How To Hate On A NATO Ally

By Steve Hynd

Turkey is the new "enemy de jour" of the pro-Israel Right, both in the US and UK. Jim Lobe, writing for Asia Times, gives a great run-down of how American neocons are turning on a NATO ally for the twin sins of being shocked that Israel murdered its countrymen and believing that Iran might be enticed to the negotiating table in small steps.

"Turkey now represents a major element in the global panorama of radical Islam," declared the Standard's Stephen Schwartz, while Daniel Pipes, the controversial director of the Likudist Middle East Forum, echoed JINSA's call for ousting Ankara from NATO and urged Washington to provide direct support for Turkey's opposition parties in an article published by the National Review Online.

The Journal has been running editorials and op-eds attacking Turkey on virtually a daily basis since the raid, accusing its government, among other things, of having "an ingrained hostility toward the Jewish state, remarkable sympathies for nearby radical regimes, and an attitude toward extremist groups like the IHH [Insani Yardim Vakfi - the Islamist group that sponsored the flotilla's flagship, the Mavi Marmara] that borders on complicity."

On Monday, it ran an op-ed by long-time hawk Victor Davis Hanson that labeled the IHH "a terrorist organization with ties to al-Qaeda", while an earlier op-ed, by Robert Pollock, its editorial features editor, called Erdogan and his Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu "demagogues appealing to the worst elements in their own country and the broader Middle East".

Meanwhile, in an op-ed published by The Forward, a Jewish weekly, Michael Rubin, a Perle protege at the American Enterprise Institute, accused Turkey of having "become a conduit for the smuggling of weapons to Israel's enemies", notably Lebanon's Hezbollah.

The onslaught is ironic both because of the neo-conservatives' long cultivation of Turkey and their avowed support for promoting democratic governance - of which they have singled out Turkey for special praise - in the Muslim world.

Neo-conservatives were among the most important promoters of the military alliance between Israel and Turkey that began to take shape in the late 1980s and consolidated by the mid-1990s.

In fact, Perle and another of his proteges, former under secretary of defense for policy Douglas Feith, worked as paid lobbyists for Turkey during that period, in major part to persuade the powerful "Israel Lobby" on Capitol Hill to promote Ankara's interests on Capitol Hill.

And in the UK, serial fabulist and Iran hawk Con Coughlan takes the rhetoric to a whole new level, suggesting in a piece headed "Turkey's alliance with Iran is a threat to world peace" that it will now be Turkey's fault if Israel or the U.S. bombs Iran.

 If the sanctions fail, then the pressure will grow for more robust action to prevent Iran from achieving its aim of developing nuclear weapons. Does Turkey really want to be the country responsible for launching a war between Iran and the West? I sincerely hope not, and that Ankara comes to realise that, so far as its policy with Iran is concerned, it is playing with fire.

Nevermind that the Federation of American Scientists and the Federation for Arms Control and Non-proliferation, as well as other experts, have called for the U.S. to accept and build upon Iran's fuel-swap offer brokered by Turkey and Brazil. Nevermind that Turkey is the aggreived and grieving nation in the Gaza Flotilla matter. The important thing is hating on Iran and anyone who might slow down or prevent the day when the bombs come.

Why do we let these bloodthirsty, Islamophobic nutters have any influence on our discourse? Didn't we learn our lesson last time?