{"id":29317,"date":"2010-12-19T04:04:02","date_gmt":"2010-12-19T02:04:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.turkishforum.com.tr\/en\/content\/?p=29317"},"modified":"2023-04-27T14:36:31","modified_gmt":"2023-04-27T11:36:31","slug":"america-and-israel-haters-relying-on-anti-turkish-lobbies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/2010\/12\/19\/america-and-israel-haters-relying-on-anti-turkish-lobbies\/","title":{"rendered":"America and Israel haters relying on anti-Turkish lobbies"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

The \u201cArmenian genocide season\u201d opened relatively early this year. Clearly the \u201cconjuncture\u201d is considered \u201cuniquely ripe\u201d by anti-Turkish activists. There are also fresh opportunities for increased cooperation against Turkey among Washington\u2019s highly active Armenian, Kurdish, Israeli and Syriac lobbies.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

In the meantime, the worsening of Turkish-Israeli ties has driven a wedge between Ankara and the Obama administration. \u00a0Both sides are trying to be polite about this but the damage is showing. It is also clear that Turkey can not rely on the Republicans in Congress, as it did before, given the unquestioning support they provide to Israel.<\/p>\n

Driven mostly by constituency considerations, Republican congressmen are said to be \u201cout to get Turkey\u201d this time for a host of reasons, not just to do with Israel. These naturally include the Erdo\u011fan government\u2019s stance on Iran and Syria, as well as its cozying up to radical groups like Hamas and Hezbollah.<\/p>\n

Put briefly, Turkey is not considered a reliable ally anymore in the United States Congress. In the meantime it is no surprise that the Israeli lobby in America should be out to punish Turkey for its stand on the brutalizing of Palestinians by the IDF in Gaza under the guise of retaliation.<\/p>\n

Turkey\u2019s apparently rock-solid demand for an apology and compensation from Israel for its the murder of nine Turkish activists on the Mavi Marmara ship, on the other hand, only fuels the growing animosity towards Ankara. What obviously increases the anger of Israelis and members of the Israeli lobby is that their nemesis, namely Prime Minister Erdo\u011fan, is so popular around the world.<\/p>\n

It is no surprise that those contributing to Time Magazine\u2019s \u201cMan of the Year\u201d poll this year should have put Erdo\u011fan in second position after Julian Assange. (He was in fact in first position before Assange overtook him with his arrest in the United Kingdom).<\/p>\n

The fact that Time, in what many see as a \u201crabbit out of the hat trick,\u201d actually selected Facebook\u2019s Mark Zuckerberg, who was in 10th position in the magazine\u2019s own public poll, as \u201cMan of the Year\u201d does not belie Erdo\u011fan\u2019s international popularity.<\/p>\n

If we go back to the Armenian issue, it is clear from the feverish activity among Armenian groups in the U.S. that they have high hopes for the passage of an Armenian genocide resolution in the U.S. Congress this time around. The advantages appear to be stacked on their behalf too.<\/p>\n

There is nevertheless a very real possibility the \u201cforce majeure\u201d will come into play again and prevent this happening \u2013 for the sake of \u201cglobal strategic considerations\u201d \u2013 despite all the anti-Turkish sentiment floating around in Washington. The mostly likely outcome is that the Armenians will be disappointed again.<\/p>\n

It will, however, be a surprise for some to hear that there are quite a few people in Turkey who are rabidly anti-Israeli and anti-American, and who have little sympathy for Europe and the European Union, who actually want the genocide resolution to pass (preferably with the help of Israeli lobbies).<\/p>\n

Their reasoning is a simple one. Such a development will spell the death knell for any hope whatsoever of a rapprochement with Israel \u2013 which they have never desired. It will also lead to the greatest crisis in Turkish-U.S. ties ever, which again will be highly welcomed by them since they see America as \u201cthe root of all evil,\u201d which makes ties with Washington abhorrent to them anyway.<\/p>\n

In other words, the Armenian and Israeli lobbies could be playing beautifully into the hands of those in this country who want to see Turkey move away from the West, and closer not just to the Islamic world but also to the powers currently on the ascendant, which Fareed Zakaria refers to as \u201cThe Rest,\u201d as opposed to \u201cThe West.\u201d<\/p>\n

The fact Turkey is also a \u201crising\u201d country makes those with anti-Western sentiments even more bullish. Firstly they believe there is nothing short of war that Armenians can do to get anything from Turkey, especially at a time when the country feels stronger and more assertive and influential in the world than at any time before.<\/p>\n

The bottom line is that the orld is not what it was a decade or two ago. Neither, in particular, is the U.S. \u2013 nor is the West generally. New centers of political, military and economic influence are emerging fast. These provide new opportunities for Turkey, and Ankara\u2019s reaching out to these countries is already fueling arguments about Turkey drifting away from the West.<\/p>\n

It is also clear that Israel\u2019s isolation will increase in such a world. It is already almost totally alone in the U.N. where it has only America\u2019s blind support to rely on, no matter what it does. This automatically puts Turkey in a much better position internationally than Israel in terms of any cost-benefit analysis relating to foreign policy administration.<\/p>\n

It seems that there will be much to mull over in Washington and Tel Aviv over the next weeks and month in terms of the \u201cTurkey question.\u201d It could be that we are heading for the kind of breakdown in ties that anti-Western elements in this country want.<\/p>\n

But if a simple list were to be made of countries that stand to loose the most by Turkey\u2019s drifting away from the West it might read as follows:<\/p>\n

1- Israel<\/p>\n

2- Armenia<\/p>\n

3- The United States<\/p>\n

4- The EU (although it is no country)<\/p>\n

5- Turkey<\/p>\n

Others may wish to change the order in the list and provide strong and convincing arguments in doing this. What appears common to all countries in the list however, is that they all stand to loose something if Turkey were to drift from he West and go with \u201cThe Rest,\u201d that is, the majority of countries in the world.<\/p>\n

Hurriyet Daily News <\/span><\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The \u201cArmenian genocide season\u201d opened relatively early this year. Clearly the \u201cconjuncture\u201d is considered \u201cuniquely ripe\u201d by anti-Turkish activists. There are also fresh opportunities for increased cooperation against Turkey among Washington\u2019s highly active Armenian, Kurdish, Israeli and Syriac lobbies. In the meantime, the worsening of Turkish-Israeli ties has driven a wedge between Ankara and the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":83,"featured_media":29318,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32,7,148,922],"tags":[9760,4822,9724,985,1046],"class_list":["post-29317","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-armenia","category-armenian-question","category-israel","category-world","tag-north-america","tag-anti-turkish-lobbies","tag-armenia","tag-eu","tag-israel-turkey-relations"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29317","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/83"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29317"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29317\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/29318"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29317"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29317"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.turkishnews.com\/en\/content\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29317"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}