WASHINGTON – The battle lines between Turkey and Egypt over who will be the “moderate” voice of Islam in the Middle East became more pronounced as Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan accused the West of “blaming Muslims” for the attack last week on the French satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo in Paris.
Erdogan’s allegation against the West comes as Turkey, a member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, increasingly demonstrates support for the Islamic State, or ISIS, which has declared the formation of an Islamic caliphate from conquests of portions of Syria and Iraq.
ISIS took credit along with Al-Qaida in the Arabian Peninsula for the attacks in Paris over three days last week that took 17 lives.
In addition to the offices of Charlie Hebdo, a Jewish delicatessen was attacked by a jihadist Muslim claiming to belong to ISIS, killing four people.
Erdogan said French citizens carried out the massacre “and Muslims pay the price.” The three Islamic jihadists – Cherif Kouachi, 32, his brother Said Kouachi, 34 and Amedy Coulibaly, 32 – were born in France but also were Muslims who swore allegiance to al-Qaida and ISIS.
Erdogan’s comments are in sharp contrast with those of Egyptian President Abdel Fattah el-Sisi on New Year’s Day to Muslim clerics, urging them to take responsibility to change the world’s outlook on Islam.
“I am referring here to the religious clerics. … It’s “inconceivable that the thinking that we hold most sacred should cause the entire ummah (Islamic community) to be a source of anxiety, danger, killing and destruction for the rest of world. Impossible!” Sisi said.
“That thinking – I am not saying ‘religion’ but ‘thinking’ – that corpus of texts and ideas that we have sacralized over the centuries, to the point that departing from them has become almost impossible, is antagonizing the entire world. It’s antagonizing the entire world! … All this that I am telling you, you cannot feel it if you remain trapped within this mindset. You need to step outside of yourselves to be able to observe it and reflect on it from a more enlightened perspective,” the Egyptian president said.
“I say and repeat again that we are in need of a religious revolution. You, imams, are responsible before Allah. The entire world, I say it again, the entire world is waiting for your next move … because this ummah is being torn, it is being destroyed, it is being lost – and it is being lost by our own hands.”
Erdogan, however, said the West was “playing games with the Islamic world” and warned Muslims to be “aware.”
He said “French citizens carry out such a massacre and Muslims pay the price.”
“That’s very meaningful. Doesn’t their intelligence organization track those who leave prison?” Erdogan asked rhetorically. “Games are being played with the Islamic world, we need to be aware of this.
“The West’s hypocrisy is obvious,” Erdogan said. “As Muslims, we’ve never taken part in terrorist massacres. Behind these lie racism, hate speech and Islamophobia.”
He also condemned the presence of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu at the solidarity march last week with other world leaders in Paris.
“How can a man who has killed 2,500 people in Gaza with state terrorism wave his hand in Paris, like people are waiting in excitement for him to do so? How dare he go there,” Erdogan said.
Nevertheless, Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu attended the rally, even though his country has refused to join the U.S.-led anti-ISIS coalition and will not allow the U.S. to use the Turkish Incirlik Air Base from which to launch aircraft against ISIS positions in Syria.
Turkey is opposed to attacking ISIS, which continues to use Turkey to funnel recruits and supplies to its fighters in Syria. Instead, Erdogan seeks the removal of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to be replaced by a Sunni government in a country whose population is predominantly Sunni.
Assad, a Shiite Alawite, is in close alliance with Shiite Iran, which has developed a so-called Shiite crescent to include Iran, Iraq, Syria and increasingly Lebanon.
Erdogan, who has designs on recreating the Ottoman caliphate, is eager to bring back under Turkish rule portions of Syria, such as around Aleppo, were part of the Ottoman empire.
Regional analysts see Turkey becoming increasingly radical even while trying to sell the West on its “moderation.”
With Erdogan as Turkey’s newly elected president and chief of his Islamist party, the Justice and Development Party, or AKP, the country has shifted from a secular state in the 1990s to an Islamist government. It is the almost the exact opposite direction recently taken by Turkey’s main competitor for regional power, Egypt.
Turkey is veering ever-further from the West and is embracing more of the jihadist mantra while also attempting to appear to be the “moderate” Sunni alternative in the region to either Saudi Arabia or its chief competitor, Egypt.
Looking more eastward, Erdogan has allowed the Muslim Brotherhood leadership to stay in Turkey after it was kicked out of Egypt and Qatar, has allowed the Muslim Brotherhood-backed Hamas to shift its headquarters from Damascus to Ankara and has provided material assistance to ISIS.
Such backing has prompted critics to call for the U.S. to put Turkey on the terrorism list and to kick it out of NATO.
Erdogan not only has increased arrests of journalists critical of his policies but has allowed his AKP to infiltrate the judiciary system and the police. In addition, Erdogan has minimized opposition parties and has sidelined the military, which, at one time, was the major defender of Turkey’s secular system.
Yet, the U.S. has done little to confront Turkey over its direction.
In turning eastward and attempting to make Turkey the top Islamist country in the region, Erdogan has put Turkey on a collision course with Egypt, which also has Islamist credentials but, unlike Ankara, is opposed to ISIS, Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood.
Erdogan had been close to Egypt, especially when Muslim Brotherhood-backed Mohamed Morsi was the Egyptian president for a year before Sisi ousted him in a military coup in 2013. At the time, Erdogan called Sisi an “illegitimate tyrant” and a “coup-maker.”
Immediately following Sisi’s election as president, Erdogan declared him to be “null and void.” In response, Egypt canceled visa-free travel for Turkish citizens as well as a transit agreement for Turkish trucks.
Even if there is an effort to mend fences with Sisi, the Turkish president’s labeling of the Egyptian president of an “illegitimate tyrant” may impede that prospect, sources say.
Erdogan criticized Sisi for asking Interpol in December to issue a red notice on the Qatar-based cleric Youssef al-Qaradawi, spiritual leader of the Muslim Brotherhood.
The red notice bars the Egyptian-born, 88-year-old Qaradawi from traveling to other countries after being accused of “incitement and assistance to commit intentional murder, helping prisoners to escape, arson, vandalism and theft.”
Qatar followed suit and kicked out Qaradawi, who then relocated to Turkey, with Erdogan’s welcome.
Because of Erdogan’s biting criticism of Sisi, Egypt cut diplomatic ties with Turkey and expelled the Turkish ambassador.
The dispute between Erdogan and Sisi doesn’t seem to be diminishing.
“Look, a person who came to power through coup is giving instructions to Interpol,” Erdogan said recently. “Based on this instruction, a step is being taken for the arrest of Youssel al-Qaradawi, president of the International Union of Muslim Scholars. What kind of a business is this?”
In supporting Erdogan, Qaradawi recently denounced the ISIS creation of a caliphate, saying Turkey is the capital of the caliphate.
Such a notion, however, will be at odds with Sisi’s major backer, Saudi Arabia, which historically has condemned the Turkish Ottoman caliphate.
