If there is one single issue that has bedeviled Turkey’s relationship with the GCC and Saudi Arabia, it is Turkey’s past efforts to cultivate strong ties with Egypt under President Morsi’s Muslim Brotherhood government. According to Riyadh, the Muslim Brotherhood could embolden Islamists and other opposition groups at home by its demands for democracy in the Middle East. They were also an enthusiastic ally to Iran, the arch enemy of Saudi Arabia. The Syrian Civil War was shaped and driven not only by a Sunni Saudi – Shia Iranian cold war but also by Saudi Arabia – Turkey confrontation on several issues such as Qatar crisis, the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi in Istanbul, and Saudi Arabia’s development of stronger ties with the PKK affiliated YPG.

Riyadh’s silence in the face of July 15 failed coup attempt and rumors that their ally, United Arab Emirates (UAE) spent $3bn on the plot was a turning point in deteriorating relations between Turkey on the one hand and Saudi Arabia and the UAE on the other. Interestingly, the Turkish reaction was appeasing and low key as Erdoğan did not want to mar relations with Saudis at a time when 940 Saudi companies had invested $6 billion in Turkey. (Middle East Monitor, 2017) Only a few months before the coup attempt, King Salman paid a visit to Turkey during which Turkey bestowed its highest honor, the Order of the State, on King Salman as a rare mark of respect. Both sides had already established the strategic cooperation council in December 2015. Despite the rift over Egypt and over Riyadh’s neutrality in the face of YPG /PKK’s activities in northern Syria with the support of the U.S., both sides maintained their friendship at key moments. For example, “Turkey’s foreign minister attended an extraordinary meeting of Organization of Islamic Cooperation foreign ministers in Jeddah in January 2016 to discuss the mob attacks on Saudi missions in Iran following the execution of a dissident Saudi Shia cleric.” (Daily Sabah, 2017) Turkey opened İncirlik airbase in southern Turkey with Saudi Arabia’s warplanes participating in the battle against DAESH forces, led by the United States. (Ergan, 2017) Six months after the failed coup attempt, President Erdogan toured the Gulf beginning with Saudi Arabia and Bahrain but not stopping in the UAE. This tour aimed to further and strengthen ties, keeping open its own lines of communication with Saudi Arabia, while preventing the escalation of tension with Egypt and UAE.

However, with the outburst of the Qatar crisis in 2017, this policy of turning a blind eye to Saudi Arabia and the UAE’s alleged support of the failed coup attempt became untenable as Turkey was openly targeted by the Saudi-led coalition during the crisis.

In addition, it became evident that Saudi Arabia saw the YPG as an efficient actor to stop Turkey’s military advance to the north of Syria and supported the PKK affiliated group more than ever as evidence of its pro-US stance towards the region. For example, only five days after the Qatar crisis erupted, a pro-government newspaper in Turkey, reported that Saudi Arabia, Egypt, and the UAE held a meeting with the YPG. Saudi Gulf Affairs Minister Thamer al-Sabhan also visited YPG controlled Raqqa with Brett McGurk, the then U.S. special envoy for the coalition to defeat ISIS. Most important of all, Saudi Arabia pledged $100 million for stabilization projects in the territories formerly held by ISIS but now under YPG control and made the payment in October 2018. (Başkan, 2019). There was more in the months that followed as well. When Turkey’s military brought an end to the YPG’s control of Afrin in March 2018, Saudi Arabia’s de-facto ruler, Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman (MbS), labeled Turkey, Iran and the Muslim Brotherhood as a “triangle of evil. This openly showed that Turkey’s gain appeared to be Saudi Arabia’s loss in the region and “highlighted how Ankara and Riyadh’s agendas in Syria are becoming increasingly incompatible with each other.” (Cafiero, 2018)

This was all the more disturbing since Islam and even sectarian belonging was no longer the major common denominator between Turkey and its previous Sunni Gulf allies; the Saudis and Emiratis. On the contrary, the Jerusalem factor in the deterioration of relations was noteworthy as it became evident with the low-profile response by the Saudi-led axis of the UAE, Egypt and Bahrain to the US’s recognition of Jerusalem as the Israeli capital. Erdogan on the other hand stated that “Jerusalem is a red line for Muslims”, and that such a move would be in violation of international law. The Saudi-led axis avoided sending high ranking delegations to the emergency Jerusalem summit of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation that was called upon by Erdogan. The Bahraini foreign minister, described the Jerusalem issue as a side issue and said: “It’s not helpful to pick a fight with the US over side issues while we together fight the clear and present danger of the theo-fascist Islamic republic,” (Aljazeera, 2017) When looking closely, Saudi and Emirati official circles aimed to restrict Erdogan and Turkey’s regional influence by building closer ties with Turkey’s foes,  acting in accordance with the old saying that; the  enemy of my enemy is my friend”.

Beyond these regional developments, there are other issues that concerned Riyadh and Abu Dhabi. The most important of these is the increasing demand for democracy and transparency of the Islamist circles including the Muslim Brotherhood and its leader Morsi, Turkey’s president Erdoğan, some intellectuals such as the Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi. Such demands have been perceived by MbS and the Emirati leader, Shaykh Khalifa bin Zayed as threatening the existing status quo and the future of their regimes. From the outset, the model of democracy practiced in Turkey, Ankara’s support of Morsi in Egypt and pro-Ikhwan policy in Syria aroused the wrath of the Saudis for two reasons. Firstly, Ankara’s insistence on Islamic democracy was perceived to be part of hidden agenda by Turkey who were perceived to have neo-Ottoman aspirations from the Saudi perspective. Secondly, Turkey’s policies tilted towards the Muslim Brotherhood whereas Saudi Arabia saw the Muslim Brotherhood as a terrorist organization. This makes it evident that the two Sunni countries differ a lot from each other in their assessments of the dangers at hand. For example, while Saudi Arabia issued a decision banning symbols such as the four-finger Rabia al-Adawiya sign, used to signal support for the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, this was used by the Turkish president Erdoğan at public events as a symbol of supporting oppressed Muslims. As al-Buluwi stressed, “the current ‘cold war’ in the Middle East has taken two forms. It involves the Shiite-Sunni war being fought in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon and the Gulf, as well as a parallel Sunni-Sunni conflict involving Turkey, Saudi Arabia and political Islamic forces to control and dominate the politics of Sunni Islam.” (Al-Buluwi, 2014)

Jamal Khashoggi’s murder made the Sunni-Sunni confrontation more evident than ever and caused Riyadh to be blamed by Muslim Middle East for betrayal and “treachery” as they became more and more pro-US and acted in accordance with Israeli interests. (The Guardian, 2019) For example, “in May 2018, Saudi Arabia ended a 70-year-old ban and allowed Air India to use Saudi airspace in New Delhi-Tel Aviv flights. In April 2018, MbS remarked that Israelis and Palestinians have the right to found their own states, giving the signals of recognizing Israel for the first time in the history of Saudi Arabia.” (Rakipoğlu, 2019).

Turkey’s insistence that Riyadh provide accountability and transparency over Jamal Khashoggi’s murder culminated in the UN’s report saying that “Mohammed bin Salman should be investigated over journalist’s murder.”  Agnes Callamard, the UN’s special rapporteur, concluded independently that the crown prince ordered Khashoggi’s murder. This led to frustration in Saudi Arabia over Ankara. (The Guardian, 2019) According to an intelligence report written by the Emirates Policy Centre, a think tank with close links to the Emirati government and security services, a Saudi strategy was prepared to punish Turkey over its stance on the Khashoggi case. (Hearst&Soylu, 2019)

In parallel with these developments, Saudi Arabia launched a social media campaign boycotting all Turkish products and calling for citizens not to travel to Turkey. Saudi Arabian authorities detained trucks and containers carrying Turkish goods into the kingdom which were described by many as a “secret embargo.” Ajlan al-Ajlan, chairman of the Riyadh Chamber of Commerce and Industry, called for an import boycott on Twitter and said: “As the Turkish leadership and Erdogan continue their hostility and target the kingdom’s leadership, we call more than ever before to boycott them… in all areas – imports, labour and dealings with Turkish companies.” (Soylu, 2019) In addition, the Saudi embassy in Ankara issued a warning to travelers that passport theft and petty crime was increasing in Turkey. This led to a thirty percent decrease in number of visitors from Saudi Arabia to Turkey in the first five months of 2019. Al Riyadh daily which is known for its pro-government stance, hared a video saying that “there are many alternatives to Turkey and they are cheaper.” As a response to the video, hundreds of Arabic-speaking Twitter users shared their own vacation videos from Turkey to show that Saudis are welcomed in the country. (Gürbüz, 2019) When looking retrospectively, the pan-Arab media based in Dubai including Sky News Arabic and Al Arabiya also had reported that the coup against Erdogan had been successful.” (Hearst, 2016)

In sum three points should be stressed once again: anxieties regarding Turkey’s military presence in the north of Syria, its collaboration with Russia and Iran throughout the Astana process and its role of promoting democracy so as to threaten the status quo in the Gulf are only several reasons for the deteriorating relations between Turkey and the GCC, specifically Saudi Arabia, UAE and Bahrain. The real reason lying behind the current problematic relationship is closely linked with the lack of capability of the GCC states to act independently in solving the crises in the region and being under the yoke of Israel and the United States. Finally, as Turkey becomes more attractive for the masses living in the Gulf as well as Arab states, the efforts of pro-government media to push anti Turkish sentiment in the GCC will remain fruitless as a poll conducted by American polling firm Pew Research Center proved that Turkey was the country with the increase in influence among the Middle East’s population.

It is said that the first documented Muslim to step onto Indian soil was Malik bin Dinar, a shaykh from Basra who also established India’s first mosque in Kodungallur, Kerala in 629 AD, just seven years after the Prophet Muhammad’s migration to Medina. The place where it was built previously occupied by an abandoned monastery and was given to Muslims by then emperor Cheraman Perumal. In a show of gratitude, they named the mosque after him, as it is known today as Cheraman Juma Mosque. This marked a peaceful start of coexistence between Hindus and Muslims. But with the unfolding centuries, this unperturbed image has been shattered into pieces. Now all that remains is building tension towards a sectarian crisis that at any time can turn even deadlier.

India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) overlook the impact of rising Hindu nationalism in India, creating a vision of India which is a purely Hindu state which denies place of other religious minorities. After Modi was elected for the second term this May, a significant rise in hate crimes against Muslims have been reported. In one incident, 22-year-old Tabrez Ansari was tied up to a tree and mercilessly beaten for four hours on the sheer suspicion of stealing a bike. When the police arrived, they took him into custody without reporting his assault and without providing any medical treatment. He died three days following his arrest.

Another young Muslim man was beaten up in Gurugram for wearing a kufi, a religious symbol of Islam. In another case, Hindu extremists attacking a man on a train and pushing him off the train when his Muslim identity was known is nothing but a mere example of the rise of Hindu nationalism. These are the heinous acts of civilians, not from the administration. But, the real question lingers here: what is the administration’s approach towards criminal acts where perpetrators are motivated by Hindu Nationalism? The answer might be surprising. When a Telengana MP threatened to behead Muslim youth if any were found to harass Adivashi Women– a bold and racist statement—no immediate action was taken. Even though a complaint was filed to the local police by minority communities.

When Modi himself made statements that refugee camps housing Muslims displaced by riots were “baby-making factories,” fear takes hold in the Muslim community in India, because it instigates further marginalization rather appeasing and erasing it. While he was the Chief Minister of Gujarat in 2002, a riot under Modi’s indirect support broke out that killed over 1000 people, mostly Muslims. A senior police officer testified to the Indian supreme court that Modi had defended this violence at that time as a legitimate route through which Hindus should be allowed to vent their anger against Muslims. This police officer, Sanjiv Bhatt was suspended in 2011 for a case that goes back to 1989, almost thirty years ago and was sacked in 2015 after Modi came to power in 2014.

In the 2019 Indian Election, BJP gave Lok Sabha (Lower house of the Indian’s bicameral parliament) ticket to Sadhvi Pragya Thakur, a woman who is considered to be the mastermind behind a bomb blast that claimed lives of ten Muslims in September 2008. Some political analysts hold India’s PM Modi responsible for those hostile and militant attacks and say that his silence and passive support following those heinous incidents instigates further attacks on minorities.

On March 22, 2019, an Indian court acquitted seven men accused of being involved in a 2007 train bombing that killed 68 people—most of the victims were Muslim. BJP president and Minister of Home Affairs Amit Shah was also acquitted from all charges just after Modi came into power in 2014. He had a long list of criminal cases including murder, intimidation and instigation of sectarian violence.

The Gujarat High Court, on April 20, 2018, exonerated Maya Kodnani, a former Minister of State for Women and Child Development in the Government of Gujarat and 32 others accused of involvement with Naroda Patiya massacre in 2002 killing 57 people. Maya Kodnani was previously convicted by a court and was sentenced 28-year life sentence. But now, under the reign of Modi, she is free without conviction. These exoneration of various high profile individuals are a catalyst that incites sectarian violence and attacks on minorities especially Muslims. With these practices, the position of the current government towards Muslims in India can be easily outlined.

Human Rights Watch published a report this February stating a worrying number of deaths between May 2015 and December 2018. It states that in these years, 44 people—36 out of them are Muslim—were killed by cow vigilantes and mobs, in 12 states. Various human rights organization in India had shown grave concern about the growing number of attacks on minorities. A local organization, India Spend Initiative found that as many as 90% of religious hate crimes since 2009 have occurred after the BJP took power of the central government in 2014. The number of attacks is increasing every passing day. With grisly statistics showing the increase of attacks on Muslims, some people who have real concerns about their future started to ask the question if Hindu Nationalism and violence are the same.

In many places, the fabricated fear of being “taken over” by minorities have been a key factor for many right-wing political parties to win elections. Indian Muslims will have to confront this same approach under the Modi government. In this situation, Indian Muslims should come together and take action to cope with this temporary calamity.

A Muslim party cannot be the only solution, but a solution after all. Two minority communities in India have already proved that through political empowerment, social and economic progress can be achieved and thus, to some extent, their rights could be upheld. Though there exist some old Muslim parties like the All India Majlis-eIttehadul Muslimeen (AIMIM) and the Indian Union Muslim League (IUML), their area of influence is restricted which within Telangana, Kerala and Maharashtra states. So, in order to be a voice against the on-going discrimination of Muslims, political parties and parliament representatives across India are a must.

Division among races, cultures, religions only create chaos and anarchy. It makes progress an impossible task. So, in order to move toward good and well-being, there is no alternative than coming together to extinguish attempts to divide Indian citizens by any sect or faith. If the Modi government wants to give India a place in international platforms, all forms of bigotry and the secret but conspicuous wish of ultra-Hindu Nationalism should be renounced immediately. If not, India will be a home for stigmatization and racism.

Fouad Siniora attended the SETA Foundation in Istanbul for a special lecture on the Middle East under the title “The Effect of Instability in the Arab World on Regional and Global Stability.”

Fouad Siniora was the former Prime Minister of Lebanon, and governed the country from 2005 to 2008. He stepped down on 9 November, 2009, in favour of Saad Hariri.

After an opening speech of the SETA Foundation’s Director of Foreign Policy Muhittin Ataman, Siniora began his speech by highlighting how he moved from the banking sector into politics, but that he was always fond of politics since his childhood. Prior to his role as prime minister, Siniora was Lebanon’s Minister of Finance and is now the leader of the parliamentary group, the Future Movement.

Fouad Siniora underlined how the world is going through changes and immense repercussions, which he described to a “period that is characterized by the absence of global leadership, less cooperation, more uncertainty and lower levels of trust in national and international institutions.”

“The world is increasingly becoming chaotic, where power relations are less clear, universal values are being eroded and the rule of law is being undermined. Accordingly, it appears that the world is leading into a new order, or a new global dis-order.”

Explaining the current situation in the Arab world and the region’s position in terms of international politics, Fouad Siniora described the Middle East as “the crossroad of three continents and the cradle of major civilizations.”

The former PM highlighted how while the Middle East is the most oil and natural resources-rich region, it is also one of the driest regions. He highlighted that while the Middle East has about 6% of the world’s population, it only has 1% of renewable sources of water.

Siniora listed what he believed the most important events to shape politics to be in the Middle East. Among this list was the 1948 Nakba, the events of 1967, which saw Israel occupy more Arab lands, the invasion of Iraq, the Arab Spring, and the impact of technological evolution in the field of telecommunications, which he believed “led among other things to the collapse of fear and silence” in the region.

According to Siniora, the most important problem of the Middle East is the current Palestine problem. The former PM highlighted how the structural policies of Israel are forcing Palestinians to flee their homes. More, criticizing the U.S. move to recognize Jerusalem as the capital city of Israel and the decision to cancel funding to those in need in the occupied Palestinian territories, Siniora emphasized that the fact that the new definition of Palestinian refugees only include those that were actually born in Palestine, is a structural way to slowly but surely see the dismantling and diminishing of this state.

According to Siniora the invasion of Iraq is what allowed for the region to be characterized by sectarian conflicts. Criticizing Iran for its sectarian policies, he simply stated that “We are all Muslims. What’s going to happen when you convert people from one sect to another. Is this how you are going to measure your success?”

Underlining how the Arab world has become the enemy, Siniora stated that “We do not want the rest of the world to be scared of us. But for this to happen, the rest of the world cannot go on to believe that the problems of the Arab world are the problems of the Arab people alone.”

Finalizing his speech, Fouad Siniora insisted on continuous reforms, which will lead to stable growth in the region. For this to happen, according to the former PM, the “Arab world desperately needs new approaches.”

Shia Islam – one of the main components of Iran’s geopolitical design – is the feature that allows Iran to be a prominent actor in the Islamic world. “Geopolitical design” could be defined as the attempt of a cultural system to build a cultural and social world in target regions through state mechanisms. After Joseph Samuel Nye conceptualized “soft power,” the importance of the term became as apparent as “hard power.” It can be argued that the most prominent aspect of soft power is to inspire awe to have the capacity to occupy others’ agendas. “Culture” is the key cornerstone here. Nye defines soft power as the ability of “getting others to want the outcomes that you want” through means that “co-opts people rather than coercing them.” Regardless of how it is pursued, when (and if) a state’s policies are seen as legitimate, their soft power will increase.

It can be stated that Iran’s utilization of paramilitary groups and its military presence in Iraq and Syria can be regarded as “normal” due to Tehran having a higher soft power capacity than Turkey. It’s mainly religious and ideological factors that allow Iran to be more persuasive in the region. Even though Shia Islam has different factions within itself, Iran has started to build its capacity to mobilize Shiite congregations with the Khomeini system established after the 1979 revolution.

Even though Shia Islam has different factions within itself, Iran has started to build its capacity to mobilize Shiite congregations with the Khomeini system established after the 1979 revolution.

In this respect, Khomeini could be considered as the founding father of Shiite Iran. According to this belief, s state without an “innocent imam” as its head cannot be considered “Islamic.” The Shia doctrine states that the “hidden imam” was yet to return and that the Shiites had to wait for his return in order to establish a state. Khomeini developed the theory of “Vilayat-e Faqih,” which allowed the Shiites to establish their own state without the hidden imam’s return. For the first time in history following the Iranian Revolution, the concept to re-design the state was established. Articles 109 and 110 of the Constitution of the Islamic Republic of Iran designates the authority and responsibility of Vilayat-e Faqih. Article 109 states that Vilayat-e Faqih serves as the leader of the Ummah until Mahdi’s return. Further, according to these articles, Vilayat-e Faqih has power over the military, judiciary, and legislative. The introductory provisions of the said constitution therefore clearly states that Iran is based on imamat and Mahdism.

According to Article 12 of the Constitution, the Islamic Republic of Iran’s official religion is “Islam and the Twelver Ja’fari school of [shi‘ī] religion” and “this principle shall remain eternally unchangeable.” While non-sectarianism is praised in Turkey, Iran’s overt sectarianism is somehow disregarded. Iran’s Constitution merely establishes a state based on religion and sect. In all governmental institutions and positions along with the administration of the country, sectarian principles are dominant. Only those who pledge alliance to the “Vilayat-e FaqihTheory” can be appointed to strategic institutions and positions. Individual and societal behaviors are evaluated in accordance with Shia principles, while familial, educational, and cultural aspects are regulated according to Shia values.

Iran’s Constitution merely establishes a state based on religion and sect. In all governmental institutions and positions along with the administration of the country, sectarian principles are dominant.

Thus, Iran not only transformed into a purely ideological and sectarian state, it has also become the global religious and spiritual leader of Shia Islam. Shiism is a profound tool utilized by the government to persuade communities in the region and to attract them against certain policies. This is because sectarian identity has transformed into a political and spiritual identity for Iran. According to the definition in the constitution, “the Islamic Republic is a system based on the faith in belief in the Imams (imamat), continuous leadership, and its fundamental role in the continuity of the Islamic Revolution.” Shia Iran’s most important defining principles are “imamat and leadership.” Imamat is the belief that the leadership has passed on from Prophet Muhammad to Ali and his lineage, and that this leadership was usurped by others. In this respect, Shia is an exclusivist sect. Not only does this understanding of Islam perceive others as wrongdoers, they also regard them as heretics who oppress the believers. Indubitably, each group could deem those that do not share their belief as superstitious. However, the issue here is the politicization of this theological thesis. When you deem superstitious beliefs as your irreconcilable enemies, you will think more about annihilating them rather than persuading them. Moreover, your alliances with them will only aim to save the day or act as part of taqiyya. Thus, you’re forced to tolerate them until you have the power.

Iranian culture centers all around the world have become an important tool for Iran to spread Shia Islam globally. Religious publications, universities, and culture centers are the most prominent instruments of Iran in terms of Shia expansionism. Unlike the publications of the Directorate of Religious Affairs in Turkey, Iran produces Shia religious publications and distributes them to other countries. For instance, “International al-Khoda Publishing” founded in Tehran in 1984 has offices in Afghanistan’s Kabul, Kyrgyzstan’s Bishkek, Turkmenistan’s Ashgabat, Iraq’s Najaf and Tajikistan’s Dushanbe cities. The firm actively attends book fairs held in various countries, and has published over 1200 books in 25 languages.

Iran not only transformed into a purely ideological and sectarian state, it has also become the global religious and spiritual leader of Shia Islam.

Another important instrument that Iran uses to spread its ideology is the “Ahl al-Bayt World Assembly.” The organization has offices in 90 countries. 39 of them are in Asia, while there are 42 in Africa, 18 in the Americas and 40 in Europe. The foreign annunciator network is one of the prominent activities the organization focuses on. In this respect, they grant scholarships to Shiite youth in various countries, bring them to Iran, indoctrinate them in accordance with Iran’s Shia belief and then send them back to their countries. These youth then establish NGOs that comply with the laws of their respective countries and propagate this belief with the support of Iran. According to the official website of the organization, Ahl al-Bayt World Assembly is present in 70 countries and has a network of 5300 foreign annunciators.

Another power dimension for Iran is universities – Al-Mustafa International University being a prominent example. On the contrary to Turkey’s supra-sectarian religious educational institutions, this university provides only Shia education and according to its official website, has 170 subsidiaries. The rector and the board of trustees are directly appointed by the Vilayat-e Faqih.

Iran’s “Ahl Al-Bayt World Assembly” grants scholarships to Shiite youth in various countries, brings them to Iran, indoctrinates them in accordance with Iran’s Shia belief and then sends them back to their countries.

A subsidiary of the Al-Mustafa International University, Al-Mustafa Research Center has 17 different divisions and conducts various social researches. The university’s publications are available in 8 countries and in 13 different languages. Al-Mustafa International University Publishing has offices in the UK, Indonesia, Malaysia, Lebanon, India, Pakistan, Afghanistan, and Thailand. According to the fund corresponding to code 114400 in the seventh table on page 101 of the 2018 budget proposal, $84 million was allocated to the Al-Mustafa International University.

Lastly, Shia Culture Centers are another instrument that surrounds the world. For instance, there are 45 Shia Culture Centers in the Americas. India has the highest Shia population among non-Muslim Asian countries and has a specific place in Shia literature. India, a country where 50 million Shiites live, has a deep-rooted Shia tradition and has strong sectarian and cultural relations with Iran. There are 19 Shia Culture Centers in Thailand and 27 in India. Currently, there are 180 Shia Culture Centers in Africa. As is seen, Iran is deeply rooted in investing in Shiism and has established special institutions in order to spread the belief along its area of influence.

*This article was first published in Turkish in Turkiye Gazetesi on December 1, 2018.

Since the announcement of the inconclusive national election results, events in Iraq have been sliding towards a civil war. In addition to this, the U.S. and Iran race for influence and hegemony in the country has speeded up the deterioration of conditions in Iraq. This piece seeks to discuss the latest developments regarding this issue in the light of the decision of the Iraqi parliament, which was issued on June 6, and which called for the sorting and manual re-count of all votes and the abolition of thousands of ballot boxes. This matter puts Iraq into a path of uncertainty during a very critical period.

The political situation has become a bottleneck that may be difficult to get out of, and it is being followed with series of destabilizing events. Unless these issues are being checked upon, Iraq will witness a civil war in a manner very similar to what is going on in Syria and Yemen. An Iraqi political analyst, writing for the daily Baghdad Post (May 23, 2018), stated that: “Iran ignites fire of “civil war” in Iraq… Iran is trying through Qassem Soleimani’s efforts, which is in Iraq now, to ruin all efforts to form a government that would not be totally loyal to her…”

Nouri al-Maliki, ex-premier and the leader of the State of Law election bloc, has joined with Hadi al-Amir’s Naser bloc in a single sectarian bloc, and has declared their hostility to the Moqatada Sadr bloc, which won the most seats in the recent election. The Sadrist project, which has been viewed by many as an Iraqi project, stands against the pro-Iranian Maliki project. The former wants to disband and demobilize the Shiite militia, known as Hashed, improve relations with Iraq’s Arab neighbors, and wants to take a neutral stand in the ongoing U.S. and Iranian rivalry in the Middle East.

Iranians have been involved in many political games such as eliciting dozens of deputies in the coalition of Naser, led by Prime Minister Haidar Abadi, in order to join pro-Iranian political blocs. According to some sources in Baghdad, the pro-Iranian circles have recently inaugurated a series of assassinations in Baghdad in order to fuel the fire of civil war. The explosion in Sadr City, which killed and wounded tens of people in Baghdad on the night of June 7, and the subsequent burning of the election ballot boxes housed in the Independent Electoral High Commission storage in Baghdad are designs of the people that want to push the Sadr group into retaliation and want to create a political rapture in Iraq. If history is any guide to us, Mr. Sadr will not be silent on all these events, even if this requires a full-fledged civil war.

It is noteworthy that al-Maliki made numerous statements in the week leading to the election in which he threatened with civil war if the election results were rigged. Many believe that this was an expression of prior knowledge on his part that he will lose the elections. Those threats “are not new to him, especially since his record is full of manipulating sectarian violence during the past years. It is not unlikely for him to re-start it again, if the course of the events were to his dislike,” wrote an expert on Iraq affairs. After the elections, al-Maliki repeated the same threat through the statement made by an MP from his bloc – Mohamed Sahiod – who told the press on May 17 that, “We demand the abolition of the election results and the extension of the work of parliament and to make the current government of Abadi a Caretaker Government due to the wide scale of fraud which took place in the electoral process.”

Iraq’s parliament passed a law on June 6 ordering a nationwide manual recount of votes in the May 12 parliamentary elections. This was a day after the prime minister had stated that there had been serious violations. This move could hinder the delicate process of forming a new government and raising the prospect of further uncertainty in Iraq. This law has also added further fuel to the fire of crisis and was received with mixed and opposing statements. It appears that Abadi’s bloc, which trailed in third place, has some information suggesting that a manual recount will increase their seats.

The pro-Iranian camp wanted the parliament to go further than by just declaring the election results null and void in order to deny Sadr any opportunity to form the government. The National Coalition of Iyad Allawi, which did not perform well either, has also supported the idea of re-holding the election. Allawi stated that, “the declared results of the elections, as it stands now and without taking into consideration numerous appeals against abuse and large-scale fraud, especially after the United Nations confirmed the existence of fraud and manipulation of votes, will lead to producing a parliament challenged by its legitimacy and an illegitimate government.

Hassan Jihad, a leader in the Coalition of Justice and Democracy in Northern Iraq (Kurdistan), led by Barham Sali, said on June 7 that the decisions of the parliament on the elections restored confidence in the elections and institutions: “The re-counting and manual counting and the application of recent measures will change the number of seats and the results of opposition parties.” He added that, “the ruling parties in the KRG should accept the fact that recounting electoral votes will change the number of seats and it should respect the domestic experience.”

The new election has suspended the work of the Independent Electoral Commission and authorized a Commission made of nine judges to carry out the re-count of votes throughout Iraq. Should this law be applied, it may lead to a series of new crises and complicate the political situation in Iraq in order to reach a state of suffocation. On June 21, the Supreme Court passed a decree, which approved the June 6 law passed by the Iraqi Parliament regarding the manual recount of votes in Iraq as constitutional. This will halt all attempts to form the government and will open hell’s door and further complicate the situation.

It appears that the “biggest beneficiaries of this process are parliamentarian Salim al-Jubouri and the government of Haider al-Abadi.” Al-Jubouri, who failed to regain his seat, believes that he has been done a great deal of injustice in this election. Hassan Turan, a Turkmen MP, was quoted stating, “The high attendance rate during the parliamentary session confirmed beyond doubt that all political blocs, including the winner, wants to distance themselves from the forgers.”

While it may seem that both Iran and the U.S. are distancing themselves from all these rapid transformations that are taking place in Iraq, behind the scenes both governments are moving all the threads of the game. It is noteworthy that both governments have welcomed the results of the election declared by electronic counting. However, it seems that the frantic frenzy behind the scene of both the U.S. and Iran is to influence the process of government formation.

It could be stated that the election results are only a symptom of a larger crisis. The 2003 Iraq invasion not only destroyed the existing state machinery but failed to replace it with a sound and effective one. As the Iraqi Vice President Ayad Allawi told The National during his visit to Dubai on April 9: “Elections will not solve the crises Iraq faces unless it maintains an inclusive political process, overcomes sectarian divisions and rids itself of foreign interference.

The African proverb goes to say that when two elephants wrestle, it is only the grass on which the wrestle taking place will be harmed. Iraq looks like it has become the grass affected by the two fighting elephants: Iran and the U.S. Turkey should support Abadi or Sadr in order to form a coalition government as only a moderate Shiite group could help prevent a civil war. As with the Syrian Civil War, a civil war in Iraq will have adverse effects on Turkey.

The Iraqi parliamentary elections took place on May 12, 2018 in the shadow of the concerns shaped by the profound crises the country confronted as of 2003. Leaving the sectarian discourses that determined post-2003 Iraqi politics aside, the political parties this time made an emphasis on the Iraqi nation and went to the polls with supra-sectarian lists. The Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi’s Victory Alliance became the first party in Mosul, Moqtada al-Sadr’s Saairun coalition received a considerable vote share across the nation, and Ayad Allawi’s Al-Wataniya coalition listed both Sunni and Shia politicians. All these developments demonstrated that various political actors endeavored to address the Iraqi nation as a whole in terms of both discourse and practice.

Another matter of debate during the election process has been a question as to whether the government would be formed with a sectarian and ethnicity-based distribution of seats or with a political majority. Various circles in Iraq stressed that the presence of all the parliamentary parties in the government and the absence of an opposition blocked the political control mechanisms in the country. It was suggested that the political majority should form the government whereas those unable to enter the government should remain as opposition. Also, due to such political barriers, the corruption allegations could not be dealt with properly. Prime Minister Abadi brought the corruption allegations to the agenda and pointed out that it is time to fight against corruption following the successful anti-Daesh fight.

Another issue that was highly discussed during the election process was the relations between politics and arms. The collapse of the security sector in the country following the overthrow of Saddam Hussein, the fact that U.S. troops stayed in the country for a long time as an occupying force, the appearance of the Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF, Al-Hashd Al-Sha’abi) during the anti-Daesh fight, and the presence of a separate security sector in North Iraq led to a complicated security system in Iraq. Those making an emphasis on civilian politics, especially Sadr, defended the reconstruction of the Iraqi security sector, the complete exclusion of armed units from the realm of politics, and drawing a sharp distinction between politics and arms. Various political groups and societal segments expressed their complaints over the PMF and the Fatah coalition, who has strong links to the former. In addition, the comments of Ayatollah Sistani on the political situation, who is the most influential Shia cleric in Iraq and the leading Ayatollah in Najaf, stirred a great deal of debates ahead of the parliamentary elections.

Serious objections were made to the election results beginning from the night of the election. The Iraqi Independent High Electoral Commission announced that the votes in a total of 1024 ballot boxes were cancelled on the grounds of irregularities. Meanwhile, a number of news reports stated that several political parties are preparing to issue a parliamentary motion next week for the manual recount of votes in case the electronic tallies used in the election might be faulty. The manual recount decision will be issued if 165 parliament members vote for the motion. But such a decision is quite risky as it will unsettle the atmosphere formed by the election results. Correspondingly, the head of the Independent High Electoral Commission Riyadh al-Badran issued a statement on the subject and warned that a possible intervention in the election results might drift the country into an internal conflict.

The election results displayed that the Iraqi electorate wants reform, national unity, economic development and demilitarization while refusing to get involved in the U.S.-Iran rivalry. The one making the strongest emphasis on these aspects turned out as the frontrunner of the elections, which reflects the electorate’s will in this direction. It has been seen that Sadr hastily established contacts with the actors emphasizing the abovementioned aspects, such as Ammar al-Hakim and Abadi, and gave the signals of cooperating with Sunni political coalitions including as Al-Wataniya and Muttahidoon (the Uniters for Reform Coalition) while giving a green light to the Kurdish actors such as the New Generation, Goran and Barham Salih. Such acts of Sadr showed that he is willing to meet the demands of the electorate.

Considering Sadr’s political background and his discourse and messages before and after the elections, it is seen that he wishes to shape Iraqi politics on the basis of national consensus and a reformist perspective and render the country independent from external factors. Therefore, Sadr will probably want to cooperate with the actors close to him by eliminating political actors representing the burdens of Iraq, such as sectarianism, dependence on foreign actors and corruption as much as possible. This approach of Sadr will be quite effective in the ongoing government forming process in Iraq.

The divergence of the Shia political groups that cooperated in the past and the dissolution of the Shiite bloc in the run up to the elections showed that the Shias developed different visions on the future of Iraq. Abadi and Nouri al-Maliki, two figures from Iraq’s Dawa Party, ran for the elections on two different lists, whereas the PMF gathered the electorate from many political groups including the bases of Abadi, Maliki and Hakim and a divergence has been observed between Hakim and the Islamic Supreme Council of Iraq. These are some of the examples portraying the divergence of Shia groups. Also, the rivalries between Sadr and Maliki; Hadi Al-Amiri and Hakim; and Abadi and Maliki demonstrate the growing dissent. The spiritual leadership Sistani represents seeks to play a conciliatory role by avoiding to become a party to any side, but he does not refrain from taking a stance against crucial issues such as corruption. Alternative opinions regarding the relation between religion and politics that do not cohere with orthodox Shiism began to spread among the youth while the separation of religion and politics started to be articulated more frequently and vocally.

The number of minor and local groups increased after the dissolution of Sunni groups and some of them ran for the elections in the lists of Abadi and Fatah, which revealed that the Shia political actors in control of government bodies achieved to win the Sunnis over and the Sunni political elites failed to meet the demands of the Sunni electorate. Furthermore, it has been frequently expressed in field that the presence of the PMF in Sunni regions has a strong influence on the behaviors of the Sunni electorate and elite and negatively affected the political representation of the Sunni will. Another significant issue that needs to be addressed is the question as to whether the ballots reflect the will of the Sunnis subject to domestic migration to different parts of Iraq due to the Daesh threat. The reflection of the Sunni people’s will on politics and whether they would receive the share they demanded from the Baghdad administration will continue to be among the primary issues of Iraqi politics.

More, it has been observed that there is not any significant divergence in Kurdish politics. The Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) and the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), who are the two leading actors of Kurdish politics, maintain their influence. There has been a decrease in parliamentary seats occupied by Goran and Islamic parties. It has been revealed that new political movements, such as the coalitions founded by Shahsuvar Abdulvahit and Barham Salih, enjoyed a voter support that suffices to carry them through. Despite that, it has been another point of discussion whether the Kurdish electorate found what they expected from Kurdish politics. The developments in the upcoming days will shed light on a number of issues including how the tensions in the Arbil-Baghdad line could be restored following the illegal referendum and the profound economic crisis suffered by North Iraq and how the internal balances in North Iraq will reflect on the relations with Baghdad. The attitude of the Iraqi Kurds during the government formation process will also be a major determinant in Iraqi politics.

The new political portrait that has emerged as a result of the interaction between politicians and the electorate for the past 15 years is not the sole factor reflecting the trajectory of Iraqi politics since Iraq is the leading country affected by the U.S.-Iran tension. In the following period, the character of the tension between Iran and the U.S. will shape both actors’ Iraq policies and determine the features they are looking for in their alliances in Iraq. The rising tension between these countries will negatively influence the voter-politician interaction in Iraq and the possibility of reconciliation in Iraq will increase in the contrary case. Therefore, the future of Iraq also depends on global and regional balances alongside the country’s internal dynamics, and the new government will be formed on this basis.

U.S. regional allies, the Israel-Gulf bloc’s demands toward breaking Iran’s regional influence and the rigidity of U.S. President Trump’s steps to that end will determine the rigidity of Iran’s counter maneuvers. If confronted with harsh steps, Iran will attempt to use its influence on Iraq to break the pressure on itself. While the U.S. will prefer actors in Iraq that will leave Iraq out of this tension by narrowing Iran’s sphere of influence, Iran will prefer actors that will act in its favor. As in the past 15 years, Turkey will prefer to play a balancing role to help Iraq overcome such tensions with minimum damage. In addition to this, Turkey will take on active roles in solving the water problem in Iraq, cooperation in counter-terror fight and the reconstruction of Iraq – displaying a policy rather different from those engaging in power struggle by proxy.

In a nutshell, the atmosphere prevailing after the Iraqi parliamentary elections showed the changing nature of Iraqi politics. A considerable part of the Iraqi electorate demands the solution of the country’s chronic problems, normalization of daily life and wants domestic politics to get over sectarian and ethnicity-based polarizations whilst another part still carries the burden introduced with post-2003 Iraq. In Iraqi politics, local dynamics are not the sole determinants as the U.S.-Iran conflict also has negative effects on the country. This conflict will be visible in the government formation process of Iraq and will continue to negatively affect the future of the country. On the other hand, the balancing role played by several countries in the region such as Turkey is making positive contributions to the relief of Iraqi people.

Boko Haram has been perpetrating mass crimes in Nigeria since 2009. The insurgency has massacred thousands of people and has destroyed the entire region’s political structure and economic circulation. According to the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), the group has killed over 20,000 people and has forced nearly 2.1 million people to flee their homes. Massive displacement has caused serious consequences for the country such as large-scale famine, which threatens the lives of 7 million people. Just this year, 4.7 million people were left in urgent need of food assistance.

As the group gradually gained infamy in the region as well as the world, discussions have set to investigate the main reasons behind the emergence of Boko Haram. The decade-long deep-rooted political and economic issues have always been pointed out as the main reasons for the birth of Boko Haram. It is true that widespread poverty leaves millions of people impoverished; economic inequality and weak political structures trigger ethno-religious conflicts and violence between the Christian dominated South and the Muslim dominated North; epidemic corruption wipes out the country’s development; and the poor education system fails to transform northern Nigeria through the education of new generations.

Undoubtedly, these chronic problems have had a dramatic influence on many young Nigerians who are pushed to a stalemate where their hope for the future is about to end. However, religious aspects of Boko Haram have usually been ignored in the discussions. In fact, the transformation of Islamic life itself can be regarded as the root cause that gradually gave birth to Boko Haram. By challenging Sufi Islam, which has firmly been established in Nigeria since the fifteenth century, the group built a theological foundation based on Salafi thought, which became a new phenomenon in the 1970’s.

Historically, Sufism was the main Islamic school in the region over the centuries. Although the spread of Islam gradually began to be driven by Sufi orders in the 15th century, the 19th century was marked as a milestone for Sufi Islam. Preaching Sufi Islam and becoming a prominent scholar, Usman Dan Fodio declared a war in 1804 against the rulers due to their oppressive, corrupt and un-Islamic administration. After 5 years of regional war, Fodio with his followers, succeeded to conquer most of the city-states across northern Nigeria, southern Niger and the western part of Cameroon. With this, he formed the biggest Islamic empire in the history of West Africa since the Songhay Empire collapsed in the 15th century. However, the significance of the Sokoto Empire was not its military advancement or political power, but a broad socio-political system that still mostly exists in present northern Nigeria. As a result, Sufi Islam gradually became a predominant form of Islam and a guideline for Nigerians in their lives, as it was institutionalized in both government and civil society.

The picture began to slowly change after Nigeria gained its independence from the United Kingdom, as Sufism faced a new phenomenon, Salafism. Since the 1970s Salafism began to gain its popularity among different sects of Nigerian Muslims. Essentially, social and economic developments, such as high population growth and rapid urbanization, helped Salafi thoughts to be planted in society. From 1960 to 2015, the country’s population quadrupled from 45 million to 182 million people. According to figures published by the World Bank, the number of people in urban areas also skyrocketed from just 6 to 87 million in the same period. The population boom in urban areas brought with it a huge number of young people who didn’t have traditional Sufi education.

These socioeconomic developments undermined the traditional Sufi establishment and formed a basis for new religious movements and scholars to emerge. Since the 1970s, Salafi scholar Abdulkadir Gumi publicly questioned and criticized Sufism and Izala, one of the largest Salafi organizations in the region, reached to huge audiences from different levels of society.

Middle-class urban Muslims approved Izala’s messages as it provided “a more rational religion.” The anti-Sufi rhetoric that Izala built also meant freedom from the traditional hierarchies for the impoverished youth who moved to the urban cities seeking a better life. Therefore, Salafi thought played a crucial role in the transformation of understanding and practicing Islam in northern Nigeria. Nonetheless, the 90s brought structural changes for Izala. The movement was divided into many sections as intra-Salafi tension increased and it caused radical groups, such as Boko Haram, to flourish.

Two essential details reveal how Boko Haram exploited Salafi thought and used it in order to frame its violence. First, the founder of the group, Muhammed Yusuf, rose as a young Salafi preacher in an Islamic center that was founded by a former Salafi Izala preacher, Jafar Mahmud Adam. Through this network, Yusuf managed to control several mosques and found a significant number of audiences to address his radical sermons. Therefore the system Yusuf created within the Salafi network helped him form Boko Haram.

Secondly, starting from the 1980s, the city of Maiduguri, which is the capital city of northeastern Borno state, became a center for Salafi groups just in less than two decades. The city was where Adam – the Salafi scholar who hired Muhammed Yusuf into his network – was based, and where Boko Haram was born. It may seem that Boko Haram, under the leadership of Abubakar Shekau, has moved away from the Salafi concept to a new ideology that favors Daesh-style violence-centered terrorism. However, despite the theological evaluation, Salafi doctrine still remains within the group’s ideological structure.

In order to avoid any possible confusion or assumption, I would like to emphasize that this piece is not written to make a comparison between “peaceful” Sufism and “violent” Salafism, the problematic angle which Western scholars and writers like to use. These two Islamic schools have various sub-branches and numerous interpretations across the Islamic world. However, Salafism has had a remarkable impact on the transformation of Islamic life in post-colonial Nigeria and it needs to be further explored. Whether sooner or later, Boko Haram will one day disappear, but Salafi thought is a longer-term phenomenon that has been shaping and transforming Islamic life in Nigeria. Therefore, this very fact reflects a deeper change for Nigeria, more than does the violence committed by Boko Haram.

Despite the high-profile participation, the fact that the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Bahrain sent low-ranking representatives to the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) summit held in Istanbul on 13 December, 2017, upon the call of President Erdogan, caused heated discussions in Turkey and the region. UAE Minister of Foreign Affairs Abdullah bin Zayed’s slanderous remarks about Fahreddin Pasha, who defended Medina during the siege of the holy city during World War One, revealed the UAE’s discomfort about Turkey’s historical responsibility for holy lands, especially Jerusalem. In this respect, discussions surrounding the UAE and Saudi position on the Jerusalem crisis, the Arab Spring, and the normalization of relations with Israel have become increasingly deepened.

The intersection of UAE and Israel policies

Criticized for its attitude towards the Jerusalem crisis, the UAE was also against the demands voiced during the Arab Spring and the political actors that the process produced. The UAE and Israel’s discomfort towards these demands and anti-Iranian notions have transformed into a synchronized foreign policy vision that support each other. While anti-Iran notions were on the rise in the Gulf, there was an increasing irritation in Israel towards the political actors of the Arab Spring. Therefore, in both the UAE and Israel, a foreign policy targeting Iran and the Arab Spring became apparent. The friendship between UAE Crown Prince Mohammed bin Zayed – the most prominent representative of this vision – and Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman inevitably contributed to the rise of the latter. The crises created by Iran’s sectarian policies in Iraq and Lebanon became tools of legitimization for both the UAE and Saudi Arabia.

The UAE’s support and the UAE Ambassador to the U.S. Yousef Al Otaiba’s lobbying in favor of Salman rendered Saudi Arabia’s Crown Prince a reputable ally of Washington. Mohammed bin Salman met with U.S. President Donald Trump on May 14, 2017, before he even became Crown Prince. His close relations with Trump’s son-in-law and advisor, Jared Kushner, could be understood from the meetings that lasted for hours. Therefore, a common vision towards the region was established between the UAE, Saudi Arabia, Israel and the United States. By pursuing various initiatives, Salman and Zayed persuaded both Egypt and Bahrain to join this alliance. Kuwait, on the other hand, preferred to remain outside of this pact, taking a different position on the embargo imposed on Qatar and the recent Jerusalem crisis.

Israel would welcome any step taken away from the Palestine cause by the UAE or Saudi Arabia. While until recent events Saudi Arabia had expressed that normalization of relations with Israel depended on the resolution of the Palestine-Israel conflict, this prerequisite began to be a burden for the Kingdom, as the administration decided to normalize relations with Israel before any solution to the conflict. For this reason, the alliance formed between the UAE and Saudi Arabia – which seems to be welcomed by Israel and the U.S. – sent low-ranking officials to the OIC summit in Istanbul. The discomfort expressed by this alliance in regards to Ankara’s initiative in aiming to preserve the status of Jerusalem was clearly expressed through various statements made by the UAE’s Minister of Foreign Affairs.

Pressure on Palestine: “Accept the U.S. plan!”

Perceiving Qatar as a threat to the domination of their foreign policy framework in the region, the embargo applied on Doha was a precautionary measure taken by the Saudi-UAE alliance in order to prevent any possible opposition. However, with the support of Turkey, Qatar resisted. As listed within the sanctions imposed on the country, Qatar was demanded to withdraw its support from Hamas, a prominent actor within the Palestinian resistance movement. This clearly indicated that the embargo aimed to undermine the resistance movement in Palestine.  Moreover, allegations that the Saudi-UAE alliance attempted to force Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas to refuse an alliance with Hamas under any conditions and to accept Jared Kushner’s so-called “Peace Plan” were widely covered in the press.

While Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro personally attended the OIC summit organized in Istanbul on December 13, 2017, as a response to the U.S. decision to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel, Saudi Arabia was represented at the same summit with a deputy minister. While the UAE, Bahrain and Egypt were represented by their ministers of foreign affairs, Kuwaiti Emir Sabah Al-Ahmad Al-Jaber Al-Sabah attended the summit in person. In this respect, the attitudes displayed by Saudi Arabia and the UAE towards the OIC extraordinary summit were not spontaneous, but were a mere reflection of an order desired after the Arab Spring. The absence of Bahraini and Egyptian leaders also re-iterate the position of these two states within the Saudi-UAE alliance.

The fact that 24 officials from Bahrain visited Israel immediately after Trump’s Jerusalem decision led to intense criticism of the regime. The Sisi regime on the other hand, while maintaining its close relations with the government of Israel, continues to preserve its strategic partnership with the UAE – a state that provided the means for the military regime to consolidate its power in Egypt.

In comparison to the states that took sides with the Saudi-UAE alliance, Kuwait approached both the Qatar crisis and the normalization period with Israel from a very different perspective. During the International Parliamentary Union (IPU) meeting held in Russia on October 18, 2017, Kuwait’s Parliamentary Spokesman Marzouq al-Ghanim called the Israeli delegates “child murderers” and demanded they leave the session.

In a letter written to Ghanim, Kuwaiti Emir Al-Sabah endorsed how the actions of Ghanim were to be proud of, adding that his attitude at the IPU was “reflective of Kuwait’s consolidation with its Palestinian brothers.” These developments highlight how Kuwait views the clandestine lobbies in the Gulf, which attempt to normalize relations with Israel. Moreover, under Ghanim’s patronage, the “Boycott, Divestment and Sanctions” (BDS) movement, an organization founded to boycott the apartheid state of Israel, organized its first regional Anti-Normalization Conference in Kuwait.

Attempting to normalize relations with Israel through shared anti-Iran notions, the UAE and Saudi Arabia failed to establish the alliance they desired in the Gulf due to the resistance displayed by Qatar and Kuwait. Attitudes of the aforementioned countries during the OIC summit in Istanbul created fervent discussions about the legitimacy of both the UAE and Saudi Arabia’s regional policies. Despite going against a U.N. resolution, by designating Israel’s ambition to legitimize Jerusalem as its capital city as one of his main foreign policy aims, Trump has caused a particular isolation of the U.S. in world politics, which has never been experienced in the country’s history.

The failure of the Saudi-UAE axis in regards to the Jerusalem issue illustrates the fact that this group is in search for an order in the region, which includes the re-design of the Palestine-Israel issue. The embargo imposed upon Qatar, Mohammed bin Salman becoming the Crown Prince, dismissals within Saudi Arabia and the Jerusalem decision could be interpreted as signs of a new order. Israel prefers the region to be secluded and in conflict with its own people rather than an order in which leaders satisfy the demands of their citizens, transfer power peacefully, are integrated with the world and provide social welfare and freedoms. This can be clearly observed in countries that ally with the UAE-Saudi axis, which nevertheless act in accordance with Israel. The Sisi regime is on the verge of chaos and economic bankruptcy in Egypt, Khalifa Haftar has undermined the political resolution proposed by the U.N. in Libya, and Saudi Arabia’s intervention in the civil war in Yemen has deepened the crisis rather than solving it. All these facts hint at a future that the foreign policy of the UAE-Saudi alliance provides.

Ultimately, substantial reactions towards Israel and the U.S. in terms of the Jerusalem decision will not hinder the UAE and Saudi Arabia’s attempts to expand their alliance together with Israel. These countries will continue to cooperate and will continue to stand against the countries that oppose the destructive policies of both the U.S. and Israel. It is not difficult to assert that the U.S. and Israel will support Arab countries that can adjust to the Jerusalem decision. Thus, for this reason, we have entered a new era that will lead to substantial transformation in the region.

The proxy wars that began in the Middle East have had dramatic impacts on many countries. With the involvement of global actors such as the United States and Russia, the ongoing struggle for power in the region paved the way for chaos. As these wars are fought in a third country through proxies, very unlike conventional wars, conflicts inevitably transform into a civil war. In this respect, conflicts in the Middle East share similarities – the situation of Iraq following the 2003 invasion and the status of Syria, Yemen and Libya after the 2011 riots are all reminiscent of each other. This situation has brought Yemen to such a point that the country is unable to deal with the humanitarian crises. While Yemen has simply become territory contested between Iran and Saudi Arabia, the interventions made by the US over al-Qaeda serve as a catalyst in this situation.

The cost of civil war

Having suffered civil wars between 1962-1968 and 1990-1994, Yemen is facing similar conditions today. The Saudi-led operations, aiming to thwart the Iran-backed Houthis’ ambitious politics to control the country, has come at a very high cost. According to figures published by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), the civil war has left over 5,000 dead and around 40,000 injured. Approximately over a million people were forced to migrate and leave their homes. Over 90 percent of Sudanese migrants in Yemen, who had originally arrived to find employment, have had to leave the country. Moreover, at least 10,000 Yemenis have immigrated to Djibouti. Stating that virtually no family had been left untouched by the civil war, ICRC Chair Peter Maurer described the situation in Yemen as a “man-made humanitarian catastrophe,” adding that the situation is worsening day-by-day.

Further, in Yemen today the education and health institutions have lost a great deal of functionality. According to a report published by the United Nations and other observers, two-thirds of the 24 million population in Yemen are on the edge of starvation and do not have access to clean water, while 3.3 million people are living in famine. According to the report, 2 million children are suffering from malnutrition. At least 160 health institutions and buildings have been attacked. The interruption of public services in cities across the country have led to heaps of garbage and overflowing sewage, which inevitably affects the health of locals. These circumstances gave birth to the cholera outbreak, which has affected approximately 60,000 people, and killed 2,000 in the last six months. Despite this situation, institutions such as the World Health Organization (WHO) have expressed that they are unable to provide adequate aid due to security risks. Despite the fact that Saudi Arabia announced the removal of the blockade (which Riyadh applied), neither the UN nor any other humanitarian agency have been able to deliver aid to the country.

It is crucial to recognize that this situation was not created by some sort of natural disaster or by a conventional war. The humanitarian crises in Yemen is a direct outcome of the proxy war fought between Iran and Saudi Arabia. Recognizing exactly this point will be the first step in resolving the crisis.

How did the situation get here?

Following the uprisings in early 2011, the resignation of Ali Abdullah Saleh raised hopes that there would be a smooth transition in Yemen. Saleh’s resignation and the commencement of transition was realized under the influence of Saudi Arabia. The role Saudi Arabia played in this transition had both positive and negative impacts. While the advantage of this was that the transition process would be realized under the patronage of a powerful actor, the risks included the possibility of an Iranian intervention – Riyadh’s historical rival. Indeed, the position of Saudi Arabia in respect to changing dynamics in the region, including the securitization of the Muslim Brotherhood and the lack of focus on Yemen led to Iran’s mobilization in the country, which resulted in the worst-case scenario.

Under the supervision of the UN, almost all parties were represented at the National Dialogue Conference (NDC) – the negotiation platform of the transition process in Yemen. Saleh’s General People’s Congress was also present at this platform. The main goal here was to render the transition process inclusive and prevent the marginalization of any actor. The presence of groups, which had 34 years of administrative experience in the new government, had the possibility of damaging the transition period. In fact, this became reality as the General People’s Congress, which has been under Saleh’s control, neglected its duties when conflicts with the Houthi rebels heightened. This enabled the Houthis to gain ground in various places and, after a while, the General People’s Congress chose to cooperate with the Houthis.

The National Dialogue Conference, the main mechanism of the transition period, has been identified as a platform that represents all political parties, women and young people. After yearlong negotiations, a pronouncement was declared to implement the NDC’s decision on January 21, 2014. The pronouncement included an extension of President Hadi’s term by one year, holding parliamentary elections, reformation of the advisory council to have thirty members each from the North and South and the designation of a new frame to create a new constitution which incorporated the NDC decision. However, the Houthis refused to recognize the arrangement and conflicts resumed. Leading a Hezbollah-like structure with the participation of various tribes and sects, the Houthis formed the “Ansarullah.” Thus, while attempting to thwart the accusations of sectarianism, the Houthis were able to form a broad-based military structure. The Houthi/Ansarullah began to advance to the south in January 2014, and with the cooperation of the former regime forces, captured Yemen’s capital Sana’a within a year. Shortly thereafter, the group rested on the borders of Aden.

Trying to maintain the administration by going to Aden, Hadi wrote a letter to the UN on March 25, demanding the UN Security Council to take a decision which allowed the military intervention of “volunteer countries” to halt the march of Houthis in Yemen. Concerned about its former ally being controlled by Iran, Saudi Arabia commenced an operation in Yemen together with Gulf countries and Egypt.

While the “Operation Decisive Storm” was expected to conclude within a couple of months of its beginning, the operation was unable to yield any substantial outcomes besides re-capturing various Houthi-controlled regions. In addition to the failure to capture Sana’a, the Houthis now possess missiles that could hit Riyadh. Although there are rumors that Saleh’s forces have switched sides in line with the Saud, this has not yet been confirmed. Even if this was correct however, it should not be expected to cause a significant change. In short, the struggle for power over Yemen did not only endure the civil war, but led to mass hunger and famine at the same time.

From a proxy war to a humanitarian crisis

Sharing borders with the narrow Gulf of Aden, large ocean waters and with a border completely overlooking Saudi Arabia, Yemen has transformed into a battleground where the struggle for power in the region is staged. With the mobilization of their armed wing Ansarullah, while the Houthis were just about to seize Aden, which would mean obtaining complete control of North Yemen, Saudi Arabia interpreted this situation as Iranian expansionism and responded with a military intervention.

It is no exaggeration to assert that the civil war in Yemen has gone from the most likely scenario to the worst.  In order for the conflict to come to an end, one of the following three possibilities must be realized: first, either one side prevails and imposes conditions on the other party, second, the cost of the war becomes unbearable for both parties, and third, an external actor acts as a mediating force between the two sides. Neither of these three scenarios have occurred: There is no indication of an overwhelming superiority one party has over the other, the cost of war is manageable for both parties and in addition, it’s clear that neither the UN nor the US has taken enough initiative to solve the problem. The prolongation of the war, the humanitarian crises that have arisen out of it, and the emerging presence of Daesh in Yemen is a result of this stalemate.

What’s next in Yemen?

About a month ago, ousted leader Ali Abdullah Saleh once again changed sides and started to fight against the Houthis, leading to conflict in the vicinity of Sana’a. The local population in Sana’a attempted to seize various public institutions. This image created a perception that Saleh could be effective against the Houthis. Yet, it is difficult to claim that Saleh had the power to shift the balance in the field by himself. In such a scenario, he would have needed arms and soldiers from Saudi Arabia and its allies.

The assassination of Saleh taking place at a time when he changed sides is significant, especially considering that this shift was yet to influence the balance in the field. Although revenge may increase motivation for a short while, for the time being, it remains a mystery as to whether followers of Saleh would be effective without their leader. Therefore, the future of the conflict depends on what actions the Saudis and their allies will take.

After the assassination of Saleh, it is undoubted that Saudi Arabia will intensify its military activity in Yemen. In order to gain successful results, the Saudis need land force. While the Saudis will organize and arm followers of Saleh, it is going to prove difficult to yield results in the short-term. Neither the Saudis nor the United Arab Emirates (UAE) will use their own military.

Another scenario that is spoken about is that the UAE will consider the division of Yemen – yet they will fail in persuading the Riyadh administration to accept this. Such a division would mean the foundation of a Houthi state right on the south of Saudi Arabia. Besides, the international community will also reject the political division of the country.

The conflict in Yemen is a proxy war that is yet to reach its climax and neither the local nor the major actors involved are at a point to end this war. Yemen has fallen into a chaotic situation. Issues exacerbating each other have created a two-tiered problem at the basic level: a military/political crisis and a humanitarian crisis. While the military crisis is a hard case to resolve due to the aforementioned parameters, an intervention to end the humanitarian crises should remain a priority, as all parties are responsible for its resolution.

Yemen is on boil after the assassination of the ousted leader Ali Abdullah Saleh, along with many supporters, by Houthi rebels near estranged nation’s capital, Sana, on Monday.

The assassination is expected to trigger country-wide escalation in violence, with millions of Saleh’s supporters expected to vie for revenge.

Yemen’s current President Abd-Rabbu Mansour Hadi on Monday called on Yemeni people to rise up against Houthi rebels, who are mainly supported by Iran to counter Saudi influence in Yemen.

“Let’s put our hands together to end the control of these criminal gangs and build a new united Yemen,” said Hadi, who is in exile in Riyadh.

Before being overthrown in 2011 amid the wave of Arab uprisings that swept the Arab world from the Atlantic to Persian Gulf, Saleh had ruled Yemen for three decades. In 2011 he met the fate of many Arab monarchs and dictators who like Saleh ruled their territories as family property. Saleh had taken over North Yemen in 1978 and became the President of the entire republic after North and South Yemen united in 1990. Since the unification period, Yemen has not seen any other leader climb the throne.

As a tribal country, like many other Arab countries where monarchs have often found it easy to rule their countries by pitting tribes against one another, Yemen directly descended into civil war after the 2011 uprisings in the Arab world. Ever since, these civil wars were fueled by outsiders in order to attain their strategic objectives.

While condemning the assassination of Saleh by the “terrorist organization” head of the Arab League, Ahmed Abdul Gheit on Tuesday said, “All means must be used to rid the Yemeni people of this nightmare.”

This latest development has come at a time when already millions of Yemenis are suffering from famine and cholera apart from terrorist attacks and air strikes supported and carried out mainly by Saudi Arabia and Iran. Yemen is just another battle ground in addition to Syria, Iraq and Lebanon for Iranian and Saudi proxies.

*Written by Waseem Ahad. 

There is an alarming rise in the tension between Baghdad and the Kurdistan Regional Government in Erbil (KRG). From an approaching conflict between the two in Kirkuk, Turkmen will suffer the most. The oil flow from Kirkuk and KRG will be disrupted too. The clash could weaken both sides and the PKK will avail itself of the possible power vacuum. All these can severely harm Turkey and cause a serious foreign policy crisis. What has sparked the crisis and what options does Turkey have to prevent a clash?

The apparent reason in the rise of the intensity in the conflict is KRG President Masoud Barzani’s insistence on holding an independence referendum on 25 September 2017. A close scrutiny of the ties between the two parties, however, reveals that there is a wide range of issues keeping them apart. The Baghdad government’s preoccupation with the war against Daesh has delayed the inevitable clash. With the battle of Mosul approaching its end, the political and military resistance of Sunni Arabs has been severely dealt with. There have been numerous recent calls from Baghdad to end the only defiant Shiite -dominated regime Iraq faces, that in the north from KRG. Should Turkey remain inactive and unable to defuse the tension, Iraq may soon witness its worst civil war and the Iraqi state could melt away. The consequences can be ruinous for all Iraqis and regional actors, especially for Turkey. Iran will avail itself of this new round of violence to assure its total dominance over Iraq and the building of a Shiite crescent will be completed.

Rising Tension

During the last decade, the relations between Erbil and Baghdad have been plagued with numerous contentious issues. This became apparent with the departure of US forces from Iraq in late 2010 when the former Prime Minister Nouri al- Maliki inaugurated a sectarian policy which alienated and marginalized both Sunni Arabs and Kurds. Although the current Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi promised to undue his predecessor’s policies and make the regime inclusive, al-Maliki’s followers and pro-Iranian Shiite militias have hindered his efforts. The Iraqi regime is now more exclusive than ever. Only two weeks ago Ibrahim al-Jafaari, the foreign minister, issued a decree which removed several Sunni individuals from Iraq’s foreign diplomatic corps.

Recently the US has failed to convince al-Abadi to allow several Sunni politicians, who have been forced into exile by al-Maliki, to attend a conference in Baghdad to build a credible Sunni leadership in Iraq. On July 20, 2017, the Shiite militias in Mosul clashed with the Nineveh Guards which is a further indication that Shiite militias are determined to re-establish their pre-2014 exclusive security rule in Mosul.

The ongoing conflict with KRG should be also viewed within this context. The KRG arguably feels that the partnership in government, which Kurds feel that the post-Saddam era will present to them, is all but an illusion. On 19 June 2017, in a response to al-Abadi’s statement which described the referendum as illegal, Barzani said “the Iraqi constitution, which was intended to create an inclusive government ruling by consensus of its major components, is dead in letter and spirit. Why is Article 140 of the constitution, which was supposed to be implemented in 2008, not implemented and neither is it on the agenda of the government in Baghdad?” Barzani pointed out that the Kurds have been gradually forced out from most important security, military and political positions, and al-Malik’s slogan to establish a government of the “political majority has been completely established in reality.”

Lately Iran’s Ayatollah Ali Khamenei stated that the referendum in northern Iraq is unacceptable. There is a heated exchange in the media and political statements made in Baghdad, Tehran, and Erbil. Although al-Abadi has been generally accommodating, recently his language became more threatening to the Kurds. Even Ammar al Hakeem, who has been in the past a close ally of Barzani, has recently threatened him with dire consequences should he proceed with the referendum. On 20 July 2017, the all-powerful bloc of State of Law in the Shiite Alliance issued a call in a statement to put Barzani on trial for charges of treason and collaborating with Israel and Turkey against Iraq. The Iranian regime too is threatening Barzani.

Having failed to dissuade the leaders of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan from supporting the referendum, on 18 July 2017 Muhammed Baqri, the of Chief of Staff of the Iranian armed forces, reminded the Kurds of Iran’s punitive and powerful weapon capacities.

 The Possible Clash in Kirkuk

Kurdish sources allege the Baghdad government has deliberately delayed the expulsion of around 2,000 Daesh militias from Haweja district, south west of Kirkuk, in order to use it as a pretext to attack Kirkuk. Peshmerga sources have recently detected the arrival of hundreds of Iranian revolutionary guards in areas adjacent to Kirkuk.

Unless the US and Turkey deliver a strong message to Iran, one can expect Qasem Suleimani, the head of Quds Corp, to soon appear in the ruins of Kirkuk to boast of victory over the so-called pro-Israeli and Saudi agents among the Kurds. The attack on Kirkuk can make tens of thousands of Turkmen homeless and asylum seekers at the frontiers of Turkey. The toothless Turkmen National Front and its followers can be caught in the middle of a devastating conflict. One of the possible consequences of an attack on Kirkuk is that it can also deepen the crisis between the Shiite and Sunni Turkmen groups. It is noteworthy that Iranians have already mobilized 12,000 Turkmen as part of the Shiite militias in Iraq for a possible attack on Kirkuk. There is also a potential for the Baghdad regime to use the old rivalries between Kurds and Turkmen and this might hurt Turkmen who have no military power to match that of the Kurds.

What can Turkey do to rescue Kirkuk?

Barzani and all other Kurdish parties have put too much stakes on the referendum and Kirkuk to retreat from their decision to hold the referendum. Forcing Barzani to give up the referendum will be a serious blow to his standing among the Kurds and will only help his foes, especially the PKK. Regardless of the stated objection of many Western countries to the referendum, Barzani appears to have received some assurances from many circles in the West to go ahead with the referendum. It suffices to say that on 28 June 2017, The Washington Post, which is close to the circles of decision making in the US, had Barzani write an op-ed to sell the idea of the referendum.

Turkey can still use its economic and political leverage with Barzani to delay the declaration of independence after the referendum. Donald Trump’s administration and several European Union countries prefer to enhance al-Abadi’s position in Baghdad in order to enable him to curtail the drastic Iranian influence over his country. This policy requires KRG not disrupt al-Abadi’s work. Barzani can be pressured by the US to be content with the de-facto annexation of the disputed territories and more independence using its current policy of selling its oil and gas abroad.

Being aware of this realty, Turkey can seek US support to defuse the situation before the current tension goes out of control and gives Iran access to Kirkuk. In addition, Turkey should give clear signals to both al-Abadi and Iran that Kirkuk is an issue that touches its national security and it will not stand by watching if things deteriorate. Besides, Turkey could use its leverage with Barzani to safeguard Turkmen rights if the referendum is held in Kirkuk. Hosting a meeting with both Barzani and Turkmen leaders in Turkey is long overdue. Shortly, Turkey needs to engage both Baghdad and Erbil in a more vigorous and foreword policy to spare Kirkuk from the destruction which has been inflicted on Mosul.

Iranian troops have been deployed in rebel-held territory in Aleppo since 2015; Assad was ensured to win back Aleppo along with Syrian soldiers and Hezbollah militants. The truth is the Syrian army was neither qualified to handle the crisis in Aleppo in its own way, nor were they able to capture the divided city where all separate enclaves were being controlled by various groups comprising of Russian soldiers, Shiite fighters from Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, Palestine and Afghanistan. Even though Assad had sent his most experienced forces to take part in operations; after more than five years of non-intrusive war; his forces have been debilitated while clinging to battle, which is being carried out under heavy attacks. With the fall of Aleppo, held by rebels since 2012, Assad has consolidated his power and polished himself by relying on foreign fighters to capture the city. Amid the diverse ethnic structure fighting for Assad, it is hard to turn a blind eye on the leading role played by Shiite-dominated “Quds Brigades” and “Hezbollah Brigades” to recapture the beleaguered city.

Revival of Shia Politics over Syria Civil War

The latent reality is liberation of Aleppo has been incited by the blessing of a Shia revival by the most powerful Shiite political figures such as Muqtada al-Sadr, a well-known anti-American Shiite cleric propping up Assad’s regime. Hezbollah leader Hasan Nasrallah has portrayed the war in Syria as “the mother of all battles,” so the discourses that significant Shia political and religious figures are appealing to could be accepted as one of the most efficient tools mobilizing Shia militiamen to Syria as an active agent of the war.

To put it more explicitly, the Aleppo battle is also a symbolic battle where the streets are surrounded by Shia iconography and Shia tones such that it is rather usual to see Shia militants carrying portraits of Shia clerics in the streets. Similar scenes unfolded in northern Aleppo Province in the last few months while Iraqi clerics were giving speeches to militiamen in fatigues stimulating their religious senses to fight in the name of the Shia faith and Islamic law. He praised his followers’ willingness to fight far from home and positioned their presence in Syria as a part of a master plan to defend the Shia faith.

Moreover, Shia clerics are also actively using social media accounts to make their strident sectarian voices heard to wide masses in the looming battle and justified martyrs who died in battleground while defending their faiths in Iraq and Syria. As reported by The Telegraph newspaper, almost 700 Iranian soldiers and militia members have died in Syria’s civil war to preserve Assad’s grip on power. For these fighters, defending their ideology, religion and holy places are their primary motivation to be on the battleground.

Damascus: Looming Starvation Crisis is at the Door

What’s happening in Syria today reveals Iran’s sectarian desires. As it is evident from Shia ideology, dedicated militiamen fighting fiercely, rooting out Syria from all Iranian supported militias will take time because they all adhere to Shia clerics’ priorities to propagate their faith both in Syria and Iraq. On the eve of the Russo-Turkish guarantee for a country wide-ceasefire in Syria on December 29, 2016, Hezbollah, a Lebanon based Iranian proxy group, jeopardized the fragile peace process by attacking the Wadi Barada village near the capital Damascus, where hundreds of families were trapped without any aid or medication support.

Amid the newly declared truce in Syria in December, the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and its mercenaries along with Hezbollah militants were storming over the Wadi Barada district of rural Damascus. Currently, as a retaliatory action various new agencies have reported that this time fighting has intensified after surprise attacks by opposition fighters in the Jobar district of Damascus located in the eastern part of the city. Reportedly, the Iranian backed Hezbollah al-Nujaba militia has announced its participation in the ongoing battle in Jobar and declared once more they are all in the battle with all their military means.

One of the most significant outcomes of the recent attacks have been air strikes by regime forces, which have caused an estimated 300,000 local residents to be cut off from any humanitarian assistance in Jobar. On top of that, some respectable international aid organizations such as Physicians for Human Rights are concerned about a looming starvation crisis is at the door. According to a recent UN report, approximately four million people located in Damascus have been deprived of safe drinking water and any medical aid support.

Ongoing Peace Talks Overshadowed Long-Awaited Peace in the Region

Opposition forces are justifying their attacks being intensified in the Jobar district of Damascus from their social media accounts based on the failure of UN sponsored peace talks, which resumed in Switzerland in February 2017. In addition as it can be remembered, opposition groups refused to talk directly with the regime as both sides accused each other of violating the cease-fire in the Wadi Barada area prior to Syria peace talks held in the Kazakhstan capital Astana in January 2017. The armed opposition forces, namely Jabhat Fath al-Sham (formerly known as al-Nusra Front) refused to leave the battleground and head to Idlib in previous months. Nevertheless, Turkey insisted on returning Hezbollah militants back to Lebanon ahead of the planned truce talks in Astana, but as Khamenei’s top advisor underlined, Hezbollah is planning to stay on Syrian soil even after the ceasefire.

Though the peace talks are not the first over the course of the war, they have been long awaited for those hoping for peace in the region, and the Assad regime and the Syrian opposition have confirmed their attendance at a meeting to be held in Geneva in March 2017. Nevertheless, even UN envoy to Syria Staffan de Mistura has warned not to expect miracles from the new round of UN-backed talks while fierce fighting is in full flow across the country. As reported by Daily Sabah, tens of civilians including children were killed and around 50 wounded in a recent air strike launched by regime forces east of Damascus. Obviously, peace talks, whether held in Geneva or Astana, will bolster the truce in the near future, so in a way the talks lost the structural function in the battleground as an effective way of welcoming the truce. It seems that consecutive peace talks are being appealed to in order to cover the humanitarian tragedy especially apparent in Damascus.

Faruk Yaslıçimen interviewed Belkıs Kılıçkaya, a distinguished Turkish journalist, about DAESH, on which she made a three-part documentary for a TV channel in Turkey. Since its initial broadcast, the documentary was repeatedly shown on TV and has reached thousands of people via internet. Kılıçkaya’s critical perspective, multi-dimensional approach, use of different source material, and in-depth analyses clarify and illuminate many points about DAESH and the ambivalent international politics against this terror group that have so far remained in the dark.

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I would like to begin with asking when and how this work began.

Habertürk asked me to make a documentary on foreign fighters in August 2015. While studying foreign fighters’ portraits, I found myself focusing on Afghanistan: from the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan, to the Taliban and to the US invasion in the aftermath of 9/11. The invasions of both Afghanistan and Iraq are recent history, but we forget them quickly. I can tell that the bad experience of invasions continues to shape these countries and the region today.

At the beginning, I remember that I was depressed while researching the daily lives of people during the invasions. I was struck by a visual. It was a holiday. I was watching a French-made documentary, showing Afghan people living in denlike houses and villages. Like a hole in the wall … The interview was about the US soldiers’ Taliban hunting methods. A man in his fifties was telling his story. He said that the US troops came at night. His father was elderly and wasn’t able wake up right away. When his father barely got up and started to ask a question, the soldiers fired at him. The man, with tears in his eyes, said that his son, who was 12 to 13 years old, yelled at the soldiers, saying “you’ll pay for what you’ve done,” and they shot him too. Then the soldiers left, saying “sorry,” this was the wrong house. After watching this, I stood silent for a long time, not being able to utter a word.

How did you feel?

Numbness … I was still for some time, as if paralyzed. And this was just one of several examples of cruelty during the years of invasion.

After my research on Afghanistan, I started working on the portraits of foreign fighters originating from Europe. These are also depressing, reflecting their sorrowful lives. Take the Kouachi brothers, for instance; they didn’t have a father. Their mother was a prostitute, who committed suicide while bearing her sixth child. The brothers, who were only children then, came to their home and saw their hanged mother. It’s not a surprise that they joined DAESH later.

Joining DAESH grants them a comfortable, safe environment. They feel they’ve become somebody from being just nothing. Even their dead bodies would become precious; they were told that they would become martyrs. While nobody acknowledged their presence before, by joining DAESH, they became like brothers to people from numerous countries. I observed this while watching an interview, which was conducted by the French with hidden cameras. A boy was passionately saying “I have brothers from countries all across the world, can you believe it?” These portraits sadden you; this gets worse when you start researching Iraq.

You believe that these people are joining DAESH due to individual or social sufferings?

Yes, sure. There are individual and social traumas at play. Invasions have severely disrupted the traditional and social fabrics of Afghanistan, Iraq, and Syria, where different segments of society have clashed with each other. Such organizations are nurtured by chaos and instability. Additionally, violence has a market in today’s world and it’s possible that there are also nihilist tendencies in some of those who joined DAESH, as Olivier Roy has argued. And finally prisons … We know from the PKK example that this terror organization emerged from Diyarbakır Prison. The politicians of the movement, academic studies, even Abdullah Öcalan himself have stated this. What else could emerge from prisons in Afghanistan where hundreds and thousands of people were imprisoned? Or from Abu Ghraib Prison and others in Iraq? Speaking from a sociological viewpoint, DAESH is not a surprise.

What kind of sources did you use while making the documentary?

I read many books. For instance, I read books on the Salafi-Wahhabi movements, along with the books by the founders of Al-Qaeda. I watched numerous documentaries, mostly French. I have also watched some US-made documentaries, as well. Slowly, I began to reach some conclusions and my further research, particularly my interviews conducted with various academicians and people who conducted field research, have all confirmed my foresight.

What did you foresee?

Looking at the patterns, academic works on the subject and the information gathered from the field, they were all leading to the same conclusion. I had foreseen that there would be DAESH attacks not only in the Middle East but also in Europe. I had forecast more precisely that there would be terror attacks in France, where I lived for 17 years. People coming from French colonies, jobless for three generations, and bearing neither Muslim nor French identity had formed a potential human resource for DAESH. Some had already revolted in 2004 by burning cars in the streets. It was no surprise that the largest participation in DAESH in Europe was from France.

A similar coincidence happened when I was meeting with academics from Turkey, Europe, and the US. For instance, what Prof. Burhanettin Duran said about the US invasion of Afghanistan was unknowingly confirmed by Alberto Munoz, who was one of the high-ranking administrators of the CIA during the invasion. Similarly, an Australian security expert’s observations in Iraq and Syria during the invasion coincided with Cole Bunzel’s findings, who is an academic at Princeton working on DAESH. Listening to all of them, I understood that none of these events were unexpected. On the other hand, Michael Nagata of US Special Operations said to the New York Times in 2014, “We do not understand the movement, and until we do, we are not going to defeat it”. This can only be an irony! Shane Bell, a former Australian soldier and a senior security consultant for Iraq, Syria, and Libya, notes that “people from military-origin, like me, and intelligence agencies were aware of DAESH for a long time. Recently, a picture [was] released showing that a US commander posing for the camera with a black DAESH flag in his hand. This picture belongs to 2008 and if you look at the souvenirs that soldiers brought along having served there in this period of time, you can undoubtedly find traces of DAESH.” Although Turkish media, along with the whole world, was surprised when DAESH first emerged in 2014, the emergence of DAESH was hardly a surprise for people working in the field.

Could you say briefly who or what caused the emergence of DAESH? Was it international interventions or regional dynamics? What does your documentary tell us about this?

Invasions, dictatorial regimes, and finally terror regimes… Firstly, there is the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan. When the Soviets left the country 10 years later, it had become a completely different Afghanistan. It is a country where 20 different dialects are spoken; a country with a population of 30 million, consisting of diverse ethnic groups. Although the Soviets have left the country, the communistic ideology remains, as many bureaucrats and civil servants were raised by the Soviets. During the Soviet invasion, new sectarian dynamics entered Afghanistan that had not existed before. For instance, with the support of the US, Pakistani jihadists entered the fray. Similarly, a Salafi-Wahhabi understanding of Islam also started to appear in Afghanistan, where the Sunni-Sufi understanding of Islam had actually been predominant throughout history. Suddenly, there was a new movement, which forbid music, girls’ education, or even flying a kite. And the Taliban emerged.

The social fabric of the region started to unravel and it became unpredictable. Then, the US invasion ensued after 9/11. Something really surprised me about this invasion. As you know, the Afghan Northern Alliance supported the international forces against the Taliban. There was a tradition between the clans of Afghanistan; the Northern Alliance, being victorious, demanded that the Taliban, the defeated side in the war, should submit, and the Taliban agreed. However, Donald Rumsfeld disagreed with the decision. As a result, prisons were built and more than 100,000 people were imprisoned. Moreover, many people were sent to the notorious “black sites”, secret prisons run by CIA and constructed generally outside of the US territory, and these are places, where human rights do not matter.

So, now we can expect that some of these inmates were probably tortured to become radicals.

Of course; people imprisoned during the Iraqi invasion turned from typical insurgents into militants with a clear agenda when they got out. The first pictures of the ruling cadre of DAESH released to the world media were all taken in the Iraqi prisons. The conditions there apparently paved the way for radicalization.

But the invasion of Afghanistan is not the whole story. After Afghanistan, Iraq was invaded. Before the Iraqi invasion, there was the Iran-Iraq War between 1980-88 that caused the deaths of almost a million people. We had Saddam Hussein, who was backed by the West. We also had the Iranian Revolution in 1979, with serious regional effects when Humeyni tried to spread it. We are basically talking about a turbulent region. Moreover, as Iraq invaded Kuwait, there was a 13-year-long embargo on Iraq by the international community, which left the country in a shambles. To top all of this, Iraq was invaded after 9/11 and it became a failed state with no authority! Prisoners who committed either felonies or petty offences were all released. Looking at the dispositions of the groups in Iraq, you can see Sunnis and Shiites who were in favor of the invasion and who were against it. Some of these groups had enmity against each other. While some elements formed an alliance between themselves in the first year, they became enemies in the second and allies once again in the third year. There were many different organizations emerging during these turbulent times.

The war in Iraq also had a psychological component. The US forces were playing Metallica on the streets of Fallujah. A whole administration was overthrown, from its fire department to basic state institutions. It became a country without any authority after the 13-year-long embargo; a country that suffered too much violence as a consequence of Saddam and the Iran-Iraq War. On the other hand, the country had the potential for wealth, as it has bountiful oil and mineral reserves. It could have become as wealthy as France, but the country is continuously ravaged by invasion.

You said that it was a transformation from dictatorial regimes to terror regimes: a title that you gave to the second part of your documentary.

DAESH emerged in Iraq and flourished in Syria. If you notice, these two countries were ruled by the Ba’ath regimes, which were actually the remnants of the Soviet ideology, while also having components of the Nazi Stasi. Moreover, both of the regimes represented the minorities in their respective countries: one represented the Nusayri minority, while the other the Sunni. It is not simply that DAESH emerged due to existing catastrophic conditions, but I want to underline that DAESH means Ba’ath. It’s not coincidental that, among all of the organizations in the region, only DAESH emerged and established a state. They got their know-how from Saddam’s men. Looking at the important figures of DAESH reveals this. Izzat al-Douri, for instance, was the right-hand man of Saddam. Abu Bakr Naji’s notes were published by Der Spiegel. Examining his networks within prisons led to the same conclusion. Olivier Roy defined it perfectly: “Secular men with mustaches grew Islamic beard[s] within a couple of months.” They also transferred their military skills to DAESH.

You’re speaking about DAESH’s organizational structure now …

After he was killed, Abu Bakr Naji’s notes were published by Der Spiegel. In those notes, it said that they were forming religious schools named Da’wah and were selecting the most talented participants. Then, they cooperated with these people from whom they received intelligence about the people in their villages or towns. They learned who had a weakness for what, who was wealthy, who would resist etc. By this method, they were able to establish a small but effective intelligence network. Abu Bakr Naji was known to be responsible for the air force and intelligence during Saddam’s reign. All of the names were somehow related to Saddam.

Do you believe that each and every member of DAESH was related to Saddam’s regime?

No, there are still many questions about the nature of this issue. Zarqawi, for instance, is still a mystery for me, even after all of the reading. You know everything about him, but you cannot make any sense of him. Cole Bunzel studied his portrait very well and read all of his works. I should state that I’m commenting on existing works. He is from Jordan and he was an alcoholic and a drug addict. Zarqawi met with Maqdisi, his Salafi teacher, in a prison; however, their relations turned sour. It is said that he is charismatic and is able to mesmerize people.

Zarqawi left the prison with a seemingly inimical attitude towards the countries in the Middle East and the Shiites. Let’s assume that he met with Salafist imams and started to hate Shiites to the extent that he came to believe that every Shiite has to be annihilated. He doesn’t even care about the invasion forces. Moreover, the American academics who examined the notes of Zarqawi state that he isn’t inimical to Jewish people.

That’s peculiar. How can we explain it?

Depending on the information provided by our interviewees and on the news appearing in the world media, Zarqawi first went to Afghanistan to meet Osama bin Laden; however, they had a disagreement. Later, someone acted as an intermediary between them and, ultimately, bin Laden funded him. Anyway, Zarqawi was wounded during the US siege of Herat and left Afghanistan. Do you know where he went? Tehran! We know that Zarqawi saw Shiites as his enemies during that time. So, how was he able to go to Tehran and conduct his business there? This is an important question. We asked this to Cole Bunzel and he said “this is a very hypocritical behavior; he didn’t attack Shiites during his stay. Moreover, the Shiite administration offered him support and he accepted it.”

Let’s stay there for a minute. A man who is inimical towards Shiites goes to Tehran, conducts certain businesses, and receives support from Iran. What does this mean?

I leave this to our readers. I’m just providing the information.

When I talked to the people of the region, they were telling me that the probability of DAESH being an instrument of Iran was high.

We know that Iran wouldn’t miss any chances. Petraeus says that Qasem Soleimani, an Iranian senior military officer, is “a wonderful spy and he established a contact with the Iraqi al-Qaeda.” The interesting thing is that Iraqi al-Qaeda is against Shiites.  According to German intelligence reports, Zarqawi started to travel frequently to Syria from Jordan. Syria isn’t an ordinary country in which to travel. It is hardly believable that someone like Zarqawi would travel to Syria frequently without any knowledge of the Assad regime. Then, in 2005, Zarqawi’s men were captured in Iraq. One of the captured men was from Syrian Intelligence, while the other was a colonel in the Syrian Army. I watched the record of this news broadcast on Iraqi TV at that time.

Let’s assume that Al-Assad was afraid of a US invasion and sent his men to infiltrate the insurgents. However, Zarqawi worked together with these men and, if the news was accurate, Iraqi Al-Qaeda started to attack Shiite mosques. It’s not improbable that they coordinated and carried out these attacks together. We also know that they appeared anti-Shiite, but they killed thousands of Sunnis too.

According to the writings of Zarqawi found by the US military, the chief purpose of Zarqawi was to sparkle a civil war with sectarian conflicts at its core. For this reason, Zarqawi called the people to protest the elections. As a result, the Sunni population protested the elections; the Shiites gained more power, while this clever act by Zarqawi pushed the Sunnis out of politics and led them to become increasingly marginalized.

At the same period of time, a book named The Management of Savagery was published. Its author was Abu Bakr Naji. The book employs a complex academic discourse. A year after its publication, it was translated by a think-tank in the US. For instance, the book interestingly distinguishes between Jihad and Islam and suggests employing violence and savagery to manage perceptions. It states “One who previously engaged in jihad knows that it is naught but violence, crudeness, terrorism, frightening (others), and massacring—I am talking about jihad and fighting, not about Islam and one should not confuse them. (Moreover, he knows) that he cannot continue to fight and move from one stage to another unless the beginning stage contains a stage of massacring the enemy and making him homeless (or ‘frightened’).”*

The claim for a state appeared first with Zarqawi and it was before DEASH, right?

Yes, Zarqawi first established the Mujahideen Shura Council. Then, they found two men, one from Baghdad (Abu Omar al-Baghdadi) and one from Egypt (Abu Hamza). They established a so-called state and announced it on the internet. But none cared about the claim. After Zarqawi was killed, Omar al-Baghdadi became the leader. The actual ruler of the organization was Abu Hamza; however, al-Baghdadi was preferred as he was a local man. The US put a $5-million bounty on these two men. Two years later, this amount decreased to $100,000, as they had suspicions about these two men’s existence. After they were killed, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi became the new leader. We did not hear his name between the years 2006 and 2011. Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi began to emerge as a powerful figure when Maliki took the government in Iraq, the Sunnis came under pressure, and the Sahwa forces comprised of Sunni fighters were destroyed by Petreaus. Some of these fighters joined the Iraqi al-Qaeda later.

You have said that there were many documentaries on this subject; how does your documentary compare with those?

I’m a journalist who loves to deal with the human element. I prefer to examine subjects with a sociological perspective. This is also true for the DAESH documentary. There are very good books and documentaries on Afghanistan, the invasion of Iraq, and DAESH. But there are also documentaries that can turn their viewers into Islamophobics. Unfortunately, the second is widespread in Europe and the US, portraying Muslims as a savage horde targeting Western civilization; however, this is not the case. DAESH is actually targeting us rather than the rest of the world. Look at, for instance, the number of people they killed in the Middle East and the cultural heritage they destroyed. Olivier Roy rightly defines the Salafi-Wahhabi movement as “Holy Ignorance” in one of his books. In my view, DAESH is an attempt to de-Islamize Islam, targeting not only Muslims but also Islamic civilization as a whole.

Do you think that modernism and DAESH are in contradiction with each other?

I think DAESH is a very modern organization, as they effectively employ every privilege granted by modern life. Their propaganda videos don’t only consist of violence. For instance, a journalist at the BBC examined their tweets posted during a three months period. The visuals are exceptionally well done. The foreign fighters originating from Europe are especially good at this. The saying of Andy Warhol, “In the future, everyone will be world-famous for 15 minutes,” applies to DAESH as well. DAESH militants become famous with their YouTube videos on the internet.

How about DAESH’s periodicals?

If you examine their periodicals, you can see that they’re all well prepared. They refer to events from the historical and sociological memory of their respective countries. For instance, their first periodical in Turkey referred to the Sykes-Picot Agreement. The British and French made a secret agreement and divided the territories among themselves. We understand that the Ottoman Caliphate was no more, right? The peculiar part is that DAESH regards neither the Ottomans nor Turkish as Muslims. That’s why they talk about conquering Istanbul, and it is no coincidence that on the cover page you see the picture of the Maiden’s Tower, not the Sultanahmet (Blue) Mosque.

So, DAESH’s media tools follow certain tactics for winning people over.

Let me tell you something more interesting. As I was exposed too much to their materials, I wasn’t able to distinguish interesting or peculiar parts of their publications. So, I gave one of their periodicals to my brother, so that he could examine it. He said, “They’re [DAESH] calling people to not vote.” I knew that they were doing this, but I thought it was only in Europe. If the Muslims in Europe don’t vote, they will become marginalized, as was the case in Iraq. Think of people in Turkey who identify themselves as Muslim not casting their vote; the people who they want to exclude from the system will become excluded, marginalized, and will form a human resource for DAESH-like organizations to be recruited.

And the image of the sword … You examine it in your documentary as well. DAESH is not killing people with the sword. But they use weapons of modern technology that were left behind by the Americans and captured by DAESH in Iraq.

These are pornographic visuals. They terrify people, while becoming a center of attraction. On the other hand, I know from France that mainstream Islamophobic periodicals sometimes used the image of the sword. Can you imagine, there was a weekly periodical published in France that had such a cover, named “Prophet of the Sword”? DAESH serves this perception and markets this image deliberately.

Interestingly, ten months after the formation of their so-called state, one of al-Baghdadi’s statements was revealed. He said “Islam is a religion of war, not peace.” This wasn’t said by Trump, Sarkozy, or any Islamophobic academics, but by al-Baghdadi himself. They first categorize the world as Muslims and non-Muslims. Then, they distinguish Muslims on the basis of their pledge of allegiance to them and they excommunicate whoever does not obey them. This excommunicative behavior is such that, if two people were left, one would excommunicate the other.

Then, what purpose does excommunication serve? Which strategy is it a part of? A rational person would expect the organization to negotiate more in order to recruit more people, especially if they are claiming to found a state. Am I wrong?

Palestine is a fundamental issue for Muslims all over the world, right? You can even find a Palestine motive, being a symbol of resistance, in very secular and leftist movements. In theory, you expect DAESH to have such a motive too. But DAESH attacked the Yarmouk Camp where Palestinians were residing. Why? I think there are some peculiarities waiting to be answered. We should try to understand DAESH by following not what they are saying but what they are doing.

There are Eurofighters in DAESH as well. What do their profiles tell us?

There is an identity crisis in Europe. Looking at the lives of those who joined DAESH, you will see intriguing facts. For instance, Salim Benghalem, one of the ten most wanted DAESH militants in the US. He has a criminal record for being a gang member, being connected with the mafia, drug dealing, and thievery. His lawyer is Léon-Lef Forster, who caught my attention when I was a journalist in France, for also being the lawyer of Alaattin Çakıcı. Forster is an expert in gang lawsuits. He said that he was very surprised when he heard about Benghalem joining DAESH. “Putting religion aside, I haven’t even seen this man being either a part of a civilization or the enemy of it,” he said. Benghalem became a DAESH member in a very short period of time.

Another example was a family in which the mother was Algerian and the father a Charlie Hebdo subscriber. The family defined itself as laical believers. Their child was against any religion. The child had two names: Yunes and Sebastian. He sometimes used one and then the other. It can be seen that he was in an identity crisis. Then, his parents joined DAESH. Interestingly, they wrote and sent a letter to their son. The mother said “don’t think that we affected the decision of each other, we made this decision by ourselves.” This indicates a hybrid form of culture. They stressed the equality between men and women. In the statements of such people, there are many indicators of a hybrid culture. For instance, some of them talk about “the right to behead people.” They say “I haven’t beheaded anyone until now, but I can. This is how I employ my freedom of expression.” Another one says, “You carry the flag of gay pride. It is my preference to carry the DAESH flag.” These kinds of rhetoric on freedoms and rights don’t appear in the profiles of fighters originating from the Middle East.

For instance, there is a family in France that produces flags. The woman there made an interesting statement. She said that she made a white DAESH flag as “many pacifists come and prefer the white DAESH flag.” This was an interesting detail.

In another instance, there was a man named Abdelhamid Abaaoud who was a Belgian of Moroccan descent. It was one of the first profiles I examined while studying DAESH. There was a visual of him, which was one of the most striking. He had attached a number of corpses to a rope and said “I used to ski, but now I’m jihading.” Then, he laughed and started to drag the corpses with the rope. It was one of the most terrifying visuals I have ever seen. A French TV station conducted an interview with this man and broadcast the footage. Abaaoud was somewhat popular in DAESH. If I had ever seen him, I would’ve been able to identify him easily. However, this terrorist entered and left France numerous times, as if there was no screening. Moreover, this man was one of the important figures of the Bataclan attack. Previously, he had prepared an attack on the opera house in Toulouse; however, it was prevented at the last minute. Abaaoud was one of the most important profiles in DAESH.

In addition, there are religious converts, all of whom don’t have any political background. They don’t have any connections with political movements, including extreme ones, in their own countries. There are very interesting portraits among these converts. There was one whose mother was an agnostic and father socialist. Then, the parents got divorced and the father married a Portuguese woman, who was a devoted Catholic. The mother raised both her child and the man’s together. However, both of the children joined DAESH. For example, Denis Cuspert’s mother was German, while his father was from Ghana. His father left the family and Cuspert was subjected to violence by his American step-father. Cuspert is an important recruiter in DAESH.

How much time does it take the new converts to join DAESH?

They join DAESH after almost a year of sharing the news of their conversion to Islam to their close friends and relatives. In his book, Robert Leiken has an important point. He says, “It’s 80 times easier for a German to become a jihadist than a Muslim.” Because, converts have no basic information about Islam at the beginning. There are elements of modernism, violence, and an identity crisis that contribute to this fact. This is also known by Al-Qaeda. In their guides on propaganda, it’s said, “stay away from the ones who know the religion well, focus on people who don’t know much about it.”

There are striking similarities between DAESH’s interpretation of Islam and evangelist’s interpretation of Christianity. I interviewed Esra Özyürek, who is an academic in the UK. Özyürek studied the Salafi mosques in Germany and published a book named Being German, Becoming Muslim. I told her an anecdote I had heard from a peshmerga who fought in Northern Iraq against DAESH. A DAESH militant and the said peshmerga somehow came side by side; the peshmerga asked the militant why he was fighting. The militant said, “Because, I’m going to have lunch together with the prophet.” After listening to this anecdote, Özyürek said that it was interesting and added, “Evangelists talk about having tea with God.”

Does this mean that DAESH is also using expressions borrowed from Christianity in its propaganda mechanisms?

No, they are not borrowing these expressions directly from Christianity. Such similarities demonstrate resembling reflections of modernism both in new Christian currents and DAESH-like organizations. It is also seen in the letters of the European Muslims who join DAESH: “If you become a Muslim, we’ll see each other [in] heaven.” They’re sure that they’ll all become martyrs. And there is also the Salafi-Wahhabi understanding, which is a modern interpretation of Islam representing not really returning to the authentic version of religion. It disregards fourteen centuries of memory of Islamic culture and civilization, severing all ties with tradition and local culture. Not all Salafis have jihadist or excommunicative attitudes, of course. But the Salafi-Wahhabi tradition turns against the Islamic culture. As you know, Salafis always have an issue with tombs. DAESH shouts “Allah-u Akbar” while destroying the tombs with explosives.

Is DAESH still a closed book?

Yes and no. In certain aspects, it’s a deciphered organization. There is a French expert on terrorism named Jean-Charles Brisard, who worked at the anti-terror department. In one of his statements, he said that the 24 banks captured by DAESH are still open for international transactions.

What does it mean if the banks are open to international transactions?

I don’t know. Banks in Greece were closed down in just a day. Then, it means that the international system allows them to stay open for transaction. When we asked this to Munoz, he said, “It is easy to close down the banks. If they are still open, someone wanted to keep them open.” He clearly wasn’t surprised.

It seems as if the international system doesn’t want to finish off DAESH quickly.

According to the 2015 report of the Louvre Museum, which was conveyed to the Élysée Palace, DAESH is smuggling artifacts. So, it is not dynamiting all historical artifacts.

Or, take the oil sales of DAESH.

We knew that the Western oil companies in the region were selling oil during the Iraqi embargo. These companies never asked the source when they found cheap oil. This was also stressed by the European Parliament. There also was a hearing in 2015 in the US. The Chief of General Staff and the Secretary of Defense were present. A senator was asking how the DAESH tankers travelled almost without any resistance. They replied that the drivers were civilians. When the senator emphasized that those drivers were working for DAESH, they said that they didn’t have any man in the field. The senator asked again, “where are these drivers? Have they retired after carrying all the oil and started to plow the fields somewhere?” The Chief of General Staff replied by saying, “I don’t understand your question.” It was just like a comedy show.

Would you like to add anything?

In Europe, one of the most brutal events in world history, the Holocaust happened. This was conducted by an organized large group, which was the product of the transitivity between the state and the people. WWII swept millions of lives away. In summary, 50 million people died and, since then, we haven’t seen a war of this scope. However, we know that in the region we’re living, WWI and WWII still continue.

Belkıs Kılıçkaya, I thank you for your time and we’re grateful that you allowed me to conduct such an extensive interview with you.

*The Management of Savagery: The Most Critical Stage Through Which the Umma Will Pass, translated by William McCants, Institute for Strategic Studies, Harvard University, May 2006.

There were moments, after 2000, when the identity-related diversity and multicultural legacy of the Ottoman Empire was celebrated. The AK Party government initiated an Alevi Opening, in 2007, and pioneered two important initiatives, one in 2009 and one in 2013, to resolve Turkey’s century-old Kurdish Question. These initiatives were important steps towards identity-related reconciliation in Turkey. Unfortunately, the crisis in Syria has stimulated the identity-related fault lines in Turkey, increasing the risk of social contention, whereby the escalating civil war in Syria has posed the threat of identity-oriented polarization in Turkey.

Unfortunately, the crisis in Syria has stimulated the identity-related fault lines in Turkey, increasing the risk of social contention.

Efforts to create a homogenous society during the early Republican era failed several times due to the resurgence of ideological and ethnic identities. Nonetheless, the top-down Turkish national-identity-building project of Mustafa Kemal is still regarded as a “successful” policy due to its immense defects. Ongoing developments in the region have drawn attention, once again, though unenthusiastically, to the harmonizing aspect of national identity. Ethnic and sectarian fragmentations in the Middle East, primarily ethnic terrorism and Salafist Jihadism, have become a serious threat to Turkey’s national security. The ongoing war in Syria has complicated the identity puzzle in Turkey, leading to the dangerous potential of triggering identity-related radicalizations.

The risk of ideological and political polarization in Turkey constitutes a serious challenge. In addition, the civil wars and uncertainties in Syria and Iraq could become a source of tension and polarization within Turkish society. The increasing material costs of the civil wars in Turkey’s neighboring countries, the presence of more than 3 million Syrian refugees living in Turkish territories and the mounting security risks are further fueling the concerns of the Turkish people. The Turkish government feels that the country’s Western allies are not taking these security worries seriously; in addition, the Western allies have proved unwilling to shoulder Turkey’s economic burden. Once ardent supporters of EU integration, the Turkish people are disappointed and feel abandoned by the country’s Western allies as Turkey faces the uncertainties of the spillover effects of the Syrian crisis.

Once ardent supporters of EU integration, the Turkish people are disappointed and feel abandoned by the country’s Western allies.

Most people in Turkey are fully aware of how the peace process ended, as the PKK attacked the Turkish Security Forces in the summer of 2015. This was partly related to the developments taking place in northern Syria, namely, the increasing power and international legitimacy of the PYD, the PKK’s Syria branch. The PYD managed to gain legitimacy and material support by positioning itself against ISIS within the Syrian context. So far, the Islamist, Alevi and Turkish nationalist dimensions of the identity polarization in Turkey have been either avoided or underestimated, owing to the absence of direct confrontations and violence. The terrorist attacks, bombings and the never-ending funeral ceremonies of the martyred Turkish soldiers are causing Turkish citizens further unease.

Secular nationalists feel further strained due to the hegemonic status of the conservative democratic AK Party in Turkish politics, which has gained ground over the last fifteen years. The rise of Salafist Jihadi radicalism in Turkey’s backyard is causing apprehension in all sectors of society in Turkey, including the conservative religious groups. For decades, conservative religious groups in Turkey managed to refrain from illegal activities and violence and pursued their goals through democratic channels, adding legitimacy to Turkish democracy. At one time, the military, judges and secular establishments had been considered the strongholds of, occasionally oppressive, secularism in Turkey; now, it seems that none have maintained their power. The loss of the relative influence of the institutions that oversee the secular foundation of the republic has caused some of the secular urban groups to feel uncomfortable.

Ethnic, sectarian and ideological tensions within the wider region have had definite spillover effects in Turkey.

Ethnic, sectarian and ideological tensions within the wider region have had definite spillover effects in Turkey. Turkey’s border with Syria is 911 kms long and all demographic groups, including Kurd, Arab, Turcoman and Assyrian, exist on both sides of the Turkey-Syria border. Indeed, the border between Turkey and Syria was drawn arbitrarily as a result of colonial bargaining in the early 20th century. Not surprisingly, given these close links between the two countries, ethnic, sectarian and political tensions on the Syrian side of the border have certainly affected and will continue to affect Turkey.

Different social groups in Turkey hold the expectation that the Turkish government will support groups in Syria to enable them to feel more connected. In 2014, a group of Kurds had expected the Turkish state to support the PYD against DAESH in the battle for Kobani. The Turkish government’s unwillingness to engage militarily was manipulated by the political wing of the PKK, which led to outrage among the Kurdish ethno-nationalists. Conservatives and Islamists wanted the AK Party government to support the moderate opposition in the Syrian civil war, whereas the secular left and the Alevis wanted the government to restore its relations with the Asad regime. Some influential names among the secular elite also wanted Turkey to stay away from the “Middle East Quagmire” and to turn instead to its traditional Western allies. Clearly, it is almost impossible for the AK Party government to meet the expectations of all social groups at the same time.

Different social groups in Turkey hold the expectation that the Turkish government will support groups in Syria to enable them to feel more connected.

Among the different social groups, there is increased excitement among the Kurdish ethno-nationalists. This group perceives the increased autonomy of the PYD in Northern Syria, under the conditions of the civil war, as a positive development, even an historic opportunity for independence or a strong autonomy. Many young PKK terrorists from Turkey either volunteered or were forced by the PKK to join the Syrian civil war in the ranks of the YPG. Some Alevis, on the other hand, fear that the anti-regime stance of the AK Party government in the Syrian civil war has sectarian underpinnings.

During the Arab Uprising, the Turkish government was in favor of political change in Syria and elsewhere, when Turkey chose to support the opposition politically and diplomatically. This support was interpreted differently and ideologically among some Alevis. The Alevis were concerned about the weakening of the secular foundations of the Turkish State, which previously had been neutral and distanced in its approach to the regimes in the Middle East. As a result, certain Alevis believe that the AK Party administration is pursuing sectarian goals within the Middle East.

Turkey’s increased security cooperation with Qatar and Saudi Arabia have further elevated such worries. From among the extreme-left Alewites (Arab Alewites differs from majority Alevis) of Hatay, few joined the Syrian civil war in the ranks of the Asad Regime as foreign fighters. Some people from Turkey joined the Syrian civil war in the ranks of groups such as the Free Syria Army, Ahrar al-Sham, Jabhat al-Nusra and even DAESH. Those who are fighting on opposing sides of the Syrian civil war may bring hostilities and their fighting experience back to Turkey, which poses a serious risk to Turkey’s national security.

In addition, some young nationalists crossed the border to join the fight to defend Turcoman villages against the regime’s forces. For the time being, the AK Party government’s humanitarian aid to Turcomans, as well as active policies and diplomatic efforts to support Turcomans on the Syrian side of the border, has curbed Turkish nationalist sensitivities; however, fluctuations are always possible. For instance, there is increased nationalist sensitivity concerning the PKK-PYD attacks on Turkey and the demographic engineering against the Turcomans and Arabs on the southern side of the border.

People in Turkey who are anxious about the economic and security-related spillover effects of the Syrian crisis may experience some friction with the Syrian refugees.

Another important identity-related issue is raised by the situation of more than 3 million refugees from Syria and some from Iraq. At the beginning of the crisis, most people believed that the Syrians would return to their homes when the civil war came to an end. However, more than five years have passed since the beginning of the uprising in Syria and, as most of the country’s cities are devastated, most of the refugees have no safe place to return to, which means that the majority of Syrian refugees will become permanent residents of Turkey.

There is increasing sensitivity about the immigrants, especially within the cities neighboring the border of Syria, such as Kilis, Antep, Urfa and Hatay. The populations in those cities are concerned about the spillover effects of the Syrian civil war. Although the refugees from Syria are also the victims of the brutal civil war in their home country, people in Turkey who are anxious about the economic and security-related spillover effects of the Syrian crisis may experience some friction with the Syrian refugees. There is always room for potential escalation. The government has regulated to accommodate Syrians on a more regular and stable basis; however, the existing identity-related status quo in Turkey can hardly be maintained with within the fast-evolving conditions.

If not skillfully managed, serious social frictions may arouse.

The mounting civil wars in both Syria and Iraq have increased radicalization at Turkey’s southern borders. Turkish citizens who live in the bordering cities feel anxious. These fears trigger skepticism and may lead to polarization among different identity groups. So far, the psychological impacts of the Syrian crisis on identity groups in Turkey remains an underestimated issue. In particular, people living in the cities bordering Syria and Iraq are experiencing this tension more intensely. If not skillfully managed, serious social frictions may arouse. Becoming aware of such a potential threat is a crucial first step, but following steps need to be taken to ensure that communities in Turkey are more resilient to such tensions.

The way out from such a subjective evaluation is to expose, on the ground of minority rights, whether or not such interventionist actors act solely or primarily in their own interests, or truly in the interest of the sectarian groups with whom they share similar sectarian sensitivities.If a policy specifically focuses on the rights of only a certain minority sect, rather than being a general policy or approach to minority rights, then it is possible to claim that such an attitude signals sectarian politics.The answer to the second question is easier. That is to say, if states or non-state actors take advantage of the same or similar sectarian identities of others in different countries to serve their interests only, then such states or non-state actors are definitely engaged in sectarian politics.

The aim of a state in such a case is not to, in essence, protect the aforementioned minorities, but to use sectarian ties with the minorities as a means to accomplish their own foreign policy objectives.

The answer to the question of why some states generally use minorities, who share common sectarian identities with them, in ways that harm them, is hidden in the nature of international affairs.

States competing with each other for superiority not only use military, economic and diplomatic instruments in their struggles; they also use peoples (often by leveraging their ethnic, sectarian and/or class identities) as tools in these struggles.

From this perspective, the identities of the (minority) people that differ from those in their home countries, but overlap with those of the other (interfering) countries may become part of the “soft power” of the latter.

Today, such politics are drawing not only the Middle East, but also other territories of Islam into conflicts, due to the competition between Iran and Saudi Arabia in sectarian politics.

However, if these like-identities (sectarian similarities in particular) are used as a means to gain advantage in power politics, they inflict almost unhealable wounds in the Middle East. The sectarian dimensions of clashes to which some regional countries were drawn during the Arab Revolutions clearly attest to this problem.

The answer to the third question signals sectarian politics also. In other words, the activities of regional countries to spread their own sectarian values in other Muslim countries (Shi’ization, Salafization, or Sunnization) represent another aspect of sectarian politics.

Why some countries follow such sectarian politics boils down to two answers – one theological, the other political. From a theological perspective, the propensity to be intolerant of anothers’ religion, to staunchly defend (or impose) one’s own religious perspective over those of others, has always been a fact of social groups. In this perspective, the Shi’ization, Salafization, or Sunnization efforts of radical groups may be interpreted as a kind of missionary activity.

From a political perspective, a state may seek to increase the number of communities with common sectarian features in other countries in order to increase its soft power.

Such sectarian activities, instigated by many Middle Eastern countries, Iran and Saudi Arabia in particular, increase the feeling of insecurity in the region. States that view sectarian activities as a threat to their security describe other actors involved in such activities as enemies, and initiate similar counter activities themselves.

In light of the above determinations, it is possible to identify sectarian politics as follows:

If a state or a non-state actor follows a policy to take advantage of the common sectarian identities of peoples in other countries for self-gain, or if it is involved in similar sectarian activities in other countries to increase the number of such communities in other territories to use them for its own interests, or if it interferes in the internal affairs of other countries with the excuse of protecting the rights of minority sects, then that country follows sectarian foreign politics.

However, it is important not to be satisfied with such a definition while answering the question of “What is sectarian politics?” as the consequences of sectarian politics must also be analyzed. In every period of history, policies which place sectarian identities at center stage, and use them as a means for political gains, have resulted in disasters for the targeted peoples.

Pro-sectarian politics is one of the most important obstacles to the development of a politics of cooperation in the Middle East based on a win-win scenario. Today, such politics are drawing not only the Middle East, but also other territories of Islam into conflicts, due to the competition particularly between Iran and Saudi Arabia in sectarian politics. For example, Salafi organizations supported by Saudi Arabia and radical Shiite groups backed by Iran play a pivotal role in sectarian clashes in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

If the actors behind sectarian conflicts in the region recognize the damage they inflict and understand that such conflicts do more harm to themselves than good, such awareness will be the way out of the regional conflicts caused by sectarian politics.

Having respect for the sectarian identity of the other party, abstaining from involvement in missionary activities among peoples of other countries, and not turning sectarian identities in other lands into tools for power politics, will eliminate the possible damages incurred by the sectarian frame of mind.

On June 29, 2014, an armed group declared that they had established the Islamic State and that they were to restore the caliphate. Subsequently, the group changed its name to the Islamic State of Iraq and to Levant/Syria-ISIL/ISIS.  In a short span of time, the group has taken hold of a number of cities, ammunition stores and has established substantial financial resources.

ISIL is a modern phenomenon and it is in many ways not different from fascism or communism which for a great part defined the bloody history of the twentieth century. For ISIL, the caliphate is a mere declaration of intention – it has never offered any theological explanation of it. Its leadership’s main group of advisors is composed of the remainders of Saddam’s army, especially the Republican Guards; in this manner ISIL features in the dictatorship of the Saddam era. ISIL is a reflection of the situation created by the United States and, later, by Iran in the region. Currently, Western countries are targeting ISIL, which in return, puts up strong resistance and has gained new sites in Iraq and Syria. At this stage, ISIL has gained the sympathy and support of radical organizations such as Al Nusra and the Islamic Front. ISIL’s power is, in a sense, a result of the lure of power. It must be born in mind, however, that neither other jihadi movements –including many warring factions under the banner of ISIL- nor major denominations –including Salafis- have accepted ISIL’s call for the establishment of the caliphate.

ISIL’s ontological base is a reaction against the regional policies of Western countries and Israel alongside the failure of the state institutions in Iraq and Syria. The emergence of fascist organizations everywhere in the world in such overwhelming and long-term instability is frequently encountered. ISIL is an outcome of the latter and to present it as one of the main reasons of the state of affairs in the Middle East is complete demagoguery.

Salafi movements can be seen as products of the reaction against the globalization of modernity in an effort to influence the Islamic world. However, ISIL represents a more radical break than Salafi movements; it is impossible to consider ISIL as part of heretical Islam. It is true that ISIL has derived its human resources from “Muslim” societies but its mode of appearance, ignorance, hastiness and greenness has reduced it to a tool for preparing the ground for regional operations of various outsiders and to legitimize and facilitate their operations.

ISIL is a modern phenomenon and it is in many ways not different from fascism or communism which for a great part defined the bloody history of the twentieth century.

ISIL suggests that all areas of life –and politics, of course- must be carried out as they were in the initial stages of Islam. That stage, at least as far as ISIL defines it, is almost an imagined one. As to the call for the caliphate of Al Baghdadi, certain questions must be answered from the outset: Is the caliphate an issue that can be owned by a group formed in a few years and trying to make a name by terror activities? Can we explain the situation while ignoring its historical-sociological background? As is known, the caliphate has a connotation of higher authority inviting all Muslims to obey. Today, the nation-state, which is formed on the concept of “absolute” positive and negative sovereignty, is the norm in global politics. It will not recognize any higher authority including the caliphate in the traditional meaning of the term. Therefore, a call for the caliphate is nothing but an instrument to carry out immediate objectives.

http://thenewturkey.org/why-daesh-is-so-pleasant-to-israel/

Radical groups or ideologies can be seen in every society and in all periods. What is important is how these groups or ideologies get hold of the community or the international system. At this point, we should ask: would we still be referring to the so-called Al-Qaida organization, had there never occurred a power struggle between the USSR and the U.S. in Afghanistan? Can we understand the emergence of ISIL without Al-Qaida and the U.S. occupation of Iraq? Going back further, without the postcolonial practices of Western countries in the Middle East – i.e. the extraordinary political capacity of the U.S. to remain on friendly terms with Saudi Arabia so as to hold sway over oil flux – would Salafi/Wahhabi ideologies terrorize marginal groups in the Islamic world?

What about the concept of jihad and mujahidin? Were not the mujahidin the “good guys” for the U.S. before 1989? What was the content of the concept prior to the mujahidin of Afghanistan? What about democracy? Do Western countries want to see real democracies in the Islamic world? What is the nature of the rage of the Muslims living in Western countries? Is it only because they are Muslims or because of the frustration caused by racist and exclusionary circumstances in the West? What is the target of this rage? Why do they kill Muslims in Syria and Iraq?

With these questions, we do not want to empty the historical content of the concept of jihad and to suggest that the concept is wholly produced by Orientalist approaches. On the contrary, the term jihad occupies an exceptional place in Islamic history. It has been a main motivation behind the social, economic and political power of Muslim states. From this perspective, we need to ask again: Can people who use the “jihad” rhetoric offer a clear definition of the concept, which is acceptable to everyone, especially to Muslims? Do the “jihadists” emulate historical Muslim figures or modern warriors like Hitler and Saddam Hussein? Current representation of the concept empties its historical content and makes it unattractive in the eyes of the whole world, including Muslims. This sort of empty concept eliminates one of the vital ontological roots of the Islamic world and exterminates its most important vantage point against the West.

It does not seem realistic to say that ISIL will soon be wiped out of the Middle Eastern scene in an environment where state institutions are paralyzed, the state image has collapsed, and political commitments are defined along sectarian lines.

At this point, it is of little significance to detect the presence of Western actors or intelligence agencies in the emergence of ISIL. What is significant is how ISIL is utilized by global actors for the sake of their pragmatic purposes. In order to understand this, we should look at the kinds of results brought about by policies designed and implemented through ISIL. To give a few examples:

• The intervention of countries such as the U.S., the U.K., Russia and Iran in Iraq and Syria is legitimized in the eyes of both their public and the global community.
• These countries have exported radicals from their homelands and in this manner postponed upcoming internal problems, thanks to the ground offered through ISIL.
• The concept of Muslim-Western tension proposed in the “Clash of Civilizations” thesis has been reinforced through ISIL.
• The center-periphery relations between the West and Middle Eastern countries have been reinforced with no visible anticipation of change in the near future.
• This environment has increased the importance of Israel as the sole representative of the West in the region and any possibility of objection to Israeli policies by the international community has been seriously impaired.
• Although Syrian opposition was and still is the most important group struggling against ISIL, its legitimacy has severely been eroded; the Assad regime has been legitimized and its life has been prolonged through ISIL.
• Iran has stiffened its hegemony in Iraq and increased its presence in Syria under the pretext of combating ISIL.
• Kurdish nationalism, PKK and its affiliates in Syria and Iraq have grown stronger.

It does not seem realistic to say that ISIL will soon be wiped out of the Middle Eastern scene in an environment where state institutions are paralyzed, the state image has collapsed, and political commitments are defined along sectarian lines. Unless power-sharing struggles between global and regional actors cease, to build successful states in Iraq and Syria will never be possible. The most aggrieved parties from this situation have been the Syrian and Iraqi peoples, of course. Regional countries such as Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Iran, and Turkey have been hit the hardest both in their domestic and foreign policies. It cannot be said that Western countries and Russia have clearly benefited from the turmoil in the region. The country that has benefitted the most, however, is Israel, which is now the most relaxed it has ever been in its history as the highest threats to its existence, namely Syria, Iraq and Egypt, have been paralyzed.