While responding to a question on hate speech, the Religious Affairs Directorate said on Monday that Islam does not allow its followers to use such discourse.
A man identified as Mustafa Petek asked the Religious Affairs Directorate on March 24 if Turkish Islamic scholar Fethullah Gülen, who inspired the Hizmet movement, deserves to be a target of hate speech by state officials. Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and several government officials have been targeting Gülen and the movement, calling him a “false prophet,” “fake saint” and “bogus scholar,” and Hizmet a “parallel state,” a “gang,” “cave dwellers,” “tools,” a “virus,” a “tumor,” an “illegal organization” and “raving Hashishin,” which was a medieval order of assassins.
The Religious Affairs Directorate, in response to the man’s query on hate speech, said, “In Islam, no one is allowed to humiliate a person or refer to him using adjectives that don’t represent him.”
[Cafe Capital] Excessive attempts to manipulate people’s perceptions to backfire
The tension caused by a Supreme Board of Judges and Prosecutors (HSYK) bill that is designed to restructure the HSYJ, the witch-hunts against police officers, teachers and other public employees who have been profiled as members of the Hizmet community (Gülen movement) and the victimization of tens of thousands of people have created unease among the general public. People started reacting negatively to the accusations and slander, which went far beyond the limits of criticism against the Hizmet community, and started saying: “This is too much!
Paralyzed by ill-treatment in Sivas prison, Turkish police officer dies at 33
Kadir Eyce, a 33-year-old police officer who was jailed due to alleged links to the Gülen movement, has died several weeks after he was released from prison due to health problems. According to photos and tweets posted by family members on Twitter, Eyce had been denied food and water in jail, thereby losing 45 kilograms in three months.
Watson points to new authoritarianism in Turkish gov’t’s relations
“A new authoritarianism can be seen in the government’s relations with business and the media, and towards protests,” the British member of the European Parliament (MEP) and leader of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats for Europe party said in his letter.
Dutch, German intelligence agencies uncover Turkish kidnapping, murder plots
The secret intelligence cabal directly controlled by the head of Turkey’s notorious National Intelligence Organization (MİT) under direct orders from the Turkish president has planned to assassinate a leading critic in Germany and execute a plan to kidnap another critic in the Netherlands, sources familiar with the cases told.
“We will root out every single Gülenist from the Balkans,” Erdoğan says in Serbia
People affiliated with the U.S.-based Islamic preacher Fethullah Gülen will be “rooted out” from the Balkans, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said on Oct. 11 in a speech in the Serbian town of Novi Pazar.
Why is Turkey’s Erdogan persecuting the Gulen movement?
Erdogan’s government has made Gulenists “the enemy you ascribe to everything that goes poorly in Turkey,” according to Henri Barkey, a fellow for Middle East studies at the Council on Foreign Relations.
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