Turkey’s prominent journalist Fehmi Koru answered Ece Uner’s questions on Haberturk TV. He also made comments about the AK Party-Gulen Movement conflict and the probability that the Gulen Movement may engage in active party politics.
Koru said, “What you call as the movement is a civil society organization. They let politicians do the daily politics. They have political opinions and they try to influence politics. But they do this by having relations with politicians as they did in the past. It is against the nature of the movement to impose any opinion on the government. If there is sharp irreconcilable disagreement between the movement and the AK Party, they may found a political party. But if they do so, they will lose the advantage of being a [civil society] movement. They will face more criticism when they found a political party.
Since conflicting with the secularist segments of society in the Gezi Park events, the Justice and Development Party (AKP) government has taken on a paranoid mentality that tends to relate all developments that are against the AKP government with some form of conspiracy against it. As a result of this paranoid outlook, the AKP government has now gotten itself into a conflict with the Gülen movement. It is arguing that the Gülen movement is working in conjunction with foreign forces to harm the government.
‘Gülen movement has a specific mission’
… If the [Fethullah] Gülen movement were a small, ineffective community, the AKP would never have disturbed it. Or if the Gülen movement had acted in full cooperation with the government, such a conflict wouldn’t have occurred. But the Gülen movement has a specific mission. What is that mission? They seek to obtain the pleasure of God by leading good religious lives and engaging in educational and social services.
AK Party, Hizmet movement and politics
İHSAN YILMAZ August 31, 2012 I have written repeatedly about the relationship between the Hizmet movement (aka Gulen movement) and politics here. Unfortunately, it still needs some more discussion. As is well known, Hizmet never associates itself with political parties. It is a volunteer movement that appeals to individuals from all sorts of social, cultural, […]
Erdogan may keep winning, but it wont’ do Turkey any good
I don’t believe Ankara is ever really going to stray from its partnership with the U.S., because Turkey simply cannot afford it. The coup — failed though it was — has left the formerly expanding Turkish economy gasping. Credit-rating agencies have lowered the nation’s stock, and the purging of coup conspirators, both real and imagined, has left tens of thousands of crucial private- and public-sector positions empty. Economic growth, meanwhile, is expected to dip.
Georgetown University in Qatar professor authors book on interfaith dialogue, Hizmet Movement
Father Thomas Michel in his new book titled “Peace and Dialogue in a Plural Society: Contributions of the Hizmet Movement at a Time of Global Tensions” explores how Fethullah Gulen and his movement are one of those voices speaking most vocally in favor of a world community, where different faiths and nations can come together at one table to solve the multitude of problems facing today’s world.
A new book: Fethullah Gulen and The Gulen Movement in 100 Questions
Professor Doğu Ergil’s two-and-a-half-year study on the Gülen movement inspired by Fethullah Gülen is in English now. Ergil met with Gülen twice while writing the book. The 100 questions Ergil asked consist of those the general public is curious about. Ergil’s analysis accompanies Gülen’s answers to these questions. Gülen gave both verbal and written replies to Professor […]
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