ISOLATION WON’T HEAL TURKEY’S WOUNDS
Leon Krauze, a Mexican blogger and a founder of letraslibres.com

Washington Post
Oct 15 2007

The U.S Congress has made a big mistake. On paper, the resolution
to denounce as genocide the killing of 1.5 million Armenians
in early-twentieth century Turkey sounds like a no-brainer. As Jon
Stewart said yesterday, in that inane, unfortunate politically correct
mode he sometimes embraces: "A resolution condemning genocide? Uh,
I think you gotta go ‘yes’ with that one!"

If only world politics were always about the punch line. Truth is, this
diplomatic confrontation between the United States and Turkey comes
at a very inopportune time. With Turkey on the brink of conflict with
the Kurds and American access to Turkish military bases in question,
Congress couldn’t have chosen a worse time for yesterday’s diplomatic
"gesture". Of course, the Armenian genocide – like the conflict with
the Cypriots – has always been a thorny issue for Turkey’s relationship
with the West. It is also true that, if it weren’t for Turkish
inflexibility, the country could be on its way to European membership.

But that doesn’t mean that the best way to deal with Turkey is to
isolate it. Quite the contrary: the country’s deep historical wounds
can only be healed by engagement. And so much is riding on the West’s
ability to fully engage Turkey! It’s increasingly clear that the
enormous challenge the world faces with militant Islam can only be
solved within Islam itself. The example of a modern, democratic, Muslim
country would be a great way to start -probably the only way to start –
such an Enlightenment period. By confronting Turkey at this difficult
time, the U.S. Congress has done a disservice to the entire world.