Turkey

Turkey’s popular prime minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, backed by a majority of voters, has turned Turkey into the Mideast’s role model for successful democracy, and unleashed the latent economic power of this nation of 75 million.

Turkey’s capable foreign minister, Ahmet Davutoglu, engineered a “zero problems” policy that vastly improved Turkey’s relations with all its formerly hostile neighbors, excepting Armenia and Greek-Cyprus. Turkey’s foreign policy now reflects Turkish rather than US and Israeli interests.

“Zero problems’ opened the Mideast’s doors to Turkish business, restoring Turkey to the former dominant regional leadership it held before World War I.

Turkey’s popular support for the Palestinians led to a bitter clash with Israel. As a result, Turkey has become the target of fierce attacks by the US Congress and media for no longer favoring Israeli interests. The Wall Street Journal, the North American mouthpiece of Israel’s hard right, has led the attacks against Turkey.

Claims by the right that Erdogn is turning Turkey into an Islamic dictatorship are false. The stable, democratic, productive Turkey he is building is a boon for all concerned. Istanbul used to be the Paris of the Muslim world. It’s returning to that role again.