Turkey Faces Its Iran 1979 Moment

On July 16, captured Turkish soldiers who backed a coup attempt Friday were beaten in Istanbul by supporters of President Erdogan.
On July 16, captured Turkish soldiers who backed a coup attempt Friday were beaten in Istanbul by supporters of President Erdogan.


Date posted: July 18, 2016

Soner Cagaptay

Empowered by surviving a coup, Erdogan may be tempted to encourage an Islamist counterrevolution.

Turkey is at a pivotal point in its history following the failed coup attempt of July 15. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, having survived the coup plot, won fresh legitimacy and gained a new ally: religious fervor in the streets. Mr. Erdogan can use this impetus either to become an executive-style president, or he can encourage the forces of religion to take over the country, crowning himself as an Islamic leader.

Though the incremental acquisition of power has been more his style in the past, the powerful eruption of Islamic support for him over the weekend may prove too tempting. This is Turkey’s Iran 1979 moment—will a brewing Islamic revolution overwhelm the forces of secularism?

As the coup plot was unfolding on Friday night, Mr. Erdogan appealed to religious sentiments in the country, rallying his supporters to launch a counter-coup. On his orders, calls for prayer were issued from Turkey’s over 80,000 mosques at 1:15 a.m.—not a time when people are supposed to be praying. The strategy worked, the call to prayer acted as a call to political action, and religious Turks took to the streets in defiance of the secularist military. Together with pro-government police forces, they overpowered the military’s botched effort.

Since July 15, pro-Erdogan sentiments in Turkey have been running high. Calls to prayer continue throughout the day (Islam requires only five calls to prayer at set times daily), reminding religious Turks of their political duty to stand with the president.

Mr. Erdogan, a politician with an Islamist pedigree, came to power in 2003 as prime minister and head of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP). At that time, he followed a policy of economic growth to build a support base. He also moved away from Islamist politics, instead embracing reform and seeking European Union membership.

After winning electoral victories in 2007 and 2011 on a platform of economic good governance, however, Mr. Erdogan turned staunchly conservative and authoritarian.

He now regularly cracks down on freedoms of expression, assembly and association. He has shut down or taken over media outlets. He bans access to social media, locks up journalists and sends the police to harass opposition rallies.

Mr. Erdogan also promotes efforts to impose religion: In December 2014, Turkey’s Higher Education Council, a government-regulated body, issued a policy recommendation that mandatory courses on Sunni Islam be taught in publicly funded schools to all students, even ones as young as age 6.

In 2014, Mr. Erdogan, acceding to term limits, stepped down as prime minister and as the head of the AKP. He instead assumed the presidency—a formerly weak office that he has been steadily transforming. The coup gives Mr. Erdogan an excuse to press ahead with his plans to cobble together a parliamentary majority; he intends to amend Turkey’s Constitution and take over the posts of prime minister and AKP chairman in addition to being president.

This process, which would make Mr. Erdogan the most powerful person in Turkey since the country became a multiparty democracy 1950, fits into his gradualist approach to consolidating power. At the same time, it presents a risk: In the two most recent elections, Mr. Erdogan’s AKP has maxed out at 49.5% support, and although the president’s popularity has risen since the coup, there is no guarantee that this bump will last until the next elections, which, depending on when Mr. Erdogan calls them, could be as late as next year.

Enter a second, quicker path to power: Islamist revolution. Erdogan supporters—who took to the streets to defy the coup, and who have continued to rally throughout the country since then—are not the garden-variety conservative AKP supporters, but rather Islamists, and even jihadists. Over the weekend, pro-Erdogan mobs captured and beat soldiers who had supported the coup. Images were reportedly posted online, in the Islamic State style, of a soldier who had been beheaded.

Unfortunately, jihadist sentiments in Turkey have become increasingly noticeable lately, in no small part due to Mr. Erdogan’s education policy, as well as his Syria policy, which has allowed Islamist radicals to use Turkey as a staging ground. According to a recent poll by the Pew Research Center, 27% of Turks don’t view Islamic State unfavorably. Mr. Erdogan can now harness these forces to usher in an Islamist revolution.

Revolutions don’t require majorities, but rather angry and excited minorities that are willing to act violently to take power. Following the failed coup plot, Turkish politics has not settled down. Mr. Erdogan is still not in charge of the whole country, which is why as of Sunday afternoon he hadn’t returned to the Turkish capital. It is not yet safe for him. Religious fervor is running high; mosques continue to call for prayers throughout the day. Islamists and jihadists who are angry at the military roam the streets, while most Turks of other political outlooks are scared to leave their homes.

If Mr. Erdogan were to pump up religious fervor further, he could convert the religious counter-coup d’état into an Islamist counter-revolution, ending Turkey’s status as a secular democracy. Adding to the temptation is the fact that the military, divided and discredited in the public eye following the failed coup, is in no position to prevent a counterrevolution.

But an Islamist revolution would carry risks. Turkey would be stripped of its NATO membership, exposing the country to nearby enemies, including Russia. It would also almost certainly lead to an economic meltdown, hurting Mr. Erdogan’s power base.

The first scenario, in which Mr. Erdogan uses the coup to consolidate power, is more likely than the second, but the chances of an Islamist revolution have never been higher in Turkey.

Mr. Cagaptay is a senior fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

Source: Washington Post , July 17, 2016


Related News

Turkey’s permanent state of crisis

However, Erdogan has a problem: Whereas Ataturk came to power as a military general, Erdogan has a democratic mandate to govern. Ataturk’s Turkey was rural and only 10 percent of the country was literate at the time, with most educated people supporting his agenda. Erdogan’s Turkey is 80 percent urban and nearly 100 percent literate, and many well-educated Turks oppose his agenda.

Fethullah Gülen: ‘I don’t have any regrets’

You insist your movement is peaceful, not political. But multiple sources tell me that Hizmet has a dark side — where individuals are carefully groomed to enter government and related professions with the intent of an ultimate takeover. Is this true? If not, is it possible that these sorts of activities are happening without your knowledge?

3,623 Aggravated Life Sentences Sought In Turkey For Scholar Fethullah Gülen

Turkish prosecutors, part of a judiciary strongly under the influence of Turkey’s autocratic President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, have demanded 3,623 aggravated life sentences for Turkish-Islamic scholar Fethullah Gülen, who lives in self-imposed exile in the US.

Erdoğan vows to strip Gülen sympatizers off Turkish citizenship

Speaking in his Black Sea hometown of Rize on Saturday, Erdoğan repeated his unsubstantiated accusations against the Gülen movement, calling its sympathizers “terrorists.” Erdoğan urged these people under persecution to become citizens of the countries in which they are living, saying that “they will not be considered citizens of this country.”

Corruption scandal will consolidate Turkish democracy

” When all the dust settles in the aftermath of corruption, money laundering and racketeering involving higher-ups in the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), we will have the chance to lay the foundation for a democracy by consensus, which is the only way to rule a large country like Turkey with a relatively young population and rising middle class.”

Dozen people hold demonstration in front of Zaman to protest corruption coverage

The protestors held up a banner bearing the picture of Islamic Scholar Fethullah Gülen saying that he despises the Taliban and Osama bin Laden. “Pick up your traitorous comrades and your prep schools, and get out of here, go to Israel, the US,” the script at the bottom of the banner said. The protest followed a series of public remarks over the weekend by Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, who attacked Zaman without mentioning it by name.

Latest News

Fethullah Gulen – man of education, peace and dialogue – passes away

Fethullah Gülen’s Condolence Message for South African Human Rights Defender Archbishop Desmond Tutu

Hizmet Movement Declares Core Values with Unified Voice

Ankara systematically tortures supporters of Gülen movement, Kurds, Turkey Tribunal rapporteurs say

Erdogan possessed by Pharaoh, Herod, Hitler spirits?

Devious Use of International Organizations to Persecute Dissidents Abroad: The Erdogan Case

A “Controlled Coup”: Erdogan’s Contribution to the Autocrats’ Playbook

Why is Turkey’s Erdogan persecuting the Gulen movement?

Purge-victim man sent back to prison over Gulen links despite stage 4 cancer diagnosis

In Case You Missed It

Dialog High School wins top prize

Dusseldorf drawn to the call “Come, whoever you are”

How can a government allow damaging their very own successful educational system to please another country?

PM Barzani and Turkish MPs attend the opening of Ishik University in Erbil

Turkish Olympiad students sing Kurdish, Turkish songs in Diyarbakır

GYV organized peace conference at United Nation

Local Muslims share Ramadan meal with each other and the community

Copyright 2025 Hizmet News