joelstrumpet

Turkey to Hold Emergency Meeting
After Attack That Killed 12 Soldiers

Associated Press
October 21, 2007 7:15 a.m.

SIRNAK, Turkey -- Kurdish rebels ambushed a military unit near Turkey's border with Iraq early Sunday, killing at least 12 soldiers and increasing pressure on the Turkish government to stage attacks against guerrilla camps in Iraq.

The soldiers died when rebels blew up a bridge as a 12-vehicle military convoy was crossing it, CNN-Turk television said. Hours later, Iraq said, Turkish forces fired about 15 artillery shells toward Kurdish villages in the border area in northern Iraq, but there were no casualties.

In a separate incident, 14 people were injured when a bomb exploded as a minibus passed near the area where the soldiers were killed, CNN-Turk said.

"Our anger, our hatred is great," Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on national television. He said the government would hold an emergency meeting later Sunday and would take "an approach that is calm, far from agitation and based on common sense." The attack came four days after Turkey's Parliament overwhelmingly passed a motion allowing its military to launch an offensive into northern Iraq against hideouts of the rebel Kurdistan Workers' Party, or PKK.

Turkish leaders have said that the motion didn't mean that Turkey would immediately order a cross-border offensive, but the latest attack was likely to increase calls by a frustrated public for the military to stage an incursion. Previous offensives by Turkey in Iraq have blunted rebel strength, but failed to eradicate the group. "These latest developments, I believe, will make us implement sharper measures," Labor Minister Faruk Celik said.

The attack occurred just after midnight, during a military offensive against rebels near the Turkish village of Daglica, in Hakkari province, where the borders of Turkey, Iraq and Iran meet. Hakkari is east of neighboring Sirnak province, another area of conflict between the PKK and the Turkish military.

Mr. Erdogan said 12 soldiers died. The state-run Anatolia news agency said 13 died and 15 were injured. Private NTV television put the death toll at 16. The military and the local governor's office declined to comment.

NTV said the fighting occurred five three miles from the border with Iraq. The Turkish military reinforced troops in the region and launched an operation to catch the rebels who attacked the military unit. There were no reports that the troops had crossed into Iraq.

The Turkish shelling of Iraqi territory started at about 7 a.m. Sunday and was concentrated in the Mateen mountain range in the Amadiyah area, 20 miles from the border, said Col. Hussein Rashid of the Iraqi border guard forces. Col. Rashid said the villages were deserted because of the border tension.

The Iraqi region of Amadiyah is roughly opposite the Turkish town of Cukurca, in Hakkari province. Rebels are active near Cukurca, 30 miles from the location where the soldiers died Sunday. Sunday's death toll raises the number of soldiers killed in PKK attacks in the past two weeks to around 30.

Turkey has been pressing the U.S. and the Iraqi government to crack down on the rebels who have found safe havens in the remote, mountainous areas of self-governed northern Iraq. The U.S. opposes any unilateral action by Turkey, fearing it could destabilize the most stable part of Iraq.

On Saturday, Mr. Erdogan said Turkey expected the U.S. to take action against the PKK but would take its own measures if it saw no results in the fight. The U.S. lists the PKK as a terrorist organization and has condemned its attacks in Turkey. However, Washington has called on the Turkish government to work with the Iraqis.

Rebels periodically cross the border to stage attacks in their war for autonomy for Turkey's predominantly Kurdish southeast. More than 30,000 people have died in the conflict that began in 1984.

Copyright © 2007 Associated Press

Associated Press

» Oct 21, 23:00 - TURKEY HINTS AT CROSS BORDER OPERATION, WARNS IRAQ - After an emergency security summit meeting chaired by President Gül and attended by Prime Minister Erdoğan and top commanders, Turkey said Sunday that it was not afraid of "paying the price" to win victory over separatist Kurdish Workers Party (PKK) terrorists based in northern Iraq after a PKK ambush near the Iraqi border left 12 soldiers dead. “Although it respects Iraqi territorial integrity, Turkey will not tolerate that terrorism be aided and abetted and will not be afraid to pay, whatever the price may be, to protect its rights, its indivisible unity and its citizens,” said a statement issued after the meeting.

Sometimes I think our leadership is completely, hopelessly stupid.

After all this time I can't believe that the US has allowed the PKK to do what they do.

What did the US think was going to happen?

For a time , I thought the Iraq invasion was a calculation to get us into a staging ground to take on Iran and Saudi Arabial. But apparently I was naive to think there was some intelligence in the heads of our leaders.'

If we invaded Iraq just for the sake of invading Iraq and nothing more ambitious , then my God.. how dumb

Just like allowing a NATO country to be the victims of terrorists that are from a country we are occupying.

I totally can't blame Turkey for doing what they are doing. I'm surprised they waited so long.

Sometimes I wonder if the United States is goading Turkey into this action....and if there is a plan to provoke the Gog/Magog conflict. There must be more going on behind the scenes than the news media reports.

Wish I understood what was happening.

Which is why I am here.

Trying to make sense of puzzling current events in light of Bible prophecy.

There may indeed be some goading of Turkey, but perhaps not by the US. Check this out:

Are Syria and Iran Manipulating Turkey on Iraq?

By Walid Phares

PKK is the Kurdish Worker’s Party that adopted violence in its struggle against Turkey. As the Turkish Parliament recently voted to authorize a limited invasion into Northern Iraq to fight the PKK militias, one can see the rising shadows of two hostile regimes in the region, eager to see a NATO member, Turkey, eventually clashing with the United States through their local allies in Iraq.

Indeed, the Iranian and Syrian regimes have been pushing the precarious mechanisms of a Turkish military intervention into Northern Iraq for a while now. Logically, a collapse of security in the most secure part of Iraq would lead to a crumbling of the military stabilization of the country, a chief objective of US plans in Iraq.

But the Iran plans for Iraq, which I have analyzed in a previous article, consist of three types of destabilization:

An Iranian push in the south, a Syrian opening for the Jihadists in the center, and dragging Turkey to a dogfight in the mountains of the north.

In order to launch the third leg preemptively into Iraqi Kurdistan, Tehran and Damascus have been pushing all the right buttons for the confrontation. Iran's shelling of villages in the northern part of Iraqi Kurdistan over the past months aimed at encouraging Turkey to do the same.

Opening salvos by the Ayatollahs are to test the Kurdish and US reactions. Moreover, Iran's Pasdaran - the Revolutionary Guard that provides training and support to terrorist groups throughout the region and abroad - is said to have infiltrated some circles within the PKK, since the latter was based in Syria a few years ago. The PKK suddenly has been waging inexplicable operations inside Eastern Turkey with a new energy, after years of calm. Sources believe the PKK was manipulated by both Iran and Syria into these terror acts on Turkish soil while the official bases of the group are on Iraqi soil. Hence the attacks triggering Turkish anger and responses may have been manipulated by the "axis."

But the Syrian regime has another card it could have played. According to well informed sources in the region, and not to the surprise of experts, the Alawite regime in Syria (Alawites are important to the leadership of Syria, as President Bashar al-Assad and his father, Hafez are Alawite) has had good relations with Alawite officers inside the Turkish armed forces. The “Alawite connection” may have been activated to encourage a military response and incursion into northern Iraq. But nevertheless, the Assad regime and the Turkish Islamist Government - reinforced by the last Presidential election in Ankara - have a joint objective interest in weakening the US presence in Iraq.

Assad thinks that he can help create a major Turkish-Iranian-Syrian alliance against the Kurds in Northern Iraq. And by the same logic, the Kurds, solid US allies, will be facing another formal ally of Washington on Iraqi soil: Turkey. The plan is to drag the Turkish Army (traditionally not inclined to find itself face to face with its major ally) to enter a territory where "terrorists are based," but where they could be indistinguishable from those Kurdish Peshmergas who are the backbone of the new post-Saddam Iraq. The rest can be guessed.

As the “axis” is using all its cards to crumble Iraq’s and Lebanon’s democracies, the Kurds in Northern Iraq should have acted quickly and strategically. There shouldn’t have been any PKK bases in their areas because these are a recipe for disaster.

The situation in Iraq as a whole is still complex, precarious and explosive, despite the advances made by the new US military plans, including the surge. The north must remain stable and secure and, above all, at peace with the only “NATO” border it has. The other frontiers Iraqi Kurdistan has are with the Pasdarans and the Syrian Baath. Both want the new Iraq’s head.

Instead of playing charms with Tehran and Damascus, the Kurdestan city of Soleimaniye must reinforce its own deterring force and maintain stability and peace on its northern border with Turkey. Knowing all too well that the new Islamist Government in Ankara is shifting the grounds inside the modernist Kemalist Republic, Iraq’s Kurdish leadership mustn’t offer any reason for a Turkish adventure in their areas.

Hence, it is recommended that the Kurdish leaders of Iraq be the ones to reign in the PKK to avoid having the Turkish Army crossing the borders. The US can – and should - broker arrangements between the Iraqi Kurds and the Turkish military to avoid the rise of an anti-Kurdish Triangle in the region.

Thought I would post this on the first page of this Turkey thread. It is a study I did back in 2005 but for the most part still accurate. This is what I was working on when I ran across Joel's online book. He was the first person I had found that interpreted Eze 38-39 almost exactly as I did. At the time hardly anyone believed an Islamic AC was possible. Thankfully many are starting to see it now as we grow ever nearer to that time. Here's the basic biblical proof for considering Turkey as a candidate for the AC nation.

Peace,
Seeker

___________________________________________

Posted: Tue Mar 15, 2005 1:20 pm Post subject: Re: The Case for the AC Rising from Turkey

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

I'll try to provide a basic overview of the scripture and research that backs the theory of Turkey being the nation the AC arises from. This will be a summary of information contained in a number of threads that helped develop the Turkey theory. Many aspects related to the theory have already been discussed in those threads.

Satan's Seat

The most direct link of Turkey to scripture is contained in Rev 2. Pergamos was one of the seven churches addressed in the first part of the book of Revelation. Those 7 churches were all located in Turkey at the time when John wrote the words in Revelation, given to him by our Lord and Savior Christ Jesus. The isle of Patmos where John was exiled to was just off the western coast of Turkey. These were physical churches full of believers living in what we know as modern day Turkey.

Revelation 1

11 Saying, I am Alpha and Omega, the first and the last: and, What thou seest, write in a book, and send it unto the seven churches which are in Asia; unto Ephesus, and unto Smyrna, and unto Pergamos, and unto Thyatira, and unto Sardis, and unto Philadelphia, and unto Laodicea.

I will spend a little time on a few of the other churches before getting back to Pergamos. This will help us understand the conditions in the area that the earliest churches lived in. The church at Ephesus was praised for hating the deeds of the Nicolaitanes. These deeds would be considered against Jesus thus for Satan.

Ephesus

6 But this thou hast, that thou hatest the deeds of the Nicolaitanes, which I also hate.

"The church at Ephesus (Rev. 2:6) is commended for hating the "deeds" of the Nicolaitanes, and the church of Pergamos is blamed for having them who hold their "doctrines" (15). They were seemingly a class of professing Christians, who sought to introduce into the church a false freedom or licentiousness, thus abusing Paul's doctrine of grace (compare 2 Pet. 2:15, 16, 19), and were probably identical with those who held the doctrine of Baalam (q.v.), Rev. 2:14."

http://www.christiananswers.net/dictionary/nicolaitanes.html

Jesus tells us through John that there existed in Smyrna a group of Jews that He described as "the synagogue of Satan". This indicates that the powers of Satan were live and active in the Smyrna (Turkey) region.

Smyrna

9 I know thy works, and tribulation, and poverty, (but thou art rich) and I know the blasphemy of them which say they are Jews, and are not, but are the synagogue of Satan.

Thyatira was rebuked for fornication and eating things sacrificed unto idols. So we have more things we know are Satanic inspired. They are praised for "not" knowing the depths of Satan. The Satanic influence is again shown to be prevalent in that small western edge of Turkey where these 7 churches were located.

Thyatira

20 Notwithstanding I have a few things against thee, because thou sufferest that woman Jezebel, which calleth herself a prophetess, to teach and to seduce my servants to commit fornication, and to eat things sacrificed unto idols.

24 But unto you I say, and unto the rest in Thyatira, as many as have not this doctrine, and which have not known the depths of Satan, as they speak; I will put upon you none other burden.
25 But that which ye have already hold fast till I come.

In Philadelphia the synagogue of Satan is mentioned again.

Philadelphia

9 Behold, I will make them of the synagogue of Satan, which say they are Jews, and are not, but do lie; behold, I will make them to come and worship before thy feet, and to know that I have loved thee.

Pergamos is the city that has a direct reference to Satan dwelling there. John tells us directly that Pergamos is where the seat of Satan is and where Satan dwells. The Babylonian priests preserved the Babylonian religion after the fall of Babylon. First in the Persia-Media empire of Daniel 8 and then it was passed on to the Greek empire. After the breakup of the Greek empire, following Alexander’s death, the Babylonian priests fled the Romans to Pergamos to preserve the religion. From Pergamos it infiltrated into the early harlot Christian churches, the Jews labeled as the synagogue of Satan, and influenced Islam. In a sense Turkey could be related to the "mother of harlots and abominations". The abominations as described in the churches above inspired by the heavy Satanic influence in the area that the churches were located. The Babylonian religion had already infiltrated the churches even in the beginning.

Rev 17:5 And upon her forehead was a name written, MYSTERY, BABYLON THE GREAT, THE MOTHER OF HARLOTS AND ABOMINATIONS OF THE EARTH.

Rev 2:13 I know thy works, and where thou dwellest, even where Satan's seat is: and thou holdest fast my name, and hast not denied my faith, even in those days wherein Antipas was my faithful martyr, who was slain among you, where Satan dwelleth.

There is no doubt that John has labeled Pergamos as where Satan's seat is and where Satan dwells in Rev 2:13. Flip chapter and verse to Rev 13:2 and we have this scripture concerning the AC. Here we are told that the AC is given 3 things from the dragon (Satan). He is given his power, seat, and great authority. Satan's seat is said to be in Pergamos.

Rev 13:2 And the beast which I saw was like unto a leopard, and his feet were as the feet of a bear, and his mouth as the mouth of a lion: and the dragon gave him his power, and his seat, and great authority.

Four out of the 7 churches had Satanic influences. There seems to be a power base located in the general area of the 7 churches with Satan's base being in Pergamos. Pergamos is now called Bergama, Turkey. Rev 2:13 is the only scripture that I know of in bible that gives us any clue to an earthly location for Satan. So at least in John's time Satan had a seat in Turkey. The Altar of Zeus was also located in Pergamos. A statue of Zeus was placed in the temple by Antiochus Epiphanies prior to its destruction and would be considered an abomination standing in the temple.

Revelation 17 gives us a view of what the AC's empire will look like just prior to its destruction. We have a picture of a beast with 7 heads and 10 horns with a woman sitting on it. Rev 17:7 an angel tells John he will tell him the mystery of the woman and the beast with 7 heads/10 horns. So here we are given an interpretation of what these things represent.

7 And the angel said unto me, Wherefore didst thou marvel? I will tell thee the mystery of the woman, and of the beast that carrieth her, which hath the seven heads and ten horns.
8 The beast that thou sawest was, and is not; and shall ascend out of the bottomless pit, and go into perdition: and they that dwell on the earth shall wonder, whose names were not written in the book of life from the foundation of the world, when they behold the beast that was, and is not, and yet is.
9 And here is the mind which hath wisdom. The seven heads are seven mountains, on which the woman sitteth.

Revelation 12:3 tells us the red dragon has 7 heads and 10 horns. Rev 12:9 defines the dragon as Satan. The beast in Rev 17 has 7 heads/10 horns and comes out of the bottomless pit. I believe that we can confidently say that the beast with 7 heads/ 10 horns of Rev 17 is referring to Satan.

Revelation 12

3 And there appeared another wonder in heaven; and behold a great red dragon, having seven heads and ten horns, and seven crowns upon his heads.

9 And the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent, called the Devil, and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world: he was cast out into the earth, and his angels were cast out with him.

Using these 3 verses we can tie Pergamos, the AC, and Satan together (Rev 2:13, Rev 13:2, and Rev 12:3). We know the beast of Rev 17 represents Satan and his last world empire. The angel has told John he will reveal the mystery. The angel continues the description in Rev 17:9.

City on 7 Hills

9 And here is the mind which hath wisdom. The seven heads are seven mountains, on which the woman sitteth.

This angel, sent from God, tells us that the 7 heads are 7 mountains the woman sits on. Rev 17:18 defines the woman as that great city.

18 And the woman which thou sawest is that great city, which reigneth over the kings of the earth.

Strong's concordance provides "hills" as one definition for mountains. So the woman (city) riding on the beast (Satan) sits on 7 mountains (hills). Many claim that Rome is the city referred to as sitting on 7 hills. Rome wasn't actually founded on 7 hills though. There was a city that was built on 7 hills, it was Constantinople also known as New Rome and modern day as Istanbul, Turkey.

Istanbul is located on the western coast of Turkey close to where the 7 churches were. We know Satan's seat was in nearby Pergamos. Currently Istanbul is the Keeper of the Keys of Mecca and also where leader of the Eastern Orthodox Church is based. The Roman Catholic Church and the Eastern Orthodox have been taking steps to reunite. Istanbul could possibly evolve into an international city representing all major religions. Lately they have been building new worship centers that have Christian, Jewish, and Islamic services in the same building.

Revelation 18 talks about the great city being destroyed. The city is a trade center. Istanbul is a long established important trade port. It is literally where the West, Middle East, and East meet. The nation of Turkey sits on 4 separate bodies of water. Revelation 17 speaks of the whore that sits on many waters. The whore is the woman which is the city on 7 hills which is the city of Istanbul. The city is in the region of Satan's seat and dwelling place.

The 4 World Empires

If Turkey is to be considered as the nation where the AC rises from then it also has to match other pertinent scripture. The book of Daniel, without a doubt, gives us the most information about the 4th and final beast kingdom. Daniel 2, 7, & 8 all three talk about the 4 world kingdoms that will exist on earth.

All 3 chapters follow the same format. First there is a dream or vision. Next Daniel asks for the meaning of the dream/vision and then an interpretation is given to Daniel from God. It is important to note that God has given us the meaning of the particular dream or vision in all 3 chapters. I know I can't improve upon the interpretation given by God so accept it as the truth and precise meaning of the vision.

Dan 2:19 Then was the secret revealed unto Daniel in a night vision. Then Daniel blessed the God of heaven.

Dan 2:28 But there is a God in heaven that revealeth secrets, and maketh known to the king Nebuchadnezzar what shall be in the latter days. Thy dream, and the visions of thy head upon thy bed, are these;

Dan 2:36 This is the dream; and we will tell the interpretation thereof before the king.

39 And after thee shall arise another kingdom inferior to thee, and another third kingdom of brass, which shall bear rule over all the earth.
40 And the fourth kingdom shall be strong as iron: forasmuch as iron breaketh in pieces and subdueth all things: and as iron that breaketh all these, shall it break in pieces and bruise.

Daniel is told that there will be only 4 kingdoms that rule over the earth. The first is Babylon, the one Daniel lives in. The vision in Daniel 2 was said to be for the latter times. That is confirmed by Dan 2:44 where we are told that the 10 kings of the 4th kingdom shall be in the days that God sets up his everlasting kingdom.

44 And in the days of these kings shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom, which shall never be destroyed: and the kingdom shall not be left to other people, but it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand for ever.

The 10 kings are said to be part of the 4th kingdom therefore exist in the same time frame as when the Lord returns. So we know the first was Babylon and the last exists near the time of the Lord's return.

Dan 7:16 I came near unto one of them that stood by, and asked him the truth of all this. So he told me, and made me know the interpretation of the things.
Dan 7:17 These great beasts, which are four, are four kings, which shall arise out of the earth.

19 Then I would know the truth of the fourth beast, which was diverse from all the others, exceeding dreadful, whose teeth were of iron, and his nails of brass; which devoured, brake in pieces, and stamped the residue with his feet;
20 And of the ten horns that were in his head, and of the other which came up, and before whom three fell; even of that horn that had eyes, and a mouth that spake very great things, whose look was more stout than his fellows.
21 I beheld, and the same horn made war with the saints, and prevailed against them;
22 Until the Ancient of days came, and judgment was given to the saints of the most High; and the time came that the saints possessed the kingdom.

Here again is the 4th kingdom in the time that the Ancient of days came and the saints possessed the kingdom. This is clearly at the return of Christ. So we are talking about the same 4 kingdoms as we were in Daniel 2.

Daniel 8

15 And it came to pass, when I, even I Daniel, had seen the vision, and sought for the meaning, then, behold, there stood before me as the appearance of a man.
16 And I heard a man's voice between the banks of Ulai, which called, and said, Gabriel, make this man to understand the vision.

19 And he said, Behold, I will make thee know what shall be in the last end of the indignation: for at the time appointed the end shall be.

Daniel again asks for understanding. The angel Gabriel is instructed to make Daniel understand the vision. Daniel 8 gives us specific information on the 2nd and 3rd kingdoms. This vision is also intended for the time of the end.

20 The ram which thou sawest having two horns are the kings of Media and Persia.
21 And the rough goat is the king of Grecia: and the great horn that is between his eyes is the first king.
22 Now that being broken, whereas four stood up for it, four kingdoms shall stand up out of the nation, but not in his power.
23 And in the latter time of their kingdom, when the transgressors are come to the full, a king of fierce countenance, and understanding dark sentences, shall stand up.

Kingdom number one is Babylon. The next is Media-Persia and the third is Grecia (Greek). The 4th kingdom again exists at the time of our Lord's return. He stands up against Jesus (Prince of princes) at His second coming.

25 And through his policy also he shall cause craft to prosper in his hand; and he shall magnify himself in his heart, and by peace shall destroy many: he shall also stand up against the Prince of princes; but he shall be broken without hand.

We are told in Dan 8:21 that the rough goat's horn is the first king. We know from history that Alexander the great was the first king of the Greek empire. Alexander died and 4 of his generals split up his empire. In Dan 8:22 we are told the horn is broken into 4 divisions just as happened to the Greek empire. Dan 8:23 says that in the latter time of their kingdom (the 4 divisions) a king of fierce countenance (AC) shall stand up.

Somewhere out of what was the Greek empire is where the AC will arise from. The interpretation given here by the angel Gabriel states that clearly. The western edge of the Greek empire only reached to modern Greece. This effectively eliminates western Europe as a candidate to produce the AC.

http://www.ancientanatolia.com/map09.htm

North and South

To further narrow down which part of the Greek empire that the AC rises from we need to turn to Daniel 11. Keep in mind that this is written by the same man that had previously received 3 dream/visions and their interpretations directly from God. The visions described what would happen to the kingdom he lived in (Babylon) and the kingdoms that followed on earth.

There were only 4 kingdoms ever mentioned. Rome could not have been the 4th kingdom because we know it exists close to the time of the return of Jesus. There is absolutely no scripture in the interpretations that indicate that the 4th kingdom will exist, be destroyed, and then exist again. Daniel already knows about the 4 world empires from the previous visions.

Daniel 11

2 And now will I shew thee the truth. Behold, there shall stand up yet three kings in Persia; and the fourth shall be far richer than they all: and by his strength through his riches he shall stir up all against the realm of Grecia.
3 And a mighty king shall stand up, that shall rule with great dominion, and do according to his will.
4 And when he shall stand up, his kingdom shall be broken, and shall be divided toward the four winds of heaven; and not to his posterity, nor according to his dominion which he ruled: for his kingdom shall be plucked up, even for others beside those.
5 And the king of the south shall be strong, and one of his princes; and he shall be strong above him, and have dominion; his dominion shall be a great dominion.

Previously in Daniel 8, Daniel is told that the first 3 kingdoms are Babylon, Media-Persia, and Grecia (Greek). Dan 11:2 speaks of 4 Persian kings that stir up all against the realm of Grecia. There was a war between Greece and Persia with Greece being the victor and defeating the Persian empire.

Dan 11:3-4 tells of a mighty king that stands up and that his kingdom will be divided toward the 4 winds of heaven. This is the Greek king that stands up against the Persia king. We know from history that Alexander was the first king of the Greek empire and that his kingdom was divided into 4 portions after his death. Four of his generals each took a portion of the empire initially.

Now in Dan 11:5 we see that the king of the south was one of his princes (And the king of the south shall be strong, and one of his princes). Alexander's general could be considered one of his princes. Further down in Dan 11 the identity of the south is given as Egypt. The northern part of the Greek empire was composed of 3 of the 4 original divisions after some battles between the 4 generals. This left the old Greek empire as being comprised of 2 primary divisions (northern and southern).

7 But out of a branch of her roots shall one stand up in his estate, which shall come with an army, and shall enter into the fortress of the king of the north, and shall deal against them, and shall prevail:
8 And shall also carry captives into Egypt their gods, with their princes, and with their precious vessels of silver and of gold; and he shall continue more years than the king of the north.

Dan 11:7-8 shows the king of the south attacking the king of the north, prevailing, and carrying spoils back to Egypt. So the king of the south is referring to Egypt. Egypt was the southern division of the broken Greek empire.

The northern division was called the Seleucid dynasty. The geographic area of the Seleucus was basically what was known as Asia Minor. This area did not include western Europe. Daniel 11 proceeds with a series of battles between the king of the north and the king of the south. Certain historic battles seem to match up quite nicely with those scriptures up until the last king mentioned in Daniel 11.

The last king is a king that will exist close to the time of the Lord's return to earth. We can know this because of this verse in Daniel 11.

31 And arms shall stand on his part, and they shall pollute the sanctuary of strength, and shall take away the daily sacrifice, and they shall place the abomination that maketh desolate.

Here we see the AOD occurring. This we know happens at the mid-point of the last 7 years. The AOD time stamp places this king of Dan 11:31 in the last 7 years. The king spoken of in Daniel 11:31 is first spoken of in Daniel 11:21.

21 And in his estate shall stand up a vile person, to whom they shall not give the honour of the kingdom: but he shall come in peaceably, and obtain the kingdom by flatteries.

The estate that this king stands up in can be found in Daniel 11:15

15 So the king of the north shall come, and cast up a mount, and take the most fenced cities: and the arms of the south shall not withstand, neither his chosen people, neither shall there be any strength to withstand.

This king of the North is succeeded by the king of Dan 11:20 who is succeeded by the king in Daniel 11:21. This makes the king of the 11:21, a king of the north. This is also the AC. So the AC will arise out of the last of the 4 world empires, specifically out of the northern portion of that empire after it was divided 4 ways. Turkey was part of that northern division so fits that part of prophecy. There are other parts of the northern division that could qualify but when added with the specific information of Satan’s seat being in Pergamos, Turkey seems more likely the one.

Gog Chief Prince of Meshech and Tubal

There are other books of prophecy in the bible that I feel speak of the battle of Armageddon. They give some specific information on some of the nations involved in that battle. There are many views on Armageddon timing which I don't wish to get deeply into. I will present the scripture and why I feel that scripture pertains to the time near the return of Jesus. Regardless of what we call the battle, it is still clear that the events described occur near the "day of the Lord".

Ezekiel 38-39 speaks of a battle that occurs on the mountains of Israel. There is a list of names of those arrayed against Israel for this battle. God defeats this alliance and then Israel knows their God from that point forward after witnessing the defeat of this alliance by the hand of God. This has to occur before the millennium. There is no way that Israel would not know their God if He is dwelling among them ruling from Jerusalem, as will be the case during the millennium.

Ezekiel 39

7 So will I make my holy name known in the midst of my people Israel; and I will not let them pollute my holy name any more: and the heathen shall know that I am the LORD, the Holy One in Israel.

22 So the house of Israel shall know that I am the LORD their God from that day and forward.

Both the heathen and Israel will know who God is after this battle sequence given in Eze 38-39. Scripture tells us when the nations finally know who God is. It is after they taste His utter defeat at Armageddon.

Revelation 16

14 For they are the spirits of devils, working miracles, which go forth unto the kings of the earth and of the whole world, to gather them to the battle of that great day of God Almighty.
15 Behold, I come as a thief. Blessed is he that watcheth, and keepeth his garments, lest he walk naked, and they see his shame.
16 And he gathered them together into a place called in the Hebrew tongue Armageddon.

Revelation 19

19 And I saw the beast, and the kings of the earth, and their armies, gathered together to make war against him that sat on the horse, and against his army.
20 And the beast was taken, and with him the false prophet that wrought miracles before him, with which he deceived them that had received the mark of the beast, and them that worshipped his image. These both were cast alive into a lake of fire burning with brimstone.
21 And the remnant were slain with the sword of him that sat upon the horse, which sword proceeded out of his mouth: and all the fowls were filled with their flesh.

We know that Armageddon occurs in Israel in the area of Megiddo. Eze 38-39 speaks of a battle in Israel. Armageddon and the Eze battle occur near the time when God is revealed by defeating the nations in Israel. There are many parallel verses between Revelation (Armageddon) and Ezekiel (Israel battle) descriptions.

The verses of interest in Eze 38 are the ones with the names of some of those who attack Israel near the end of time.

Ezekiel 38

2 Son of man, set thy face against Gog, the land of Magog, the chief prince of Meshech and Tubal, and prophesy against him,

5 Persia, Ethiopia, and Libya with them; all of them with shield and helmet:

6 Gomer, and all his bands; the house of Togarmah of the north quarters, and all his bands: and many people with thee.

The first map shown on this website below, is one that I consider to be accurate in the locations of ancient names. Meshech and Tubal are shown to be located in what is now present day Turkey. There are many others that feel Turkey is the location of Meshech and Tubal and can be found by googling "Turkey Meshech Tubal".

http://www.teachinghearts.org/dre00maps.html

Turkey (Gog) leads the battle in Eze 38 and is aligned with Persia (Iran), Ethiopia (Sudan?), and Libya. We can see Turkey developing close ties with those regional gov'ts currently. The 3 nations positively identified in Eze 38 are all Muslim nations. Turkey is around 98 % Muslim so it would make sense that they would align with other Muslim nations.

A combination of Genesis 10 and a bit of good ole' common sense adds credibility to the concept of Meshech and Tubal being located in what we know as Turkey. Genesis 8 tells us that Noah's Ark came to rest upon the mountains of Ararat. There is a mountain named Ararat located near the eastern border of Turkey. Mt. Ararat, Turkey is commonly believed to be the location where the Ark landed.

4 And the ark rested in the seventh month, on the seventeenth day of the month, upon the mountains of Ararat.

Noah and his 3 sons, with their wives, were the only ones on the Ark. These 8 people first stepped off the Ark and set foot in Turkey. We know that one of the first things that Noah did was plant a vineyard. He almost certainly planted that vineyard near where the Ark landed. There wasn't a pre-built home waiting for Noah so I am guessing they used the Ark for shelter at first. The animals were all released in the area so it is highly likely that Noah and his sons lived in the area of the Ark (Turkey) at first.

Genesis 10

1 Now these are the generations of the sons of Noah, Shem, Ham, and Japheth: and unto them were sons born after the flood.

2 The sons of Japheth; Gomer, and Magog, and Madai, and Javan, and Tubal, and Meshech, and Tiras.

Noah's son, Japheth, was the father of two of the men's names that I am interested in. Meshech and Tubal were two of Noah's grandsons. It is highly unlikely that with as few people on earth as there was at the time, that Meshech and Tubal settled very far away from the original Ark landing site.

Strong's concordance tells us that Meshech and Tubal were names of Noah's grandsons as well as locations.

Mesech or Meshech = "drawing out"

1) son of Japheth, grandson of Noah, and progenitor of peoples to the north of Israel

a) descendants of Mesech often mentioned in connection with Tubal, Magog, and other northern nations including the Moschi, a people on the borders of Colchis and Armenia

Tubal = "thou shall be brought"

1) son of Japheth and grandson of Noah
2) a region in east Asia Minor
a) perhaps nearly equal to Cappadocia

Cappadocia is located in central Turkey as shown on this map below.

http://www.turkeytravelplanner.com/Maps/cappadocia_map.html

This makes perfect sense that Noah's grandsons settled in the general area of the Ark landing. We know from scripture that Gog leads the invasion of Israel and that he is chief prince of Meshech and Tubal (Turkey). The invasion is defeated by the Lord Himself and then the nations and heathen will know who God is from then forward. Israel will not know their God until close to when Jesus returns. They will have to accept Jesus prior to reuniting with their God. Jesus even told the Jews before He left that they would not see Him again until they said blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord. In other words not until they accepted Christ.

Ezekiel 32 Nations

The old testament provides other scripture that reinforces the idea that a group of Muslim neighbors of Israel attack her near the day of the Lord. Ezekiel 32 lists some specific names of nations that God takes vengeance on. Meshech and Tubal are among the names in this chapter.

The following verses of Eze 32 establish the time stamp for the events described. We have an event that I refer to as the "cosmic signs". They are found in conjunction with the day of the Lord in many places in scripture. Matthew 24 tells us that these signs occur just prior to the return of Christ.

7 And when I shall put thee out, I will cover the heaven, and make the stars thereof dark; I will cover the sun with a cloud, and the moon shall not give her light.
8 All the bright lights of heaven will I make dark over thee, and set darkness upon thy land, saith the Lord GOD.
9 I will also vex the hearts of many people, when I shall bring thy destruction among the nations, into the countries which thou hast not known.

11 For thus saith the Lord GOD; The sword of the king of Babylon shall come upon thee.

Egypt, Babylon (Iraq), Asshur (Syria), Elam (Iran), Edom (Jordan), and Meshech/Tubal (???) are all mentioned separately. This tells us that Meshech/Tubal aren't any of these: Egypt, Iraq, Iran, Syria, or Jordan.

The Assyrian

Isaiah 10 speaks of God sending one called an Assyrian to punish the people of Israel for their sinful ways. The Assyrian becomes boastful and takes credit for what God has done. God then deals with the Assyrian for his arrogance. There are many verses in this chapter that make it clear the time setting is around the time of the end.

15 Shall the axe boast itself against him that heweth therewith? or shall the saw magnify itself against him that shaketh it? as if the rod should shake itself against them that lift it up, or as if the staff should lift up itself, as if it were no wood.

16 Therefore shall the Lord, the Lord of hosts, send among his fat ones leanness; and under his glory he shall kindle a burning like the burning of a fire.

The Assyrian empire encompassed most of the middle east. Here is a map of the extent of the ancient Assyrian empire. The Assyrian is leading the Israel attack in Isaiah 10 much like Gog is in Eze 38. We eliminated Egypt, Iraq, Syria, Iran, and Jordan as being Meshech and Tubal in Eze 32.

http://www.keyway.ca/htm2002/ancassy.htm

If we take those countries out of the Assyrian empire map then we are basically left with Turkey and the Armenian/Georgia area. We can eliminate Saudi Arabia as a possibility using Eze 38:13. Dedan (Saudi Arabia) is part of the group against Gog. There are other references of the Assyrian in the Old Testament as well. I think Armenia/Georgia can be eliminated mainly because of the lack of other scripture support.

The case for Turkey producing the AC has a strong biblical and historical foundation. Rev 2 tells us that Satan's seat was located in Turkey. Istanbul could be the city on 7 hills. Daniel 2,7, & 8 show us that there will only be 4 world empires and the 4th empire will rise out of the geographic area of the old Greek empire. Daniel 11 specifies that the AC rises out of the Northern portion (Asia Minor) of the divided Greek empire. Ezekiel 38-39 names Gog as chief prince of Meshech and Tubal which have been shown to have been located in Turkey. Gog attacks Israel near the end of time as does the AC. Genesis 10 adds support for Meshech and Tubal being located in Turkey. Ezekiel 32 eliminates Egypt, Iraq, Iran, Syria, and Jordan as identities for Meshech and Tubal. Isaiah 10 depicts an Assyrian attacking Israel near the end of time. When you remove the eliminated nations from Eze 32 that leaves Turkey as the most likely candidate in light of all the supporting scripture above. There is very little doubt in my mind that the AC will be a Muslim from the middle east area.

There are a couple of misc. items I feel are related also. Turkey has the ability, via a series of dams, to completely shut off the water flow to the Euphrates river. In Revelation we are told that the Euphrates river is dried up to make way for the kings of the east. The celebration of Christmas and Easter on pagan holidays was integrated into Christianity in Turkey. There is some research that indicates that the actual location of Babel was in Turkey.

The validity of any theory is how it performs in the real world. We know that at some point Israel will sign a peace treaty with many. The one that confirms this treaty will also break the treaty at the mid-point of the last 7 years. Look out into the world today and see who Israel's sworn enemies are, they are Muslims. The peace everyone is looking for is between Israel and her Muslim enemies.

The history of the Arab hatred for Israel makes it hard to imagine Israel ever trusting them enough to sign a peace treaty. The Arabs have never recanted their call for Israel to be driven into the sea. There is one Muslim country that Israel trusts. It is Turkey. Turkey is Israel's only ally in the middle east. Turkey has recently been very active trying to position itself as a mediator in the mid-east peace process. As Turkey says, they are friends with all parties involved. Turkey has been calling for a comprehensive peace treaty involving all of Israel's Arab neighbors. Sounds like a covenant with many to me.

Peace,
Seeker

The following is an article from the free section of STRATFOR. The analysis and conclusions are from a secular viewpoint - but we should be raising our eyebrows looking through the biblical lens. I have highlighted in bold some comments I found interesting.

Turkey as a Regional Power
October 23, 2007 2030 GMT


By George Friedman

Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) guerrillas based in northern Iraq ambushed Turkish troops near the border Oct. 21, killing 12 soldiers and suffering 23 casualties in the ensuing firefight, according to the Turkish government. For its part, the PKK said it captured eight Turkish troops, though Ankara has not confirmed the claim.

Based on prior PKK attacks, the Turkish parliament last week authorized the use of force in Iraq. This latest attack, therefore, was clearly designed to challenge that decision. Even before the dust had settled Oct. 21, Iraqi President Jalal Talabani, a Kurd, rejected an earlier demand from Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan that Baghdad shut down all PKK camps in Iraqi territory and hand over PKK leaders. Talabani said Iraq cannot solve Turkey's problem, given that PKK leaders hide out in rugged mountains and even the "mighty" Turkish military has failed to kill or capture them. Specifically, he said, "The handing over of PKK leaders to Turkey is a dream that will never be realized."

If that position holds, it is difficult to imagine that the Turks won't move into northern Iraq and re-establish the sphere of influence and security they had during the Saddam Hussein era. The United States is working furiously to satisfy Turkey by taking responsibility for controlling the PKK. It is not clear whether the United States can deliver, nor is it clear whether the Turks are prepared to rely on the United States. Some move into Iraq is likely, in our mind, but even if it doesn't happen in this particular case, tensions between Turkey and the United States will remain. More important, Turkey's willingness to play a secondary role in the region is declining.

This is not really new. The Turks refused to allow the United States to invade Iraq from Turkish territory, even though Washington offered them free room to maneuver in northern Iraq in exchange for their cooperation. The Turks, however, were not unhappy with the status quo in Iraq. They also were concerned about the consequences of an American invasion and were not eager to be seen as a tool of the United States in the Islamic world.

At the same time, the Turks did not want a rupture with the United States -- given that the relationship has been the foundation of Turkish foreign policy since World War II. The refusal of the European Union to admit Turkey in particular made it necessary for Ankara to preserve its relationship with Washington. Therefore, although the invasion was problematic for the Turks, they have cooperated with the United States, allowing a large portion of the supplies for U.S. troops in Iraq to come through Turkey.

The Turkish balancing act on Iraq has pivoted on one fundamental national security consideration: that the autonomy given to Iraq's Kurds remains limited. The Kurdish nationality crosses existing borders -- into Iraq, Turkey, Iran and, to a lesser extent, Syria -- and represents a geographically coherent, self-aware nation without a state. Historically, the Kurds generally were compelled to be part of larger empires, including the Ottoman Empire. When that empire collapsed -- leaving Turkey as its successor -- these other countries contained Kurdish lands, with more than half of the Kurds living in Turkey. The Turks, dealing with the collapse of their empire and the building of a new nation-state, feared that Kurdish independence would lead to the disintegration of that nation-state. Therefore, they had -- and continue to maintain -- a fixed policy to suppress Kurdish nationalism.

From the Turkish point of view, the greatest danger is that an independent Kurdistan will be created in Iran or Iraq, and that the homeland will be used to base and support Kurds seeking independence from Turkey. In fact, each of these countries -- and outside powers such as the United States, Soviet Union and United Kingdom -- have used the Kurds as a tool to apply pressure on Turkey, Iran or Iraq at various times. They have used Kurdish separatism as a threat, and then normally double-crossed the Kurds, making a broader deal with the nation-state in question.

The evolution of events in Iraq is particularly alarming to the Turks. Hussein was not necessarily to the Turks' liking, but he did pursue one policy that was identical to that of the Turks: He opposed Kurdish independence. The U.S. policy after Desert Storm was to use the Iraqi Kurds against Hussein -- and the United States helped carve out an area of Iraqi Kurdistan that he could not reach. The Turks, uneasy with this arrangement, entered Iraq in the 1990s to create a buffer zone against the Kurds. The United States did not object to this move because it increased the pressure on Hussein.

In looking at current U.S. strategy in Iraq, the Turks have drawn two conclusions. The first is that the United States, focused on Iraq's Sunni and Shiite areas, has little interest in controlling the Kurdish region -- the one area that is fairly unambiguously pro-American. The second is that the Iranians and Shia want an Iraq divided into three regions -- or even independent states -- and that a U.S. policy designed to create a federal state with a strong central government will fail.

Therefore, Turkey's perception is that it already is dealing with the post-war world, one in which an increasingly bold Iraqi Kurdistan is pursuing a policy of expanding Kurdish autonomy by facilitating a guerrilla war in Turkey. The PKK's actions in recent weeks confirm this view in their mind. They also believe they cannot deal with the Kurdish challenge defensively, and therefore they must defend by attacking. Hence, the creation of a security zone in Iraq.

From the Kurds' point of view, if there ever was a moment to assert their national rights, this is it. However, their highly risky gamble is that the United States will not chance an anti-American uprising in Iraq's Kurdish areas and so will limit the extent to which Turkey can intervene. Moreover, with the United States at odds with Iran, it might support a Kurdish uprising there. Hence, though the stakes are high, the Kurdish gamble is not irrational.

The Kurds in Iraq are correct in their view that the United States does not want conflict in the one area in Iraq that is not anti-American. They also are correct that this is a unique moment for them. But they are betting that the Turks don't recognize the danger and thus will place their interests second to those of the United States -- which is more concerned with stability in Iraqi Kurdistan than with suppressing attacks in Turkey's Kurdish areas. Although this might have been true of Turkey 10 years ago, it no longer is true today. The U.S.-Turkish relationship has flipped. The United States needs Turkey more than Turkey needs the United States -- for reasons beyond getting supplies to Iraq.

Al Qaeda's geopolitical threat has subsided, no uprising capable of effecting regime change has occurred in the Islamic world and the threat of a unified Islamic world has vastly decreased. Meanwhile, the grand strategy of the United States has remained the same. It played Hitler against Stalin, Mao against Brezhnev and is now playing Sunni against Shi'i. The Sunni threat having subsided, the Shiite and Iranian threats remain. The current U.S. task is to build an anti-Iranian coalition. Regardless of whether the Europeans approve sanctions against Iran, its neighbors are important -- and one of the most important is Turkey. However, given that Turkey and Iran have a common interest in preventing an independent Kurdish nation anywhere, the more the United States supports the Iraqi Kurds, the greater the danger of an Iranian-Turkish alliance. At the moment, that is the last thing the United States wants to see, which is why the resolution on Turkish responsibility for Armenian genocide in the U.S. Congress could not possibly have come at a worse moment.

But that is atmospherics. When we look beyond al Qaeda and beyond Iran -- a country that has been unable to create substantial spheres of influence for many centuries -- we see a single country that is likely to begin bringing order to the region: Turkey. Turkey is the heir to the Ottoman Empire, which at various points dominated the eastern Mediterranean, North Africa, the Arabian Peninsula, the Caucasus and deep into Russia. Its collapse after World War I created an oddity -- an inward-looking state in Asia Minor. Cautious in World War II and strictly aligned with the United States during the Cold War, Turkey played a passive role: It either sat things out or allowed its strategic territory to be used.

The situation has changed dramatically. In 2006, Turkey had the 18th largest economy in the world -- larger than that of any other Muslim country, including Saudi Arabia -- and the economy has been growing at a rate of between 5 percent and 7 percent a year for five years. Most important, Turkey is not a purely export-oriented country. It has developed a substantial middle class that buys the products it produces. It has a substantial and competent military and is handling the stresses between institutions and ideologies well.

It also is surrounded by chaos. Apart from Iraq to the south, there is profound instability in the Caucasus to the north and the Balkans to the northwest. The southern region from the Levant to the Persian Gulf is tremendously tense. The stability of Egypt -- and therefore the eastern Mediterranean -- after President Hosni Mubarak departs is in question. Turkey's longtime rival, Greece, no longer presents the challenge it once did. Moreover, the European Union's effective rejection of Turkey has freed the country from many of the constraints that its membership hopes might have imposed.

Turkey has a vested interest in stabilizing the region. It no longer regards the United States as a stabilizing force, and it sees Europe as a collective entity and individual nations as both hostile and impotent. It views the Russians as a long-term threat to its interests and sees Russia's potential return to Turkey's frontier as a long-term challenge. As did the Ottomans, it views Iran as a self-enclosed backwater. It is far more interested in the future of Syria and Iraq, its relationship with its ally, Israel, and ultimately the future of the Arabian Peninsula.

In other words, Turkey should be viewed as a rapidly emerging regional power -- or, in the broadest sense, as beginning the process of recreating a regional hegemon of enormous strategic power, based in Asia Minor but projecting political, economic and military forces in a full circle. Its willingness to rely on the United States to guarantee its national security ended in 2003. It is prepared to cooperate with the United States on issues of mutual interest, but not as a subordinate power.

This emergence, in our view, is in the very early stages. Just as Turkey's economy and its internal politics have undergone dramatic changes in the past five years, so have its foreign policies. The Turks are cautiously reaching out and influencing events throughout the region. In one sense, the intervention in Iraq would simply be a continuation of policies followed in the 1990s. But in the current context, it would represent more: a direct assertiveness of its natural interests independent of the United States.

Looked at broadly, three things have happened. First, the collapse of Yugoslavia drew Turkey into a region where it had traditional interest. Second, the collapse and resurrection of Russian power has made Turkey look northward to the Caucasus. Finally, the chaos in the Arab world has drawn Turkey southward. Limits on Turkish behavior from Europe and the United States have been dramatically reduced as a result of Western strategy. Turkey believes it needs to bring order to regions where the United States and Europe have proven either ineffective or hostile to Turkish interests.

Considering the future of the region, the only power in a position to assert its consistent presence is Turkey. Iran, its nearest competitor, is neither in competition with Turkey, nor does it have a fraction of its power -- nuclear weapons or not. Turkey has historically dominated the region, though not always to the delight of others there. Nevertheless, its historical role has been to pick up the pieces left by regional chaos. In our view, it is beginning to move down that road.

Its current stance on the Kurdish issue is merely a first step. What makes that position important is that Turkey is pursuing its interests indifferent to European or American views. Additionally, the reversal of dependency between the United States and Turkey is ultimately more important than whether Turkey goes into Iraq. The U.S. invasion of Iraq kicked off many processes in the world and created many windows of opportunity. Watching Turkey make its moves, we wonder less about the direction it is going than about the limits of its ambition.

Seeker wrote:Thought I would post this on the first page of this Turkey thread. It is a study I did back in 2005 but for the most part still accurate. This is what I was working on when I ran across Joel's online book. He was the first person I had found that interpreted Eze 38-39 almost exactly as I did. At the time hardly anyone believed an Islamic AC was possible. Thankfully many are starting to see it now as we grow ever nearer to that time. Here's the basic biblical proof for considering Turkey as a candidate for the AC nation.

Wow.. outstanding work!

Turkey blames US Jews for genocide bill
Yigal Schleifer/JTA , THE JERUSALEM POST Oct. 23, 2007

When a US Congressional committee approved a resolution recognizing the World War I-era massacre of Armenians by the Ottoman Empire as genocide, Turkey's reaction was swift and harsh: Blame the Jews.

In an interview with the liberal Islamic Zaman newspaper on the eve of the resolution's approval October 10 by the US House Committee on Foreign Affairs, Turkish Foreign Minister Ali Babacan said he had told American Jewish leaders that a genocide bill would strengthen the public perception in Turkey that "Armenian and Jewish lobbies unite forces against Turks." Babacan added, "We have told them that we cannot explain it to the public in Turkey if a road accident happens. We have told them that we cannot keep the Jewish people out of this."

The Turkish public seems to have absorbed that message.

An on-line survey by Zaman's English-language edition asking why Turks believed the bill succeeded showed that 22 percent of respondents chose "Jews' having legitimized the genocide claims" - second only to "Turkey's negligence."

US Jewish community leaders reject that argument and privately say Ankara has only itself to blame for its failure to muster the support necessary to derail the resolution, which is seen in Turkey as anti-Turkish.

Resentment lingers in Washington over the Turkish Parliament's failure to approve a March 2003 motion to allow US troops to use Turkish soil as a staging ground for an invasion of Iraq.

And an official visit to Ankara in early 2006 by Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal angered many of Israel's supporters on Capitol Hill, who have been among Turkey's most vocal proponents as part of a strategy of developing strong ties between Turkey and Israel.

"The Hamas thing was really serious," said an official from a large Jewish organization. "There is less sympathy for Turkey because of what some see as an anti-American, anti-Israel, anti-Jewish policy that is there."

The official added, "I think there's a sense on the Hill that Turkey is less of an ally. There is a sense that it's a different Turkey."

Soner Cagaptay, coordinator of the Turkish research program at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, echoed that thinking.

"The lingering effects of 2003 resonate," Cagaptay said. "Some people are still angry with Turkey."

Malcolm Hoenlein, executive vice chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, said the Jews should not be blamed for the Armenia genocide bill, particularly not by Turkish officialdom.

"We regret that some officials there are trying to lay the onus of what's happened on the Jewish community," Hoenlein told JTA. "They shouldn't allow some people to manipulate this initiative in Congress to the detriment of this relationship, which is beneficial for both sides."

Hoenlein, who met with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan during last month's UN General Assembly, said, "There is the same commitment on the part of the organized community to support Turkey."

Observers in Turkey say the public perception of the Jews' outsized role in the resolution's passage is based on an element of fact mixed with a greater amount of fiction.

In August, the Jewish-run Anti-Defamation League, facing pressure from grassroots activists, reversed its long-held policy of not recognizing the Armenian genocide when ADL National Director Abraham Foxman declared that what happened to the Armenians was "indeed tantamount to genocide."

But Foxman maintained the ADL's position, opposing a congressional resolution on the matter. Such a resolution would strain US-Turkey ties and jeopardize ties between Israel and Turkey, Israel's main Middle Eastern ally.

Nevertheless, the ADL's reversal was seen in Turkey as a major blow to the country's diplomatic and public-relations campaign against Armenian efforts to get a genocide resolution passed in Washington.

"Obviously the ADL's switch was not good news," said Suat Kiniklioglu, a member of the ruling Justice and Development Party and spokesman for the Turkish Parliament's foreign affairs committee.

Mustafa Akyol, an Istanbul-based political commentator who frequently writes about religious issues, said the strong reaction to the ADL's policy switch and the perception that it somehow legitimized the Armenians' claims were based on an "inflated sense" of American Jewish power among the Turkish public.

"There is a belief that [the resolution] couldn't have happened without Jewish support," Akyol said.

The House bill passed the committee by a 27-21 vote, with seven of the committee's eight Jewish members voting in favor of Resolution 106. The full House of Representatives has yet to vote on the resolution.

Yet despite the vote, US Jewish groups said they lobbied against the bill - just as they have done in the past.

"Behind-the-scenes support [from US Jewish groups] has been quite powerful" in persuading congressmen to oppose the bill, said Cagaptay. It may yet help prevent the bill from being brought to a vote in the full House.

Turkish Jewish community leaders declined to be interviewed for this story, but Turkey's Jewish leaders published a full-page advertisement in the Washington Times on the day of the vote voicing their opposition to the House bill.

"We believe this issue should be decided first and foremost on the basis of evidence adduced by historians, not on the basis of judgments by parliamentarians or Congressmen, who naturally (and understandably) may be influenced by concerns other than historical facts," the statement said. "There have been insinuations that our security and well-being in Turkey is linked to the fate of Resolution 106. We are deeply perturbed by any such allegations."

According to Cagaptay, "there is a trilateral relationship, which is Turkey, Israel and the American Jews. The relationship is about good ties between Turkey and Israel, and good ties between Turkey and the American Jewish community, which makes up for the fact that Turkey has not had, historically, a strong presence on the Hill."

This time, however, it seems Jewish opposition to the bill was not enough to overcome support by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), a longtime supporter of Armenian-American issues, who has vowed to bring the bill to a full House vote.

Turkey masses trooops, attacks in Iraq confirmed

8:25AM Thursday October 25, 2007
By Thomas Grove

Turkey has moved more troops to the mountainous Iraqi border following confirmed security reports its troops did attack Kurdish rebels inside Iraq earlier this week. Security sources, speaking on condition of anonymity, confirmed a series of sorties between Sunday and Tuesday evening in which Turkish warplanes flew 20km into Iraq and some 300 ground troops advanced about 10km.

"Further 'hot pursuit' raids into northern Iraq can be expected, though none have taken place so far today," a military official told Reuters. State-run Anatolian news agency said Turkish warplanes and helicopters had bombarded PKK positions in southeast Turkey on Wednesday. The sorties into Iraq killed 34 PKK rebels and all the Turkish troops involved in the operations were now back in Turkey, the official said. But Abdul Rahman Jaderji, a PKK spokesman in northern Iraq, told Reuters there had been no direct fighting between the two sides since clashes on Sunday in which 12 Turkish soldiers died.

He said Turkish troops had been shelling areas of northern Iraq, but little new shelling had been reported on Wednesday. Baghdad has pledged to act against the rebels. A Turkish official on Wednesday quoted Iraqi President Jalal Talabani as saying Iraq might hand over PKK militants to Turkey, but Talabani denied this.

"We have said many times that the PKK leadership does not exist in Kurdish cities but are living with thousands of their fighters in the Qandil mountains, so it is not possible for us to arrest and hand them over to Turkey," he said in a statement. The Turkish official described a planned visit by an Iraqi delegation to Ankara on Thursday as a "final chance" for diplomacy. At Turkey's request, the team will be headed by Iraqi Defence Minister General Abdel Qader Jassim. It will also include Iraqi National Security Minister Shirwan al Waeli. Washington and Baghdad fear a major Turkish incursion into northern Iraq could destabilise the whole region. But Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan's government is under heavy public pressure to take tough action, especially since Sunday's deaths.

"If I look at the Turkish government as it has acted up until now I think the Turkish government is showing restraint - remarkable restraint under present circumstances," Nato Secretary-General Jaap de Hoop Scheffer told reporters at a meeting of the alliance's defence ministers. US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice told the House Foreign Affairs Committee on Wednesday she had told Erdogan on Sunday that she took the situation "extremely seriously".

"Iraq should not be a place where terrorism can hurt Turkey," she said. "We have a list of things that we believe, if they are undertaken, will help to deal with this situation," she added, citing Iraq's pledge to close PKK offices there."......................................

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/category/stor ... d=10471976

Thx Vince parts of it I would change a bit and add a bunch more if I ever get around to revising it like I should...lol. It is pretty solid though. A good overview to get a quick picture of the scripture behind the Turkey theory or the way I see Turkey that is.

Peace,
Seeker

Awesome as usual Seeker.

The Babylonian priests preserved the Babylonian religion after the fall of Babylon. First in the Persia-Media empire of Daniel 8 and then it was passed on to the Greek empire. After the breakup of the Greek empire, following Alexander’s death, the Babylonian priests fled the Romans to Pergamos to preserve the religion. From Pergamos it infiltrated into the early harlot Christian churches, the Jews labeled as the synagogue of Satan, and influenced Islam

Seeker, Can you tell me where you got this information from? I find this fascinating and a great confirmation of what I'm seeing. I'd just like to be able to document it somehow. Thanks.

Hi Screaming Eagle,

The original research was on another forum so is there somewhere...lol...but if you do a Google search for the terms "Pergamos Babylon" that should lead you in the right direction. Here is one I quickly dug up with that search.

Peace,
Seeker
____________________________________

POLITICS, POWER AND THE PRIESTHOOD

Nebuchadnezzar’s successor, Awil-Marduk, set the stage for the submission of the empire to the Medo-Persians. Weakened over the next few decades by internal divisions, the strongly fortified Babylon fell without a fight in 539 B.C. to Cyrus the Great’s forces. The Persians were generally tolerant toward the nations they defeated, allowing them to retain their culture and religion. An example of their permissive attitude came soon after the fall of Babylon. Cyrus issued a proclamation returning the Jewish captives in Babylon to Jerusalem with instructions to rebuild the temple destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar.

Though the Persians did not initially interfere in Babylon’s religious practices, the political power of the Babylonian priesthood (who were Chaldean magi) eventually became a problem. The temple had always been central to Babylonian life, with an entire culture and economy surrounding the Ziggurat of Marduk. As a result, the Chaldean priests were a powerful elite. They were often more powerful than the Babylonian king himself: the monarch had to acknowledge the priests’ intermediary role and “take the hands of Marduk” before assuming the throne. The king thus became the son of the god and was obliged to protect the religious hierarchy.

The priests frustrated the Persians’ tolerance when, in an attempt to retain their behind-the-scenes political power, they installed one of their own, a priest posing as the king’s brother Smerdis, as ruler of Babylon. The imposter was discovered and killed by the Persians. Following a subsequent revolt when the priests again set up their own Babylonian ruler, the Persian king Xerxes came and destroyed Babylon in 487 B.C. In the process, he tore down the temples and removed the statue of Marduk.

At this point, around 480 B.C, the Babylonian priests are thought to have left the city and reestablished their base elsewhere. According to one source, “the defeated Chaldeans fled to Asia Minor, and fixed their central college at Pergamos, and took the palladium of Babylon, the cubic stone, with them. Here, independent of state control, they carried on the rites of their religion” (William B. Barker, Lares and Penates: or, Cilicia and Its Governors, Ingram, Cooke and Co., London, 1853, pp. 232–233).

http://www.vision.org/visionmedia/article.aspx?id=638

Israeli, Palestinian Leaders Meet in Turkey

By Dorian Jones
Istanbul
13 November 2007

The Turkish capital, Ankara, is hosting the Israeli and Palestinian presidents. The two leaders are meeting with their Turkish counterpart and the prime minister. The visit comes ahead of an expected peace summit in the United States. Dorian Jones reports for VOA from Istanbul. The official reason for the visit of the Israeli President Shimon Peres and his Palestinian counterpart Mahmoud Abbas is to confirm the construction of a Turkish-backed industrial park on the West Bank. But, analysts say the real goal of the trip is to set the stage for a peace summit in Annapolis, Maryland, later this year. President Peres says his country supports the effort for peace. He says hard work remains ahead.

"I think all of us would like not to make the Annapolis meeting a failure. If it will succeed, it won't be perfect success. But, if it will fail, it will be perfect failure," Mr. Peres said.

After meeting with his Israeli counterpart, Turkish President Abdullah Gul stressed his country is a close friend of both Israel and the Palestinians. Ankara has strong political and military ties with Israel and has, for decades, been one of Israel's closest allies in the Muslim world. At the same time, it has kept strong ties with the Palestinians. Turkey, which once ruled the region, has particular interest in helping to find peace, according to International relations specialist Soli Ozel of Istanbul's Bilgi University.

"The Turkish public believes being the inheritors of the empire Turkey may have a special role to play in the Middle East; that It should try to play that role and it should try to place this in an even-handed fashion," he said.

Both the Israeli and Palestinian leaders to address the Turkish parliament. It will be the first time an Israeli president has addressed the body. According to Turkish reports the two Middle Eastern leaders will meet for private talks, to discuss the upcoming summit. While Turkey is trying to facilitate peace efforts, tensions with Israel over Iran are apparent. During the meeting with his Turkish counterpart, President Peres emphasized that Israel will never tolerate a nuclear Iran. President Gul insists Iran has the right to the peaceful pursuit of nuclear technology. Last week, the Turkish parliament passed legislation to start its own nuclear power program.

http://voanews.com/english/2007-11-13-voa12.cfm

İstanbul to become new nucleus for Turkic world

Representatives from Turkic language-speaking countries, meeting in the Azerbaijani capital of Baku, have agreed to set up a permanent secretariat facilitating regular summits of leaders, a step in the direction of boosting cooperation and dialogue among these countries.

The decision, made at the three-day 11th Congress of Friendship, Brotherhood and Cooperation of Turkic-speaking Countries and Communities, which ended yesterday, will bring the Turkic republics yet closer to one another. The establishment of such a mechanism, proposed first by Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, who also attended the gathering, will be officially launched at the next summit meeting of the heads of state of Turkic-speaking countries, which is expected to take place some time in the next two months. The secretariat is envisaged to expedite and enhance the commercial, cultural, diplomatic and political relations among Turkic states.

In his speech at the congress on Saturday, Erdoğan called on leaders of Turkic-speaking nations to join forces and suggested establishing a union of Turkic-speaking countries as a primary tool for coordinating joint moves in the foreign policy arena.

The prime minister also called for a common stance on regional issues, such as Iraq and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and warned that a lack of cooperation in the face of these problems could prove costly. “What will our state of affairs be if we do not cooperate? The way to success passes through full cooperation and solidarity in today’s world. If we don’t cooperate, then they will tear us to shreds. It is not possible for us to reach to the level we deserve by isolating ourselves from the world.”

The summit meeting of the heads of state of Turkic-speaking countries is held every year. The hottest topic on the agenda of the leaders attending the next summit will be the establishment of a permanent secretariat. Turkish plans envision having the center of the permanent secretariat in Turkey’s culture capital, İstanbul. It was stated during deliberations that the secretariat could have a system of rotation or develop some other formula regarding the secretariat. The chief responsibility of the permanent secretariat will be overseeing preparation work for the summit meetings. The secretariat will also follow up decisions made at the summit, thereby providing immediate resolution to troubles at the implementation stage and giving the summit much higher functionality. The permanent secretariat will additionally assess summit verdicts of civil organizations similar to the General Assembly of Turkic-speaking Countries.

Among the people cheered by the idea was Professor Abdülhaluk Çay, the chairman of the Foundation for Friendship, Fraternity and Cooperation among Turkic States and Societies (TUDEV), which organized the general assembly. Noting that the help of the political will in such organizations would help make it easier to equally share responsibilities, Çay said: “The stage of getting to know one another is over. Now it’s time to solve the problems. That the permanent secretariat will be established is an indicator of this.”

While delivering his opening speech on Nov. 17, Prime Minister Erdoğan stressed that it was high time that cooperation among the Turkic republics was upgraded to a much more planned level, namely, given an institutional character.

“To this end, I suggest establishing a permanent secretariat for the summit meeting of the heads of state of Turkic-speaking countries which will coordinate in a more planned and organized manner. I suggest and value the establishment of a permanent secretariat,” Erdoğan said.

A ‘Turkic parliament’

In the meantime, suggestions were made during yesterday’s session of the general assembly. Justice and Development Party (AK Party) İstanbul deputy Alaattin Büyükkaya suggested the Turkic republics could have a parliament of their own, similar to the European Parliament. If Büyükkaya’s suggestion is put into practice, a 50-member parliament will be formed and the number of representatives to be sent from all Turkic republics will be determined in accordance with their population. The parliament building will be in İstanbul.

Participants at the general assembly meetings also proposed that the form of Turkish spoken in Turkey be accepted as the common language in international gatherings of the Turkic countries. Others called for olympic games among Turkic language-speaking countries and the establishment of a television station that will broadcast in these countries. “We are ready to work to bring this proposal into being,” Turkish official broadcaster TRT’s Acting Director Ali Güney said of the proposed television broadcasts.

20.11.2007

ERDAL ŞEN ANKARA

Zaman

Seeker - regarding Turkey - like someone else said, great study. I am coming out of lurk mode to respond to your post.

I am largely in agreement with you. I believe the AC will come from the Seleucid portion of the old Greek Empire, and that his kingdom will be a revived Islamic caliphate.

I too believe that Gog = Armageddon, or to be more specific, that the Gog invasion leads to Armageddon. After extensive study of the specifics regarding the Day of the Lord, this is what I think will happen - at the midpoint of the seven years, the AC of course invades Israel and sets up the A of D. But this IS the Gog invasion. For the next 3 yrs he makes war against Israel and others, culminating in his defeat at the hands of God Himself.

In my opinion, Gog is not a separate, earlier event as taught by most. When you study the details, the events of Gog match the events of the very end extremely well.

A distantly related point - I believe the book of Joel describes the very end also, and interestingly, in it there is mention of a stopped sacrifice. Check this out -

Joel 1:5-9, "Awake, ye drunkards, and weep; and howl, all ye drinkers of wine, because of the new wine; for it is cut off from your mouth. For a nation is come up upon my land, strong, and without number, whose teeth are the teeth of a lion, and he hath the cheek teeth of a great lion. He hath laid my vine waste, and barked my fig tree: he hath made it clean bare, and cast it away; the branches thereof are made white. Lament like a virgin girded with sackcloth for the husband of her youth. The meat offering and the drink offering is cut off from the house of the LORD; the priests, the LORD'S ministers, mourn."

I know that some commentators believe the first chapter is talking about literal locusts, but considering the content of the second chapter, I think Joel is being figurative in describing the utter devastation caused by an actual, human army. In that case, Joel is lamenting because a nation has invaded and the sacrifices are cut off. Same strongs word used in Joel for sacrifice that is used for oblation in Daniel 9. As you read chapter two, the invasion is described as a dark cloud, a huge number of horses and people who enter every part of the land. It's a call to repentence, and Joel says if they repent, God will answer and "remove the NORTHERN army" - v20.

Look what is also happening -
Joel 2:10 The earth shall quake before them; the heavens shall tremble: the sun and the moon shall be dark, and the stars shall withdraw their shining:

The start of the Day of the Lord, ie the sixth seal - this is the pivotal event from which everything else can be related. If you watch for this event, a lot of eschatology lines up. And it immediately precedes the "sign of the Son of Man" that Jesus describes in Matt 24.

And when God does respond and rescue them, this is what He says will be the end result -
Joel 2:27 And ye shall know that I am in the midst of Israel, and that I am the LORD your God, and none else: and my people shall never be ashamed.

Just like in Ezekiel 38-9, when the whole world learns who He is.

Ezekiel 39:28 Then shall they know that I am the LORD their God, which caused them to be led into captivity among the heathen: but I have gathered them unto their own land, and have left none of them any more there.
29 Neither will I hide my face any more from them: for I have poured out my spirit upon the house of Israel, saith the Lord GOD.

Oh and wait, what is the next thing to come in Joel?

Joel 2:28 And it shall come to pass afterward, that I will pour out my spirit upon all flesh... Similarities abound.

Anyway, without going into any more detail (and there's a ton more), I think that the entire book of Joel, Ez 38-39, Zechariah 12-14, Daniel 9, and various other mentions here and there, describe basically the same time period in the following sequence - the Gog invasion, the abomination of desolation, the sacking of Jerusalem and its obvious results, the AC's conquests, the people crying out to God in their suffering, finally culminating 3 1/2 years later with the return of Jesus.

Hi agrace,

Glad to see you out of lurking! Looks like you understand very well and see the big picture. I often say "it is all the same story". The OT "day of the Lord" is the day Jesus returns to destroy sinners from the earth. This happens very near the end of the last 7 years. It makes no sense for Eze 38 to happen and then God allow Israel to be persecuted. Eze 38 makes it clear that Israel returns to God after that war. This only happens after the "times of the Gentiles" are over (Romans 11). Glad you are posting please elaborate on your thoughts in other threads, would love to look at your views.

Peace,
Seeker

Thank you for the welcome - I'll jump in here and there. Since my initial interest in eschatology a decade ago, when I casually accepted contemporary opinion (pretrib rapture, revived Roman Empire etc), I have come full circle to a post-trib rapture position with a firm belief in a revived Islamic caliphate. At some point, I came across Joel's online book version at answering islam, right about when the full book was coming out. Got the full book - what a thrilling (and chilling!) confirmation of much of what I had been looking into.

Turkey says air strikes in Iraq hit their targets

By Selcuk Gokoluk

ANKARA (Reuters) - Turkey said on Monday its warplanes hit their Kurdish guerrilla targets in weekend raids on northern Iraq that raised fears of destabilisation in one of Iraq's few peaceful regions.

The EU urged Turkey to show restraint after the raids, which officials in northern Iraq said hit villages, killed one woman and forced hundreds to flee.

UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon expressed concern about reports of civilian casualties, and urged Baghdad and Ankara to work together to tackle Kurdish guerrillas using northern Iraq as a base for attacks in Turkey.

Dismissing reports the raids hit villages, Turkey's General Staff said its targets were fixed "after it was established that they were definitely not civilian residential areas."

The three-hour offensive, reported to involve 50 fighter jets, also included ground forces shelling suspected positions of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) in northern Iraq.

"According to initial valuations, all the planned targets were hit accurately," the General Staff said on its Web site.

The Turkish army has massed up to 100,000 troops near the border, raising fears that a major cross-border operation could further destabilise Iraq and fuel ethnic and sectarian tensions.

However, initial responses to the weekend raids from Turkey's main allies stopped well short of condemnation.".............

Reuters UK

Turkey relayed Israel offer to swap Golan for peace: Assad

DOHA (AFP) — Syrian President Bashar al-Assad confirmed in remarks published on Thursday that Turkey has relayed a message from Israel expressing a readiness to swap the Golan Heights for peace.

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan "informed me of Israel's readiness to withdraw from the Golan in return for peace with Syria," Assad was quoted by the Qatari daily Al-Watan as saying.

In excerpts from an interview to be published in full on Sunday, the paper quoted Assad as saying that Ankara has been mediating between Israel and Syria since April last year.

Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert assured Erdogan of his readiness to return the Golan, and this was relayed to Syria a week ago, Assad said, confirming reports of Turkish mediation that emerged on Wednesday.

"What we now need is to find common ground through the Turkish mediator," he said, adding that any negotiations with Israel would be conducted via Ankara.

Olmert's spokesman, while withholding direct comment on Assad's remarks, said Israel wanted peace talks with Syria.

"We have no specific comment on President Assad's statements," Mark Regev told AFP in Jerusalem.

But "Israel wants peace and wants to engage in peace negotiations with Syria. We know what Syria would expect from such negotiations and Syria knows what we would expect."

Israeli Tourism Minister Yitzhak Herzog, a member of the inner security cabinet, said that Israel was in no hurry to give up the Golan, however.

"The Golan is precious to us all and no one is in a hurry to relinquish it... We're not there yet anyway... but the fact that both sides are talking peace is in itself positive," he told Israeli public radio.

Assad said the first thing that needs to be discussed is "recovery of the land in order to (ascertain) Israeli credibility, because we have to be cautious and precise in discussing this issue."

Assad said Israel was proposing direct talks, but that these need common ground and "a sponsor, which can only be the United States, unfortunately."

He said the administration of US President George W. Bush "has neither a vision, nor the will to (push forward) the peace process" but that direct negotiations might become possible under his successor.

Assad said he will discuss the issue with Erdogan when the Turkish prime minister visits Damascus on Saturday.

Assad's remarks came a day after reports in Syria that Erdogan has assured Damascus that Israel is ready to return all of the Golan Heights in return for peace.

Israel captured the Golan from Syria in the 1967 Middle East war and annexed it in 1981 in a move never recognised by the international community.

An Erdogan spokesman declined to comment on the reported peace feelers.

"We are going to Syria on Saturday. The prime minister will make the necessary statements before and after the visit. We deem it inappropriate to comment on the issue at the moment," Mehmet Akif Beki told AFP in Ankara.

As its price for peace, Syria has consistently demanded the return of the whole of the Golan right down to the shores of the Sea of Galilee -- Israel's main water source.

Israel balked at the demand in the most recent peace talks, which broke off in 2000. But Israeli media reported last year that the government was considering accepting it in return for Syrian agreement to end its longstanding alliance with Iran and its support for Lebanese and Palestinian militant groups.

Last June two Israeli ministers confirmed that peace feelers had been made to Syria through third party governments, one of which was widely identified as Turkey.

Olmert told Israel's Channel 10 television last week: "Very clearly we want peace with the Syrians and we are taking all manner of actions to this end.

"President Bashar al-Assad knows precisely what our expectations are and we know his. I won't say more."

Despite a 1974 armistice, the two sides remain technically in a state of war. As recently as last September Israel launched an air strike against a site in northeastern Syria.

Damascus reacted furiously to the raid, roundly rejecting Israeli charges that the site was military.

AFP News

Turkey plans to send envoy to Israel for Syria talks

Turkey is planning to send an emissary to Jerusalem in an attempt to find a compromise that would pave the way of peace talks between Syria and Israel, as it played down the high expectations saying there is a long way to go. (UPDATED)

Israel's Haaretz said on Monday Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan plans to send an emissary to Jerusalem to brief Prime Minister Ehud Olmert on his recent talks with Assad in Damascus. Erdogan will apparently send his foreign policy advisor Ahmet Davutoglu, who is also in charge of talks with Syria and has in the past met with Olmert adviser, Yoram Turbowicz, in Ankara, it reported.

Israeli officials believe Turkey's involvement in the issue will increase. "Erdogan has decided to go all the way on the issue of Israel and Syria," the Israeli government source told Haaretz.

The source added that Israel has not yet received an update on Erdogan's talks in Damascus. "Talks are being conducted to chart out the issue," the source said. "The goal of Turkey's activity is to allow talks to start. That's how we view it. So far, no real negotiations are taking place."

Turkey has been mediating between Syria and Israel to restart peace talks. Israel and Syria's last round of direct talks broke down in 2000 over the details of Israel's proposed withdrawal from the Golan.

Syria has said it received word from Turkey that Israel would be willing to give back the Golan in return for peace with the Arab state. Israel captured the plateau in the 1967 Middle East war and annexed it in 1981 in a move not recognized internationally.

Israel would be open to participating in a senior-level meeting with the Syrians brokered by Turkey to test the waters for renewed peace negotiations, Israeli officials said. Turkey's foreign minister said there's still a lot to achieve before any peace agreement between Israel and Syria.

In Ankara Turkish Foreign Minister Ali Babacan told reporters there's still a lot to achieve before any peace agreement between Israel and Syria. An agreement between the longtime enemies requires "strong political determination" from both sides, he added.

Babacan said Turkey would pass messages between the sides until they are ready to meet. "Talks will continue to take place through Turkey for a while," he said. "When the issue is a little more mature, then I hope that the sides will meet each other," he added.

Turkey is trying to restart low-level talks between the two countries as a prelude to bringing the leaders of Syria and Israel together.

Israeli officials told Reuters such a preliminary meeting between Israeli and Syrian representatives would be the next step in the mediation efforts by Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan. That meeting could lay the groundwork for more formal talks in the future, they added.

"If such an invitation comes from Turkey, I can't see any reason why Israel would not attend," said a senior Israeli official. "They would accept," an Israeli official from Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's office Reuters reported.

Hurriyet

Report: U.S. asks Turkey to push harder for Israel-Syria talks

By Haaretz Service

Tags: Turkey, Israel, Syria

The U.S. government has asked Turkey to increase efforts to advance negotiations between Israel and Syria, according to a report published by the London Arabic daily Al-Hayat on Saturday.

According to the report, the U.S. request comes in light of the recent political crisis in Lebanon, and U.S. assessments that peace between Israel and Syria will help distance the country from Hezbollah.

The report quoted a source as saying that Washington has hinted to Israel more than once the importance of progress in talks with Syria. The source added that the U.S. said they are ready to participate in talks between the countries if Turkey is able to achieve a breakthrough between them.

Last week, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert said he was prepared to bring about a peace agreement between Israel and Syria during his term in office, according to a report in the magazine Paris Match.

Olmert told the French weekly that his top priority was reaching peace with Syria and the Palestinians, adding that no other matter was as important or urgent for the future of Israel.

Also last week, the pan-Arab London-based daily newspaper Al Hayat reported that Turkish officials are moving to convene a three-way meeting between Israeli and Syrian representatives. The meeting would likely take place in Istabul, as Turkey continues its efforts to jump-start peace negotiations between the two countries.

Ankara would like both sides to commit to a signed declaration as a starting point for talks. According to the report, Turkey decided to postpone the proposed sit-down after the Syrians revealed Jerusalem's stated willingness to withdraw from the Golan Heights in exchange for peace. The newspaper added that the Syrian leadership was assuaged by Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's refusal to deny or backtrack from the claims when word reached the news media in Israel.

Israel Radio also cited a report in the Egyptian daily Al Ahram stating that Israel has received messages from Damascus regarding the continuation of contacts between them in the near future. The newspaper quoted a Syrian official as stating that the probability of direct Israeli-Syrian negotiations taking place while President Bush remains in office remains slim, according to Israel Radio.

The United States would support a Turkish-brokered Syrian-Israeli peace drive but wants to see Damascus change its policy on Lebanon, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said in remarks published on Sunday.

"We do not wish to stand in the way of any attempt to achieve peace between Israel and its neighbors including Syria," Rice told Asharq al-Awsat newspaper in remarks translated into Arabic.

"If the two sides wished to exert an effort for peace the United States would give its blessing and back these efforts. The problem is that Syria is yet to show a desire for Middle East peace especially vis-a-vis Lebanon," she added.

http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/984337.html

Israel and Syria negotiate as Turkey mediates

By Ethan Bronner Published: May 21, 2008

JERUSALEM: Israel and Syria announced Wednesday that they were engaged in negotiations for a comprehensive peace treaty through Turkish mediators, the first time in eight years that such talks had taken place.

Senior Israeli officials from Prime Minister Ehud Olmert's office and their Syrian counterparts were in Istanbul on Wednesday, where both groups had been staying separately, at undisclosed locations, since Monday. The mediators shuttled between the two.

The elements of negotiation were not made public in short official statements from both capitals that spoke of conducting "these talks in good faith and with an open mind." But there is no question that the Syrians want to regain the Golan Heights, captured by Israel in the 1967 Middle East war. Nor is there any doubt that Israel wants to end Syria's close alliance with Iran, hoping to reduce the power of anti-Israel groups like Hezbollah in Lebanon and Hamas in Gaza. Both benefit from Syrian as well as Iranian patronage; both are considered terrorist groups by Israel and the United States. Two weeks after Hezbollah seized much of West Beirut in an open display of its power, political factions in Lebanon Wednesday announced an agreement that gave Hezbollah an upper hand in the government. That doubtless added to Israel's sense of urgency in pursuing a deal with Syria.

The talks in Turkey were coordinated with the United States, according to a senior Israeli official who spoke on condition of anonymity, though the talks come less than a week after President George W. Bush, speaking to the Israeli Parliament, created a stir by criticizing those who would negotiate with "terrorists and radicals." Bush's remarks have become an issue in the American presidential campaign because they were widely perceived as a rebuke to Senator Barack Obama, the Democratic front-runner, who has advocated the kind of engagement that Israel and Syria are now undertaking.

Turkey, a Muslim country and member of NATO, is a close ally of the United States. It is also Syria's neighbor and has an interest in securing regional peace.

The Turkish prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, has been working on convening negotiations for some time, an official in his office said, including holding phone conversations with leaders on both sides, and assigning a special envoy to handle the diplomatic back-and-forth. The fact that messages were being exchanged has been public for a couple of months, due to official Syrian statements.

The senior Israeli official said that shortly after Olmert became prime minister more than a year ago, he went to Turkey and held a long one-on-one meeting with Erdogan in which it was decided that Turkey would mediate between Israel and Syria."......

http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/05/21/ ... ideast.php

LEBANON'S COMPROMISE
New rules for the Middle East
By Rami G. Khouri Published: May 26, 2008

BEIRUT:

The accord that has resolved the immediate political crisis in Lebanon is the latest example of the new political power equation that is redefining the Middle East. It reflects both local and global forces, and 18 years after the Cold War ended, provides a glimpse of what the post-Cold War world will look like - at least in the Middle East.

Several dynamics seem to be at play, but one stands out as paramount: We are witnessing the clear limits of the projection of American global power, combined with the assertion and coexistence of multiple regional powers (Turkey, Israel, Iran, Hezbollah, Syria, Hamas, Saudi Arabia, etc.). These local powers tend to fight and negotiate at the same time, and ultimately prefer to make reasonable compromises rather than perpetually wage absolutist battles.

The Doha accord for Lebanon was much more than simply a victory for Iranian-backed Hezbollah over the American-backed alliance. It is the first concrete example in the Arab world of a negotiated, formal political agreement by local adversaries to share power and make big national decisions collectively, while maintaining close strategic relationships with diverse external patrons in the United States, Iran, Saudi Arabia and Syria.

The Lebanese agreement (unlike the failed Fatah-Hamas unity government) is likely to succeed because all the parties know that to live together peacefully they must make mutual compromises. This accord has been forged in the furnace of Middle Eastern demographic and political realism, in contrast to the hallucinatory absolutism that often drives American-Israeli policy in this region.

This is not a full defeat for the United States - it's more like a draw. It puts into concrete political form the most powerful force that has defined the Middle East in recent decades: the willingness of individuals, political movements and some governments to openly defy, challenge, resist and occasionally to fight the United States, Israel and their Arab and other allies.

Since 2004, the United States has explicitly, repeatedly and passionately singled out Lebanon as an arena where Hezbollah and other regional Islamist forces backed by Iran and Syria would be faced down and defeated. But now the United States will face these forces from across the same cabinet room table, not as bludgeoned and defeated foes, but rather as partners and colleagues in Lebanon's national unity government. When Hezbollah and its erstwhile foes exchange kisses, a befuddled Condoleezza Rice should take care not to fall off her exercise bicycle.

The United States is a slow learner in the Middle East, where the terrain is strange, the body language bizarre, the fierce power of historical memory incomprehensible, and the negotiating techniques otherworldly. But the United States is not stupid. It learns over time that if you retread a flat tire over and over again, and it keeps going flat on you, perhaps it is time to buy a new tire - if you hope to actually move forward.

Now that we have a draw in the broad ideological confrontation throughout the Middle East that pits Israeli-Americanism against Arab-Islamo nationalism, we should expect the players to reconsider their policies if they wish to make new gains on both sides.

Lebanon, however, is not the most significant recent development reflecting the limits of American power in the Middle East. The truly remarkable manifestation of how the United States has marginalized itself is the conduct of the Israeli government.

The United States has pushed the Israelis hard to do two things in the past two years: Do not negotiate with Syria and do not engage Hamas. What has Israel done during the past few months and more? It has been wisely negotiating with Syria via Turkey, and engaging Hamas on a truce deal through the mediation of Egypt. Hold on, Condi, this gets even worse.

It is no big deal in Washington when nearly 500 million Arabs, Iranians and Turks ignore and defy the United States. But when Israel - the only democracy in the Middle East, America's eternal ally, and the bastion of the epic modern struggle against fascism, totalitarianism, Nazism, communism and terrorism - ignores the United States, that is newsworthy.

So we now have a rare moment in the Middle East. Iran, Turkey, all the Arabs, Hezbollah, Hamas, and Israel all share one and only one common trait: They routinely ignore the advice, and the occasional threats, they get from Washington. Rice was correct in summer 2006 when she said we are witnessing the birth pangs of a new Middle East. But the emerging new regional configuration is very different from the one she fantasized about and tried to bring into being with multiple wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, Palestine, Somalia and Lebanon, and threats against Iran and Syria.

The new rules of the political game in the Middle East are now being written by the key players in the Middle East - and that should be welcomed.

Rami G. Khouri is editor-at-large of The Daily Star and director of the Issam Fares Institute for Public Policy and International Affairs at the American University of Beirut. Distributed by Agence Global.

IHT News

US applauds Turkey's efforts for solution of Syrian-Israeli dispute

US State Department spokesperson Sean McCormack said on Monday at a press conference that Turkey's mediation in peace talks between Israel and Syria was worthy of applause.

Responding to a question from reporters referring to remarks from Syrian president Bashar al-Assad suggesting that the support of the US as a broker was needed for the success of talks with Israel, McCormack said he didn't think either side had requested such a thing from the US.

"If the sides and all the parties to this want the United States to participate, it's something we would consider. To my knowledge, we haven't been requested to participate in the process. As a matter of fact, the Turkish government should be applauded for the fact that they are working to further the cause of peace in the region," he said.

He added that the only caution from the US was that Syrian-Israeli talks should not substitute for or in any way distract from the direct negotiations that were under way between Israel and Palestine.

Answering a question about Turkish Foreign Minister Ali Babacan's upcoming visit to Washington, McCormack said US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and Babacan would meet on June 5.

"Turkey can play a very important role. It's got a lot of influence. It's an important country. It has a lot of resources. And, moreover, it can be a voice for -- has been and can be a voice for -- peace in the region," he said.

TodaysZaman

Top Turkish General Says Turkey, Iran Coordinating on Strikes Against Kurds

By Dorian Jones
Istanbul
05 June 2008

A senior Turkish general says Turkey and Iran have carried out coordinated strikes against Kurdish rebels based in northern Iraq. Over the past few months, Turkey has reportedly intensified its attacks against bases of the Kurdistan Workers' Party, or PKK. For VOA, Dorian Jones reports from Istanbul.

The deputy head of Turkey's armed forces General Ilker Basbug told Turkish television that Turkish forces have collaborated with Iran in attacking bases of the Kurdistan Workers' Party in northern Iraq, and will do so again if necessary.

In the past, Turkey and Iran have pledged to cooperate against the rebels, but the general's comment is the first confirmation that the two countries have been working together against the PKK, and PJAK, the group's Iranian wing.

International relations expert, Soli Ozel of Bilgi University says the cooperation is a watershed in Turkey's fight against the PKK.

"Turkey bombed PJAK that is the anti Iranian Kurdish organization and it flew into the region using Iranian airspace," he said. "That tells you volumes what is cooking about PKK PJAK because PJAK is the twin of PKK for Iran."

During Turkey's more than two-decade fight against the PKK, Ankara frequently accused Tehran of providing direct assistance to the PKK, a claim denied by the Iranians. But the present Turkish government has been working hard to improve relations with Iran. Observers say closer cooperation between the two countries will be a blow to the PKK.

Turkish armed forces are continuing to bombard Kurdish rebel bases in northern Iraq, while its continuing its diplomatic efforts to isolate them. The head of Turkey's armed forces, General Yasar Buyukanit, on Thursday called for an end to logistical support to the rebels.

"In the past the PKK were supplied by mules carrying arms," he said. "Today they are supplied by trucks. How can this be? All counties should recognize they are a terrorist organization."

That call, according to observers, is directly aimed at the leaders of the Iraqi Kurdish-controlled enclave, where PKK bases are located. Like Iran in the past, Ankara has accused the Iraqi Kurds of supporting the PKK.

But here too, the last few months have seen relations improving. The prime minister of the Iraqi Kurdish region Nechirvan Barzani this week said they were optimistic that relations with Turkey are improving. The warming of relations, says Bilgi University's Soli Ozel, is an indication of how isolated the PKK has become.

"The PKK, for all intents and purposes, has well lived out of its usefulness, for anyone concerned and everyone want to get rid of them, and this is what is happening," he said.

But the PKK insurgency is still essentially a Turkish problem, with Turkish Kurds still make up the overwhelming majority. Despite the PKK being designated as a terrorist organization by the United States and European Union, pressure still remains on Ankara to extend greater cultural and economic rights to its Kurdish population, as a key part of the strategy to defeat the insurgency.

VOA

Turkish PM: court must explain headscarf ruling

Tue Jun 10, 2008 9:37am EDT
By Hidir Goktas

ANKARA (Reuters) - Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan said on Tuesday the Constitutional Court must explain its decision to overturn a government-led reform allowing students to wear Muslim headscarves at university.

Last week's Constitutional Court ruling was the most serious setback for the Islamist-rooted AK Party since it came to power in 2002 and analysts said it increased the chances of the party being banned for Islamist activities, in a separate case.

Erdogan reiterated that the court was not authorized to examine the content of a constitutional amendment and should look only at the technical aspects of the reform.

"The Constitutional Court must certainly explain why it examined the contents of the reform in the (headscarf) case," he told a parliamentary group meeting.

The Constitutional Court normally gives reasons for its rulings after announcing the decision. The court's chairman said in this case that the justification would be announced, but not for the time being because of speculation surrounding the case.

An analyst said Erdogan showed he did not seek escalating tensions but stood firm against the judiciary.

"The prime minister did not create new tensions but he did not bow either. He pointed at the nation for solving the problems and I saw all signs of an early election in his speech," said Mehmet Ali Birand, a liberal columnist for Posta newspaper. "The government will call early elections if the AK Party is closed down," said Birand.

The AK Party passed the headscarf amendment earlier this year, angering a secularist establishment of judges and generals which sees the headscarf as a symbol of political Islam.

The reform was seen as a catalyst for the separate case which aims to close the party down and ban 71 members, including the prime minister, from party politics.

The AK Party decided to keep parliament open until the Constitutional Court decides on the closure case, said Sadullah Ergin, a senior AK Party deputy. Normally the parliament recess is set to start on June 30.

PARLIAMENT'S POWER

Last week after an emergency meeting to discuss the court's ruling, the party accused the Constitutional Court of violating the constitution and the concept of the separation of powers.

On Tuesday, Erdogan used a more conciliatory tone when referring to the top court and blamed the main opposition party, the staunchly secularist CHP, for the row between the government and the judiciary.

"We have to be responsible and behave with common sense ... We should not forget that both the legislature and judiciary exist (to serve) this nation. We cannot allow the judiciary or the legislature to be eroded," he said.

Investors, fearing months of political uncertainty, are watching the developments around the two cases and had said that an aggressive response from the AK Party could further undermine market confidence. The closure case is expected to take months.

"The constitution states that the legislative power belongs only and exclusively to elected parliaments," Erdogan told cheering supporters. "Nobody can take the power given by the constitution away from our esteemed parliament."

The headscarf debate goes to the heart of the officially secular but predominantly Muslim country's identity.

Turkey, which has seen four governments pushed from office by the arch-secularist military since 1960, is struggling to balance the demands of an increasingly prosperous but pious part of society with those of a traditionally pro-Western sector whose values have long been represented by the secularist elite.

(Reporting by Selcuk Gokoluk; Editing by Peter Millership)

Reuters

Turkish PM urges Mideast countries to overcome problems

www.chinaview.cn 2008-06-12 21:05:57

ANKARA, June 12 (Xinhua) -- Turkey's Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Thursday that Turkey and Arab states bear great responsibility in the solution of problems encountered in the Middle East and the surrounding region, the semi-official Anatolia news agency reported.

Delivering a speech at the opening of the Turkish-Arab Economic Forum in Istanbul, the largest city of Turkey, Erdogan said that "Problems of our region are not unsolvable. We can solve all of the problems, overcome all hardships and obstacles through solidarity."

Erdogan said he believed the forum would contribute to the economic development, welfare and stability of the regional countries.

"Turkey aims at acting as a bridge of development and prosperity between the Arab world and western countries, and our membership in the European Union will be a major step taken toward peace and stability in the region," Erdogan said.

The Turkish premier also called for improved economic ties between Turkey and the Arab countries, urging Arab businessmen to invest in Turkey in a larger extent.

"We would be very happy to see more Arab entrepreneurs and investors in our country," Erdogan said.

The third Turkish-Arab Economic Forum opened here in Istanbul, under the sponsorship of Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan. The two-day forum will discuss means of boosting cooperation between Turkey and Arab countries in the economic, financial, investment, energy and tourism fields.

The forum is organized by Al-Iktissad Wal-Aamal Group, in cooperation with the Finance Ministry and the Foreign Economic Relations Board in Turkey (DEIK) and the Arab League.


Editor: An Lu

http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/2008- ... 356542.htm

Turkey: Constitutional Court’s preventive regime change

Friday , 13 June 2008
By Saban KARDAS, TZ

* The Constitutional Court's decision annulling Parliament's amendments to the Turkish Constitution continues to penetrate into every aspect of Turkey's political scene.

As the details unfold, the extent and depth of the crisis become clearer every passing day. The decision strengthens the precedent of judicial activism that the judiciary sought to deliberately and aggressively create. Through the judicialization of politics in the recent history of Turkish politics, the court, as well as other higher courts, has endeavored to shape politics and society after their narrow ideological mindset. The court's latest decision, in addition to continuing this trend, also torpedoes the whole constitutional system by claiming a right to act outside its competences as they were laid down in the Constitution. As such it corroborates the fears of those who have viewed the judiciary's latest activism as the biggest threat against Turkish democracy and constitutional order and had been calling it an attempt at a judicial coup. By claiming an unrestricted right to review Parliament's legislative powers, the court negates the meaning of a parliamentary democracy and turns the country into a juristocracy par excellence.
The court has not yet issued its detailed decision, so we do not clearly know what considerations went into the court's decision. According to press reports, some judges already leaked the discussions leading to this decision. These arguments, if they are true, are even more horrifying than the final verdict itself. They reflect clearly that the mindset of the judges sitting in Turkey's highest court is the major obstacle before Turkish democracy. The justices are far from the reality of Turkish politics and an increasingly globalizing world politics.

Preventive regime change!

According to the reports, the members of the court again built their opinion on a subjective reasoning, instead of objective evidence. They considered a hypothetical situation: What if a government that controls the parliamentary majority, thereby being able to amend the Constitution, capitalizes on this advantage and decides to revamp the nature of the regime, say by holding elections every 20 years and in effect establishing an authoritarianism of sorts? Since they deemed such a scenario unacceptable, they opined that under such a situation the court cannot remain aloof of attempts to change the regime through amendments to the Constitution. They further opined that it would then be incumbent on the court to take an assertive stance and protect the constitutional order, a duty they are tasked with by the Constitution. To prevent such a hypothetical scenario from happening in some indefinite time in the future, they found it necessary to act preemptively now and establish a new precedent of constitutional review: As a revision to the 1982 Constitution, the court accepted to review parliamentary amendments on substantive grounds and decided to annul those amendments. As it was seeking to protect the republic and democracy against likely attempts in the future, the court in effect changed the nature of the regime now!

It is not unusual for Turkish political actors to act on such subjective presumptions. In fact, the whole case for limiting individual liberties, including political, religious and cultural freedoms, is based on this reasoning. The possibility that a religious majority may one day limit the rights of other religious minorities is offered as justification for contravening the rights of the religious majority. The possibility that some people may one day attempt to establish a religiously based rule and undermine the principle of secularism has been enough ground for the secularist Turkish establishment to limit political freedoms without necessarily inquiring whether objective material evidence existed to substantiate those claims. The possibility that cultural and ethnic rights could be used to disintegrate the country was considered a sufficient warrant to deny those rights to Turkish people. That is old stuff for Turkish politics; the phrase "mind reading" best describes this attitude.

Judicialization of politics: a sinister attack on democracy

We are now confronted with a more fundamental threat: The same subjective reasoning is being offered as justification for changing the regime preemptively. It is no different from military interventions in politics and has to be objected to accordingly. However, given the nature of the actors undertaking the coup, it is more difficult to detect. The principle of respect for the rule of law is used to conceal this sinister attack on democracy.

What is therefore more troubling is the indifference of some segments of the Turkish political community. Some cherish this decision because it promotes their political agenda. Others criticize it as a politically influenced decision but still call on the Turkish people to respect the decision of a judicial body. Even Parliament Speaker Köksal Toptan has failed to respond to this challenge properly. In his proposal to overcome the crisis, he suggests Turkey should consider reintroducing a bicameral system whereby the upper house may review the functions of the lower house. In this way the workload and pressure on the Constitutional Court would be relieved.

However, what these responses fail to see is that the real challenge before the country is not how to constrain the popular will. There is no need for another guardian over representatives of the people, for there are already enough of them. The challenge is to develop effective checks against currently unaccountable institutions, most importantly the judiciary, so that the people are protected against the guardians.

Judiciary: New guardians of the people?

Protecting Turkish democracy from this challenge necessitates that we recognize and confront the source of the problem: the mindset of the Turkish secularist elite at large that continues to treat Turkish people as immature and in need of being guarded by enlightened elites. Given its mission, inner organization, education, ideological makeup and historical/political positioning, the judiciary is opposed to reforms, favoring the maintenance of the status quo. It views itself as the progressive/modernizing force à la 19th century templates, failing to recognize that in contemporary Turkey a number of powerful social and political actors are now active in civil society and politics. They want to maintain a political structure that was traditionally based on an undemocratic notion of state elites making top-down decisions on the fate of the people.

For a long time, the reasoning that the only guarantor and protector of the survival of the nation and the maintenance of the regime was the military's ongoing supervision over the system was used to justify the military guardianship over politics and society. This self-declared custodian role has been one of the main reasons behind the circumvention of the scope of civilian politics and civil society, hence hindering the democratization process. We see that the judiciary capitalizes on the same argument to reproduce this problematic notion in a new form. In a democratic system, however, the judiciary is not a representative institution, bestowed with the right to decide on political processes. Pretending that it could do otherwise would elevate the judiciary to an autonomous position above civilian politics. The decisions pertaining to the regulation of society's domestic and international affairs could only be taken by the people and the representative institutions that are eventually accountable to the public. Bracketing the judiciary as an unrestricted "veto player" over the people's will reverses this process and bring us back to where we started: a guardianship regime peculiar to Turkey.

Moreover, to the extent that the court does not trust other sectors of the society and considers itself the main guardian of the founding ideology of the Turkish Republic -- and its protector against revisionist ideologies -- it further isolates itself from the society and dwarfs civilian politics. As a result, secularism and other principles emerge as part of an ideology under the tutelage of the bureaucracy. According to this reading, the regime could be advocated for, reinterpreted and protected solely by the bureaucracy. As a result, other civilian and secular sectors of the society and the role they play against the anti-regime forces, in particular, and in the making of the Turkish politics, in general, are ignored by the judiciary.

Today, democracy and the Turkish Republic have been embraced by wide segments of the Turkish society and have become a truly popular project. In a democratic Turkey where popular consensus behind the regime has taken hold, the guardianship by the bureaucracy is not needed. The agents of democracy are not the bureaucracy but the society and its political representatives. Moreover, as Turkey is deeply integrated into the international community, Turkish democracy is anchored into international networks of checks and balances. If we do not object to the judiciary's or any other institution's extra-judicial veto power over Parliament, we further depart from the idea of a democratic Turkey.

Presumptuous Constitutional Court

If a threat of sorts hypothesized by the court emerges to Turkish democracy, both the vibrant social constituency behind Turkish democracy and the international community will be there to resist it. Whether such a scenario is probable is another question. Implicit in the secularists' argument is the idea that such an attempt to overturn democracy could come from the Justice and Development Party (AK Party) or another party representing the same political position, which may come out of its ashes if the court decides to close down the party later this year. The AK Party's track record so far indicates that it did not seek to manipulate the democratic game. Although it possessed a majority of the votes in Parliament to change the Constitution, it played according to the alternation rule and sought re-election. The people trusted the party's commitment to democracy and elected it for a second term. Apparently, the judges are not convinced of the Turkish people's maturity and acted on a subjective presumption that in the future elections could be halted to change the democratic regime. The court's decision, however, rendered the meaning of popular democracy and elections obsolete. This should be the biggest irony of this legal comedy: preventive regime change by the guardians!


-------------------
* Şaban Kardaş is an instructor at the University of Utah, the chairman of the Middle East and Central Asia Conference Committee and a research assistant at Sakarya University.

June 2008

By Saban KARDAS

http://www.turkishweekly.net/news.php?id=56185