist poem with the lines “the mosques are our barracks, the domes our helmets, the minarets our bayonets and the faithful our soldiers.”
In late September, Breitbart News reported that the Turkish government may have negotiated with the Islamic State to ensure the release of 49 hostages. Hinting that he had engaged ISIS in negotiations, Erdogan told reporters at the time, “Whether there was or wasn’t a swap – 49 personnel were returned to Turkey. I would not exchange that for anything.”
The President has also recently authorized an Islamic dress code, which has changed the once-secular policies that Turkey has been known for in its post-Ataturk form.
The Turkish President’s record shows strong favorability to the Muslim Brotherhood.
In September, When Muslim Brotherhood leaders were being kicked out of Arab countries left and right and had nowhere to go, Erdogan was happy to offer them safe haven. Some have described the Muslim Brotherhood as the “gateway drug” to Islamic radicalism, as almost all of today’s well-known jihadi group leaders were once members of the Brotherhood. Erdogan’s Turkey has actively supported Muslim Brotherhood Palestinian terror group Hamas in its genocidal campaign against Israel’s existence.
Erdogan’s record of anti-semitic hatred is second to none outside of his Arab rivals.
In August, Erdogan was successfully re-elected under the campaign banner “Allah is Enough for Us, Turkey is Enough for Us.” On the campaign trail, the Turkish President was known for his blatantly anti-semitic and pro-Islamist remarks. In July, he said of the Jews, “Those who condemn Hitler day and night have surpassed Hitler in barbarism.”
When Turkey goes so far as to officially deny that it has allowed the United States entry to its bases to strike Islamic State positions, one can only wonder about the level of support the domestic population and its government provide to elements of the jihadi group.
Germany’s deputy speaker told a Kurdish newspaper this week that “Turkey’s dealings with the ISIS are unacceptable.” Deputy Speaker Claudia Roth told Rudaw, “I could not believe that Turkey harbors an ISIS militant camp in Istanbul. Turkey has also allowed weapons to be transported into Syria through its borders. Also that the ISIS has been able to sell its oil via Turkey is extraordinary.”
The safeguards that come with Turkey’s membership in NATO only do more to ensure that Ankara can sit and watch as innocents continue to be slaughtered in droves. Should the Islamic State cross into Turkey, the former Ottoman Empire has been assured that NATO will spring into action and defend them. Meanwhile, Erdogan continues to regress Turkey into the seventh century.
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