Love of the Land: Turkey Denies Another Genocide

Turkey Denies Another Genocide

Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir with Turkish President Aldullah Gul

during their meeting in Turkey in January, 2008.

Evelyn Gordon
Contentions/Commentary
11 November 09

Anyone who still thinks Turkey is a Western ally ought to pay close attention to what Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan told members of his AKP party this weekend. Defending his decision to invite Sudanese President Omar al-Bashir to Istanbul for an Organization of the Islamic Conference summit, AP reported, he said he has no problem with the fact that Bashir is wanted by the International Criminal Court for mass murder in Darfur, because the accusation is clearly false.

“It is not possible for those who belong to the Muslim faith to carry out genocide,” he declared.

In other words, Erdogan is convinced that his co-religionists can do no wrong, in blatant disregard not only of the facts in Darfur but also of Muslim atrocities in many other places around the globe. And not only did he make it clear where his loyalties lie — with Islam, not the West (which supported Bashir’s indictment) — but in the process, he also rejected two of the cornerstones of the Western world, rationality and empiricism, preferring to disregard any facts that are inconvenient to his theology.

But lest anyone think this was a mere slip of the tongue, Erdogan went on to say that Israel committed far worse crimes during January’s war in Gaza than anything that happened in Darfur. Moreover, even if Bashir were responsible for state killings, he would still find it much easier to talk with Bashir than with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Hmm. Human-rights groups estimate that as many as 300,000 people were killed in Darfur in 2003-05, and the killing continues even today, albeit at a slower pace. The highest estimate of Palestinian fatalities in Gaza is 1,440. Any unbiased observer would naturally agree that 1,440 deaths are much worse than 300,000 — given that the 300,000 were killed by Muslims (who, as we know, cannot commit genocide) and the 1,440 by non-Muslims. My co-religionists, right or wrong.

Adding a further note of surrealism to all this, Turkish Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said last Friday that Turkish-Israeli relations would improve if only Netanyahu would let Turkey resume its role as mediator in Israeli-Syrian talks. Netanyahu has flatly refused, saying (correctly) that Turkey has forfeited any pretense of being an honest broker. It requires a serious disconnect from reality to even imagine that you can accuse someone of being the world’s worst war criminal one moment and expect him to treat you as an impartial mediator the next. Have we mentioned yet that Erdogan’s Turkey doesn’t seem too keen on rationality?

The Bashir contretemps is hardly the first time Erdogan has behaved in a matter incompatible with Turkey’s traditional alliance with the West. But it is past time for the West to finally admit the unpalatable truth. Turkey’s departure from the Western camp undoubtedly leaves a gaping hole. But only if Western leaders finally admit that this hole exists can they start thinking, as they must, about how to fill it.

Love of the Land: Turkey Denies Another Genocide