29-Nov-14: Is Turkey providing cover for Hamas terror?

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey hosts Khaled Mashaal
and Ismail Haniyeh of Hamas in his Ankara bureau, June 18, 2013
[Image Source: Turkish Prime Minister's Press Office]

Since the disclosures made in Israel two days ago about Turkey's involvement in a major Hamas terrorism initiative directed at killing yet more Jews and sowing ever-greater chaos in Jerusalem, we have been paying extra attention to what is making news in Turkey.

(For the background, see this post: "27-Nov-14: Hamas terrorist ring is busted; Israel says the handlers operate from Turkey; Qatar is involved")

Let's start with the Turkish 'denials' of involvement in hosting, tolerating or otherwise co-operating with the terrorists of Hamas. Ynet yesterday published a not-so-comprehensive refutation of the allegations:

Turkey denies harboring Hamas terror command | Ynet, November 28, 2014 | Itamar Eichner | Turkey denied on Friday the claim that Hamas planned terrorist attacks from headquarters in Istanbul. The Shin Bet made the accusation on Thursday, setting off a diplomatic face-off between Israel and Turkey. Turkish sources argued that the Shin Bet's announcement was meant to demonize Turkey and sabotage attempts to mend the countries' diplomatic ties. Israel requested NATO and the American government to take steps against Turkey in response. "It's illogical for a NATO member to host a terrorist organization that trains and plans terror attacks on its soil," said the Israeli statement. Turkish diplomats were enraged by Israel's allegations, calling them "lies and deception... There are elements in Israel who are trying to torpedo the attempts to smooth things out between the two countries and turn a new leaf. They are telling lies, as though Hamas operates in Turkey with the government's knowledge. Turkey has a dialogue with Hamas, but will absolutely not allow any terror organization to operate on its soil."

Had Ynet quoted Turkish names or Turkish titles, the broad, but entirely non-specific, Turkish statements might have had some persuasive value. But they did not. It's simply "Turkey denied" and "diplomats said". So we went looking elsewhere.

So far, the only article we have found (Turkish, but published in English) is from the website of the Turkish newspaper, Daily Sabah. It published the denials of Turkish involvement with the busted Hamas gang ["Top Hamas Official Denies Israel's Claims of Hamas Fighters Trained in Turkey", November 2, 2014], by interviewing a person it oddly sees as a credible source: Osama Hamdan, the man who runs Hamas operations in Lebanon. The 'unimpeachable' Hamdan clears things up by saying (direct quote):

"This is a story made up by Israel... I can say this for certain this is a big lie. They say these lies about Turkey or Jordan for political reasons. They know that after their attack in Gaza there is huge sympathy for Palestine from Europe, from Latin America. Also there is huge sympathy for Turkey. The Turkish government, politically, stands by the rights of Palestinians. They are trying to create stories about militant activities outside Palestine and involve these countries in it. These countries are not supporting terrorist actions. They are supporting Palestinians against occupation. What Israelis say about training and recruiting in Turkey is a big lie..."

To us, it's actually fairly clear that Hamdan is admitting the facts. But he is changing the definitions: what Turkey is doing (our interpretation of what the Hamas terrorists is saying) is supporting the Palestinian Arab anti-"occupation" "resistance" activities. And that's not terrorism, even if Israel and the rest of the world say it is.

Daily Sabah has some fascinating aspects to its own story, according to its Wikipedia entry. Established in 1985, it ran afoul of the Erdogan government which seized its assets in 2007 and then sold them off to (as it happens) a media company controlled by Erdogan's son-in-law. Starting in 2009, it was the local publishing partner in Turkey of the New York Times, distributing the New York Times International Weekly on Sundays. That Sabah/NYT partnership ended earlier this year but Wikipedia is unable to say why. We also don't know.

Osama Hamdan, defender of Turkish virtue, pursuing
a favourite theme in July 2014 [Image Source]

What we do know is that in choosing to defend Turkey's honour by turning to Osama Hamdan, the editors at Daily Sabah somehow neglected to draw readers' attention to the man's passionate attachment to nauseating antisemitic blood libels. On July 28, 2014, here's what he said on the Al-Quds TV channel (controlled by Hamas, beamed throughout the Arabic-speaking world). It's translated from Arabic by the indispensible MEMRI organization:

The Israelis concentrate on killing children. I believe that this is engraved in the historical Zionist and Jewish mentality, which has become addicted to the killing of women and children. We all remember how the Jews used to slaughter Christians, in order to mix their blood in their holy matzos. This is not a figment of imagination or something taken from a film. It is a fact, acknowledged by their own books and by historical evidence. It happened everywhere, here and there. [Transcript here; Video clip here]

Another major Turkish news source, Todays Zaman, published the Israeli claims ["Israel claims ‘foiled Hamas attacks’ were planned in Turkey", November 27, 2014] but has not - as far as we can tell - found any Turkish government source who will go on the record to deny them. Nor have we seen any Turkish official going on the record anywhere else so far to deny. We do expect those denials to come.

Some of the stories that are capturing Turkey's headlines in the recent past are, we think, worth noting.

• "Muslims discovered Earth is round, Turkey's science minister says", Hürriyet Daily News, November 29, 2014 | Muslim scientists working around 1,200 years ago were the first to determine that the Earth is a sphere, Turkey's science, industry and technology minister, becoming the latest Turkish official to inform the world about apparent scientific firsts on the part of Islamic world...
• "Foreigners don’t like Muslims, only their money: Turkish President Erdoğan", Good Morning Turkey, November 28, 2014 | “Foreigners” are unable to solve the problems of the Middle East because Western states “don’t like us” and are more interested in just following the cash, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said on Nov. 27. “Only we can solve our problems. I speak openly; foreigners love oil, gold, diamonds, and the cheap labor force of the Islamic world. They like the conflicts, fights and quarrels of the Middle East. Believe me, they don’t like us,” said Erdoğan during an address to the Standing Committee for Economic and Commercial Cooperation of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation (COMCEC) in Istanbul. “They look like friends, but they want us dead, they like seeing our children die. How long will we stand that fact?”...
• "Erdoğan says America was discovered by Muslims, not Columbus", Hürriyet Daily News, November 15, 2014 | "...Converting people by force, by the sword, has never been a part of Islam. Our religion has never been a tool of exploitation," Erdoğan continued, arguing that "those who colonialized America for its gold and Africa for its diamonds, now do it in the Middle East for its oil with the same dirty plot..."

Tonight there are reports in many news channels [for instance, "Isis launches attack on Kobani from inside Turkey for first time", The Guardian, November 29, 2014] that jihadists from the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) terror forces have launched an attack on the beleagured border town of Kobane, Syria, from inside Turkish territory. Turkey is officially and energetically [here] denying that too.

02-Nov-14: How well does "Democracy is for infidels" resonate among Europeans?

"They kill Muslims", ISIS preacher's son responds. "The infidels
of Europe, all the infidels."[Image Source]

The German news magazine site Spiegel Online currently has an interview with an Islamic State operative who goes by the name Abu Sattar

around 30 years old and wears a thick, black beard that reaches down to his chest. His top lip is shaved as is his head and he wears a black robe that stretches all the way to the floor. He keeps a copy of the Koran, carefully wrapped in black cloth, in his black leather bag.

The article says he "recruits". This brief extract gives a sense of what the marketing-savvy ISIS people want the world to hear:

SPIEGEL: There are an estimated 1.6 billion Muslims in the world today. Many are very democratic, some are liberal while others are conservative and, just imagine, there are heterosexual Muslims and homosexual Muslims among them. Most of them do not share your ideology. But you act as though there were only one kind of Muslim, namely those who think like you do. That is absurd!
Abu Sattar: Democracy is for infidels. A real Muslim is not a democrat because he doesn't care about the opinions of majorities and minorities don't interest him. He is only interested in what Islam says. Furthermore, democracy is a hegemonic tool of the West and contrary to Islam. Why do you act as though the entire world needs democracy? And when it comes to homosexuality, the issue is clearly dealt with by the Koran. It says it is forbidden and should be punished...

SPIEGEL: In the golden age of Islam, there was music, dancing, painting, calligraphy and architecture. Yet you are propagating an Islam free of culture and art. It is time to discuss religious content and find a modern interpretation, don't you think.
Abu Sattar: It is not up to us to interpret God's word. There have been repeated errors and lapses in Muslim societies. That which you refer to as the "golden age" was one of them...

SPIEGEL: You constantly speak of fighting. Do Muslims not constantly speak of Islam being a religion of peace?
Abu Sattar: It is when people submit to Allah. Allah is merciful and forgives those who follow him.

We mentioned yesterday (here) the stunningly high degree of support views like this person's have among the British, but it's certainly not only them. A poll released during August 2014 [reported in Newsweek] examined attitudes towards ISIS among Europeans.

One in six French citizens sympathises with the Islamist militant group ISIS, also known as Islamic State, a poll released this week found. The poll of European attitudes towards the group, carried out by ICM for Russian news agency Rossiya Segodnya, revealed that 16% of French citizens have a positive opinion of ISIS. This percentage increases among younger respondents, spiking at 27% for those aged 18-24... Newsweek’s France Correspondent, Anne-Elizabeth Moutet, was unsurprised by the news. “This is the ideology of young French Muslims from immigrant backgrounds,” she said, “unemployed to the tune of 40%, who’ve been deluged by satellite TV and internet propaganda.” She pointed to a correlation between support for ISIS and rising anti-Semitism in France, adding that “these are the same people who torch synagogues”.[Newsweek, "16% of French Citizens Support ISIS, Poll Finds", August 26, 2014]

Positive attitudes to ISIS in Germany "showed less divergence, remaining between 3% and 4% for all age groups" [Newsweek]

Compare this with Lebanon, Egypt and Saudi Arabia - the Arab states who are now partnered with the US in combat with ISIS forces in the military sense. A recent New Republic analysis [graphics here] based on polls conducted in September suggested

that ISIS has almost no popular support in Egypt, Saudi Arabia, or Lebanon—even among Sunnis. Among Egyptians, a mere 3 percent express a favorable opinion of ISIS. In Saudi Arabia, the figure is slightly higher: 5 percent rate ISIS positively. In Lebanon, not a single Christian, Shiite, or Druze respondent viewed ISIS favorably; and even among Lebanon's Sunnis, that figure is almost equally low at 1 percent. Nevertheless, there is a real difference between almost no support and no support at all. Since 3 percent of adult Egyptians say they approve of ISIS, that is nearly 1.5 million people. For Saudis, the 5 percent of adult nationals who support ISIS means over half a million people. And even in tiny Lebanon, 1 percent of adult Sunnis equals a few thousand ISIS sympathizers. In any of these places, this is enough to harbor at least a few cells of serious troublemakers.

Back in July 2014, there were reports showing a completely different trend among Saudi Arabians, described in "Saudi poll to reveal public’s level of sympathy for IS":

The Sakina Campaign plans to carry out a scientific survey to determine the position of the Saudi public on the "caliphate" announced by the Islamic State (IS) in Iraq and Syria. This comes after the results of an opinion poll of Saudis were released on social networking sites, claiming that 92% of the target group believes that "IS conforms to the values of Islam and Islamic law." [Al-Monitor, July 2014] 

Despite some searching, we have not yet found any indication on-line that the Sakina ("which operates under the supervision of the Ministry of Islamic Affairs, Endowments, Da'wah and Guidance in Saudi Arabia" - Al-Monitor) poll was done or its results published. We will keep looking.

07-Oct-14: So we should believe spinning of news and reporters happens only in failed, devastated states?

CNN's main newsroom in 2001 [Image Source]

The item we posted earlier this evening ["7-Oct-14: A small window into how lethal journalism happens"] about overt demands/threats by the jihadist invaders of Syria, backed up horrific physical violence, got us thinking about how this works in places outside Syria.

The writer at The Independent ended his piece with these calming words:

"There are not thought to be any foreign journalists still working in Isis territory, so it would follow that these rules would only apply to Syrian and Iraqi reporters."

Intimidation in the ISIS and Hamas way clearly has violence weaved prominently into its fabric. But is that the only sort of intimidation that is brought to bear on the news reporting industry? And does it happen only in devastated, failed-states like Syria?

It might be that the people at (say) Associated Press or Reuters or The Guardian are completely free of threats of violence directed at them. Or not. We news consumers don't normally get to know that much about what drives the editors and reporters inside the Western media, or in the big syndication agencies. That's a shame. It's a subject that deserves much more attention.

But from our own personal encounters with MSN reporters (and their fixers) here in Jerusalem over the past 13 years, we are struck by how frequently they give signs of understanding - perhaps without necessarily being overtly threatened (on this we have no real idea) - what is smart for them to say and what's smart to ignore. When intimidation is in the air, and the threats are made or have even been carried out against one or two individuals, there's less need to restate it. As a process, it is efficient. The compliance becomes self-imposed.

Think back to the astounding mea culpa of CNN's key news product manager back in the early 2000s, and how surprised people were to read it:

Over the last dozen years I made 13 trips to Baghdad to lobby the government to keep CNN's Baghdad bureau open and to arrange interviews with Iraqi leaders. Each time I visited, I became more distressed by what I saw and heard — awful things that could not be reported because doing so would have jeopardized the lives of Iraqis, particularly those on our Baghdad staff... Now that Saddam Hussein's regime is gone, I suspect we will hear many, many more gut-wrenching tales from Iraqis about the decades of torment. At last, these stories can be told freely.

That's Eason Jordan ["The News We Kept to Ourselves", published April 11, 2003], unloading in the op ed pages of the NYTimes more than eleven years ago. He was CNN's chief news executive and president of newsgathering and international networks - the occupant of the desk where the buck stopped within one of the world's richest, most prominent and influential sources of news. He didn't make his astonishing disclosures in real time, unfortunately, but only long after the poisoned fruits of compromised brand-name reporting/editing had gone out into the market and been thoroughly consumed and had their effect. In other words, once the damage had already been well and truly done.

Does anyone doubt this happens today?

Beyond that: when you replace the word "lives" with "economic well-being" or "professional competitiveness" in Eason Jordan's last sentence, we feel pretty confident it describes what goes on at every level of the news industry today.