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Gulen’s New Strategy for Solving the
Kurdish Problem: Why Gülen Was Silent about...
3.11.2011
By Dr. Aland Mizell - ekurd.net
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November 3, 2011
Fethullah Gülen, in a recent decree on how to solve
the Kurdish problem published on the website
Herkul.org, thinks he knows the best solution.
Especially when it comes to how to resolve the
Kurdish problem, Gulen assumes his way is the best,
that his followers are God’s chosen people, and that
God gave them this mission. Gülen suggests that the
Turkish government should let the Kurdish language
be an elective, and then he goes on to blame the
previous regime for not letting the Kurdish language
be an elective in public and private schools in
Turkey. Although he made some excuses mostly blaming
the previous regime, Mr. Gulen failed to explain
that for thirty years he was cooperating with that
same regime and the same military. Mr. Gülen failed
to address that if he had wanted peace in Turkey, he
should have stood up for justice. Justice must serve
not only for his group but also for society as a
whole. Also, Mr. Gülen suggests that the Turkish
military is strong, but why then can it not defeat a
few PKK thugs? |
Muhammed Fethullah Gülen is a Turkish preacher,
author, educator, and Sufi Muslim scholar living in
self-imposed exile in Pennsylvania (USA). He is the
founder and leader of the Gülen movement. |
So
the questions is how can a man of peace and love ask
for violence now having turned a blind eye to the
Turkish military’s perpetuation of bloodshed for
three decades? Mr. Gulen failed to understand that
if he really wanted peace, then he should not follow
the principle of talking to a friend who praises you
all the time; instead you talk to your enemies who
do not praise you, and you show love and tolerance
to those opponents. Probably Mr. Gulen and his
followers will not like these Christian principles;
however, for me true men of love, peace, and
tolerance should follow this principle: if someone
slaps you on the right cheek, offer the other cheek
also. What Gulen is suggesting is to do the
opposite. According to him, if the PKK cannot lay
down their arms, the military should kill them, but
it would be far more effective to talk to the
renegades and to listen to what they have to say,
especially if saving lives has more value than
taking them.
Did Mr. Gulen ever criticize the military or the
Turkish government when they did not let the Kurds
speak their God-given mother tongue or learn their
native language in school? Did he explain why he was
so silence for three decades, not having said
anything about the Kurdish language in his own
schools? Did he ever condemn the regime for
depriving the Kurdish people of their rights? Mr.
Gülen said he and his followers failed to infiltrate
all aspects of life of the Kurdish people, to go
into their houses, villages, and institutions to
assimilate them. Gulen used religion as a tool again
for assimilation, but rather he should have focused
more on what Saidi Kurdi gave as the prescription a
century ago. I wrote about Said Kurdi’s prescription
for the Kurdish problem on Kurdish Media in 2008
http://www.kurdmedia.com/article.aspx?id=14465. The
Kurds have gone through innumerable hardships,
experiencing cruelty, oppression, and injustice.
Thirty thousand lives have been lost, thousands of
homes have been destroyed, and thousands of Kurdish
men and women have been kidnapped or killed with no
one knowing what happened to them. Is society
divided into two camps? Because none of us,
including Mr. Gülen himself, stood up and dared to
tell the Turkish government or the military that
this is wrong and cruel. Why? Half-truth is often a
great lie. Mr. Gülen and the AKP ruling party seized
the moment after the Yazici plane crash, and the
State ordered a full investigation to reveal what
happened to Muhsin Yazicioglu and how his plane
crashed, but they failed to order an investigation
about what happened to thousands of kidnapped
Kurdish men and women? Justice is good for all, or
it is good for none. According to the Herkul
website, the Zaman newspaper translated Mr. Gulen’s
recent statements regarding the Kurds as follows:
When making recommendations for establishing a
university called Medresetü’z Zehra in Van during
the years of constitutional monarchy, Bediüzzaman
[Said Nursi] said Arabic [as an academic language]
should be fard [mandatory], Turkish wajib
[necessary] and Kurdish jaiz [permitted], and that
all three should be taught at the same time. He
referred to Kurdish as recommendable. We have not
been able to spell this out. … Why was not the
Kurdish language allowed in the schools? It would
have developed as a language within your system. In
this huge country, the United States, Hispanics
speak their own language and Italians theirs. You
are also allowed to open your own schools where you
offer Turkish language as an elect course. Nobody
does anything about this.... (Herkul.org,
24.10.2011)
But my question for you, Mr. Gülen, is that you have
opened more than 140 schools in the USA and opened
schools all over the world offering Turkish, English
and each country’s local language, but why have you
failed to teach Kurdish in your private schools in
Turkey? I would understand if you were afraid of the
regime, but is it not true that real Muslims should
not be silent against cruelty? You say:
Today, already the government does not have a choice
but to let Kurds have their birthright. All who care
about our country and our people should remain calm
and exercise restraint against agitations and
provocations, and avoid retaliatory actions. This
problem cannot be resolved by nationalistic
reactions and slogans, ‘Martyrs are immortal, and
the homeland is indivisible.’ Those who would like
for the provocations and seeds of discord to be
prevented may peacefully express their opinions
through solid and sound reports and declarations
that could be forwarded to the authorities as
guidance for others.” (Herkul.org, 24.10.2011)
How will Mr. Gülen solve the Kurdish issue? Not by
negotiation. Still, he fails to apologize for not
letting the Kurdish language be an elective in his
schools in Turkey? Since he has so many schools in
his native country, why has he not taken Said
Kurdi’s idea of opening universities teaching in
three languages, including Kurdish, and thereby have
solved the problem? William Gladstone, a British
politician in the 1800s, said, “Justice delayed, is
justice denied.” If Mr.Gulen wants peace in Turkey,
he and his followers should work for justice first.
Instead Mr. Gülen has praised the military, and when
Leyla Zana rightly criticized the military and asked
for basic rights, saying that the military conducted
illegal war against Kurds,www.ekurd.net
Mr. Gülen condemned Zana and asked her to apologize
to the military. The question then arises, “Why did
Mr. Gulen turn a blind eye when Saddam was
committing massacres against the Kurds? Why did Mr.
Gulen turn a blind eye when the Turkish Army
illegally burned villages; harassed, kidnapped, and
killed thousands of Kurdish men and women? Mr. Gulen
and his chosen followers do not talk about the
Kurdish Ergenekon? When will the Kurdish Ergenekon
be unveiled? Why does Mr. Gulen not talk about the
Turkish Gladio’s collaboration with Iran in the
1990s under the name of Hezbollah to make Kurds kill
Kurds, at a time when this organization killed or
executed thousands of Kurdish patriots?
Mr. Gulen and his followers are trying to change the
world, but they never think of changing their
attitudes toward the suffering of the Kurds. They
should know that without justice, courage is weak
and ineffectual. Why do he and his Gulenists’ media
ignore the Kurdish Ergenekon? So many Kurdish men
and women have been kidnapped or killed, yet when
will the perpetrators face justice? Today, Mr. Gülen
knows the military no longer has power, and
therefore, he is not scared of the army anymore. In
asking why Gülen now is rising up, the inquirer must
note the obvious. He is no longer afraid of a
military poised to defend secularism. Now, he
declares that Kurds have a right to have education
in their language. Yet, today Kurds who defend their
basic rights, fight against the regime, and are
especially eager not to let Gulenists function well
in the Kurdish region like they do other places in
Turkey, are labeled “Bad Kurds or Terrorists.” By
contrast, those who praise the Gulenists and do not
say anything against him, assimilating into
Turkishness, have become “Good Kurds.” This is a
double standard. I hope Gulenists give up the double
standard and support the Kurd’s justified struggle
for freedom and a peaceful solution, not what Gulen
suggested-- assimilation. In Mr. Gulen’s regrets he
pines about his followers’ failure to assimilate the
Kurds, to infiltrate Kurdish households and cities,
and to infuse Gulen’s ideas into every aspect of
local Kurdish life.
Defending rights of any individual is a human
obligation. It is sad to say that so many at least
nominal Muslims and a self-proclaimed defender of
love and tolerance failed in that obligation. The
Kurdish situation in Turkey used to be the most
severe and oppressed in the entire region. In the
last three decades the Kurds led a very determined
struggle for freedom, and they obtained results
although with great cost. Mr. Gülen realized that
the government could not overcome its problems using
its old political methods of pressure, kidnapping,
distorted ideas, assimilation, violence, denial and
destruction. Mr.Gulen has been glamorized globally
for advocating peace tolerance, and love as well as
teaching Turkish language in his schools around the
world. Can that world not see that his actions are
not consistent with his message and force Mr. Gülen
to make some changes in his strategy to undertake
some positive steps, not because he has a love for
Kurds but because he knows God proclaims that it is
right thing to do; however, these steps are too
small and are far from resolving the problem. At the
present moment, the law still does not recognize the
most basic human rights of the Kurds, including
language and culture, and the Kurdish children
cannot learn their mother language at school. But
Mr. Gulen failed to demand that the government ask
the Kurds for an apology for causing all the
sufferings and pain. Since so many people follow him
in Turkey and since he is the government inside the
government. Mr. Gulen addresses his followers
acknowledging that they failed to assimilate the
Kurdish people, but at the same time, he wears a
blindfold when he sees Prime Minister Erdogan’s
criticism of the German immigration policy towards
the Turks, claiming that assimilation is a crime
against humanity, even though Kurds have had a “do
or die” policy to force their assimilation in
Turkey.
A Republic should stand for justice and public
order, but even today justice is delayed and thus
denied in the Republic of Turkey. However, power’s
dominance is transitory while truth, equality, and
justice’s dominance is eternal, and no one has the
power to take away God-given rights.
Dr. Aland Mizell is with the University of
Mindanao School of Social Science, President of the
MCI and a regular contributor to the Kurdish Media.
You may reach the author via email at:
aland_mizell2@hotmail.com
Copyright © 2011 ekurd.net. All
rights reserved.
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