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Turkey's Islamic Revolution Paid for by Wealthy Islamists

(Commentary) Michael Rubin - Turkey has changed. Gone permanently is secular Turkey, a unique Muslim country that straddled East and West and that even maintained a cooperative relationship with Israel. Today Turkey is an Islamic republic whose government saw fit to facilitate the May 31 flotilla raid on Israel's blockade of Gaza. Turkey is now more aligned to Iran than to the democracies of Europe. Outside of public view, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Abdullah Gul, now his foreign minister, presided over an influx of so-called Green Money - capital from Saudi Arabia and the oil-rich Persian Gulf emirates, much of which ended up in AKP party coffers rather than in the public treasury. Between 2002 and 2003, money appeared in Turkey's financial system for which government reporting cannot account - an amount that increased from approximately $200 million to more than $4 billion. By 2006, Turkish economists estimated the Green Money infusion into the Turkish economy to be between $6 billion and $12 billion. Some Turkish intelligence officials privately suggest that Qatar is today the source of most subsidies for the AKP and its projects. Thus, Turkey's Islamic revolution was bought and paid for by wealthy Islamists. Erdogan equated degrees issued by Turkish madrassas - Islamic religious schools - with ordinary high school degrees. This bureaucratic sleight of hand enabled madrassa students to enter the university and qualify for government jobs without ever mastering or, in some cases, even being exposed to Western fundamentals. When such students still fumbled university entrance exams, the AKP provided them with a comparative bonus on their scores, justifying the move as affirmative action. As a NATO member, Turkey is privy to U.S. weaponry, tactics, and intelligence. Any provision of assistance to Turkey today, however, could be akin to transferring it to Hamas, Sudan, or Iran. Does President Obama really want to deliver the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter to a hostile Turkey, as promised, in 2014? As mayor of Istanbul, Erdogan quipped, "Democracy is like a streetcar. When you come to your stop, you get off." The writer is a resident scholar at the American Enterprise Institute.
2010-06-29 08:31:44
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