Etiket arşivi: Arab Spring

Turkey’s Middle East Policy Coming Full Circle

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December 6, 2021

The so-called “Friends of Syria Group”, now history, held its first meeting in Tunis on February 24, 2012.  On April 1, 2012, it met for the second time in Istanbul.

Later that month in 2012, Turkey’s Foreign Minister delivered a major foreign policy speech in the parliament. Emphasizing the genuine desire for change underlying the Arab spring, he declared that attempts to explain the current developments with plans imposed from abroad and external conspiracies were primarily an insult to the honorable peoples of the region.

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The Arab Spring Nine Years On

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December 2, 2019

The Arab Spring began on December 17, 2010 in Tunisia as street vendor Mohammed Bouazizi set himself on fire to protest the arbitrary seizing of his vegetable stand by police. Mass protests forced President Zine El Abidine Ben Ali to resign in January 2011, after 23 years in power and go into exile in Saudi Arabia.

In February 2011, mass protests forced Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak to resign after three decades in power. Okumaya devam et →

“Putting Arab Soldiers on the Ground”

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Co-authored with Yusuf Buluç (*)

May 7, 2018

At his joint press conference with his French counterpart President Trump said:

“And if I might add, the states and, as I alluded to — and countries that are in the area, some of which are immensely wealthy, would not be there except for the United States and, to a lesser extent, France.  But they wouldn’t be there except for the United States.  They wouldn’t last a week.  We’re protecting them… 

“… And they will pay for it.  They will pay for it.  We’ve spoken to them.  They will pay for it.  The United States will not continue to pay.  And they will also put soldiers on the ground, which they’re not doing…” (emphasis added) Okumaya devam et →

Orlando: A Collage of Views on the Background

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June 20, 2016

Phrases like “radical Islam”, “jihadist terror”, “Islamic extremism” and “Islamophobia” have been with us for quite some time. The Orlando massacre must have galvanized the behind closed doors debate on them. And, while some use them openly and with fury, others find it wiser to avoid doing this.

Mr. Trump, suggesting that all Muslim immigrants posed potential threats to America’s security, has renewed his call for a ban on Muslim migration into the United States and extend it to cover all nations with a history of terrorism. Mrs. Clinton said that a ban on Muslims would not have stopped the attack and neither would a wall. She also said that she’s not afraid to say “radical” Islam as she countered attacks from Mr. Trump that she’s too politically correct to use the phrase.

Although we are less than five months away from the November 8, 2016 US presidential election, I prefer to focus on what President Obama has said following the Orlando massacre. Here are excerpts from his statements: Okumaya devam et →

The Obama Legacy: A View from the Middle East

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May 2, 2016

It was a few months before the 2008 US Presidential election. I was talking to my American colleague at UNESCO. I said to her that since American presidents’ decisions have global implications, democratic countries should also have the opportunity vote in those elections within a reasonable quota to be shared among them. She responded, “an interesting idea…”. We both laughed. It was a joke but the premise was not entirely without logic.

Now that we are only months away from the end of President Obama’s second term in office, pundits have started to express opinions regarding his legacy. I feel that without voices from the Middle East the portrayal President Obama’s legacy would be incomplete. Okumaya devam et →

From Arab Spring to Europe’s Autumn of Refugees

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September 3, 2015

The West has misread and mismanaged the Arab Spring. The first glaring mistake was the Sarkozy-led Libya intervention (*). PM Cameron readily became his partner and President Obama felt that he had to join in.

In introducing Resolution 1973 (2011) on Libya Alain Juppé, then Minister for Foreign Affairs of France, said the world was experiencing “a wave of great revolutions that would change the course of history”, as people throughout North Africa and the Middle East were calling for “a breath of fresh air”, for freedom of expression and democracy. Such calls for democratic transition had echoed through Tunisia, Egypt and Morocco. Everyone had witnessed the events with great hope and he believed “this new Arab springtime is good news for all”. The changes required the international community not to “give lessons”, but to help the people of those countries build a new future. He said that the urgent need to protect the civilian population had led to the elaboration of the current resolution, which authorized the Arab League and those Member States wishing to do so to take all measures to protect areas that were being threatened by the Gaddafi regime. “We have very little time left — perhaps only a matter of hours,” he said, adding that each hour and day that passed “increased the weight” on the “international community’s shoulders.

Bosnia and Herzegovina, Colombia, France, Gabon, Lebanon, Nigeria, Portugal, South Africa, United Kingdom and United States voted for the resolution. Brazil, China, Germany, India and Russia abstained. So much for the “international community” myth… Okumaya devam et →