Turkey is the ideal candidate to rise up as a leader of the Islamic world and the country’s President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan is working to seize this role and pursue expansionist policies inspired by the Ottoman Empire, analyst Arindam Mukherjee wrote in Indian news site the First Post.
The Turkish leader is capitalizing on his country’s regional influences in North Africa, the Middle East, Caucasus, as well as parts of Eastern Europe, Mukherjee wrote, and has become increasingly aggressive in northern Iraq, Syria, Libya, or Greece and Cyprus.
During his almost two-decades in power, Erdoğan has been accused of pursuing a foreign policy of “neo-Ottomanism,” the pursuit of a Turkish presence and role in the territories that were formerly part of the Ottoman Empire, as evidenced through his use of diplomatic and military activism in the Middle East and beyond.
He is also accused of galvanising anti-Western sentiment in the country. Russia and China have more sympathy from Turks than the United States and the EU, according to a poll conducted by Metropoll in January.
“Erdogan has been targeting the Turkish Shi’ite, Christians, Kurdish population, and even journalists or dissenting voices, while at the same time developing Sunni hardliners to buttress a Turkish identity that resonates with the Ottoman era,” the analyst said.
Moreover, the Turkish leader has “established ties with Muslim Brotherhood; he has been found accommodating the Syrian rebels or the ISIL terrorists” while also making public his preference for Hamas, he added.
Erdoğan, who had forged close ties with ousted Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi, frequently condemned Abdel Fattah Sisi as a dictator and Turkey became a safe haven for Egyptian exiles of the Muslim Brotherhood opposed to the government in Cairo after 2013.
Turkey also maintains a close relationship with Hamas, the Islamist militant group governing the blockaded Palestinian territory of Gaza. The group which is designated as a terrorist organisation by Israel, the United States and several European countries, maintains an Istanbul office. Turkey has also provided funds and/or citizenship to top Hamas officials, prompting Israeli rebukes.
Erdoğan has been on an “overdrive trying to grab the natural gas resources around Turkey,” according to Mukherjee, and is expected to initiate Black Sea drilling for gas in 2023.
Erdoğan’s Turkey also “acts as a tap in the European immigration crisis among others, controlling the flow of Muslim refugees into the EU. Western Europe already has a steady population of second and third generation Muslim North African and Turkish settlers, and Erdogan is pushing for Islamic political parties in different European nations,” the analyst said.
Ahval