Unidentified individuals have graffitied offensive remarks on a wall of the Turkish Cultural Center (TCC) in the city of West Haven, Connecticut.
The graffiti echoes Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s hate speech against the Hizmet movement inspired by Turkish Islamic scholar Fethullah Gülen, with which the cultural center is affiliated.
The TCC has been serving the Turkish-American community in Connecticut for seven years. Mehmet Elmacı, the coordinator of the organization, told Turkish media outlets that the incident was unprecedented. “We are a cultural center that does not take part in politics. Our goal has been to share Turkey’s cultural heritage with our community. We condemn those individuals who are inspired by Erdoğan’s hate speech toward the Hizmet movement to write offensive remarks on our walls,” he said.
When tanks blocked bridges in the heart of Istanbul and F-16s bombed Turkey’s parliament in Ankara on July 15, Western diplomats were caught by surprise. So too were U.S. forces stationed at the Incirlik Air Base in southern Turkey. The U.S. intelligence community had not an inkling that anything was amiss until the troops started moving.
You cannot fool all the people all the time
In a panic to save its future, the Erdoğan government calling it a “parallel state,” an “illegal organization,” a “criminal gang,” a “web of treason” and “raving Hashashins” is attempting to collectively punish the Hizmet movement, whose establishments have significantly contributed to the betterment of the country in the fields of education, business, democratization, social solidarity and international relations.
US law professor: Gülen extradition would be unlawful
Seval Yıldırım, a professor of law at Whittier Law School, said in a statement to Today’s Zaman on Wednesday that for the US to extradite Turkish Islamic scholar Fethullah Gülen without a formal case against him would be an infringement of US law.
Love is A Verb – forthcoming documentary on the Gülen Movement
Love Is A Verb is an examination of a social movement of Sufi-inspired Sunni Muslims that began in Turkey in the l960s and now spans across the globe. The group is called Hizmet, the Turkish word for “service” or The Gülen Movement after its inspiration and teacher, Fethullah Gülen, a man TIME magazine named as one of the most influential leaders in the world in 2013 for “…preaching a message of tolerance.”
Interview with Henri Barkey on the Hizmet Movement
Henri Barkey, who has been one of the leading Turkey analysts in Washington, joined journalist Ruşen Çakır’s live broadcast via Periscope. He made interesting comments about the claims of the “parallel structure,” the situation of Fethullah Gülen in the US, and the appointment of trustees to the Zaman daily.
HRW report: No evidence to accuse Gülen movement of terrorism
The Human Rights Watch’s latest world report states that there is no evidence to prove the charges of “terrorism” held against the Gülent movement, which is inspired by the teachings of prominent Turkish Islamic scholar Fethullah Gülen.
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