Today’s Zaman, Turkey
Feb 15 2009
The racist inferno
by ANDREW FINKEL
In 1660, six years before the Great Fire of London, there was an even
greater conflagration in Ä°stanbul which destroyed two-thirds of the
city and which, according to historians, claimed 40,000 lives. Blame
for the inferno was attributed to the Jewish community. The Jewish
quarter around the port of Eminönü was appropriated in order to
construct the Yeni (New) Mosque. That the removal of the Jewish
merchants of the area was viewed as a righteous act is attested to by
the Quranic inscription along a tile panel in that mosque’s royal
pavilion which refers to the Prophet Muhammad’s expulsion of a Jewish
tribe from Medina and the confiscation of their land. The mosque’s
foundation deeds similarly (and here I am relying on learned articles)
labor the point by referring to "the Jews who are the enemies of
Islam."
This is a historical snapshot at odds with contemporary Turkey’s
official view of itself as an intrinsically tolerant society. This
more benevolent view has as its own historical centerpiece the
decision of Beyazid II to welcome the Sephardic community fleeing the
Spanish Inquisition. The Ottoman principle of official toleration —
allowing space for different confessional communities — was not the
same as social tolerance, nor should anyone in the least bit familiar
with the variations of history expect the rosier picture to be the
correct one. Turkey rightly prides itself for the instances of
providing succor for Jews fleeing Nazi wrath. On the other hand, I had
coffee just the other day with someone who still bears the emotional
scars of seeing his father financially ruined and packed off to a
labor camp after being unable to pay the 1942 wealth tax which was
imposed unfairly on minority communities.
There is a film going the rounds which takes place against the
background of the urban riots of 1955 prompted by government
provocateurs who blew up Atatürk’s house in Thessalonica. The looters
spouted nationalist slogans and directed their anger at Greeks.
However, the pogrom (as the event is sometimes referred to) soon
included other non-Muslim populations. Not surprisingly this event
accelerated the departure from Turkey of the minority community, and
today the number of indigenous non-Muslims in "multi-cultural"
Ä°stanbul could just about fill a football stadium. I still recall the
chilling interview with a son of one of the suicide bombers who blew
himself up in front of an Ä°stanbul synagogue in 2003. He felt sorry
for the Muslims whom his father had killed but not the Jews. The
family didn’t like Jews much, he said (though probably had never met
one). "In fact we don’t like them at all." In any case, he told the
interviewer, "the Holy Quran says not to [make] friends with Jews." To
be fair, he didn’t like the British, either — the other target of the
suicide bombers.
I write this not to scratch at old wounds but to question the
complacency of those who say that anti-Semitism and other racism has
never and could never exist in Turkey. There is an equally naïve view
that racism is purely the result of the deliberate manipulation of
Ergenekon-style plotters (although in 1955, those plotters were
certainly at work). The argument runs that tolerance is the default
mode of the Turkish people and that any suggestion that racism or
violence is nurtured by the religion is an ignorant reading of
Islam. My own argument is that racism can take root in any society and
that it is not simply the result of bleak stupidity but the
complacency by those who should know better.
There is little question in my mind that when the prime minister
criticizes Israel, his remarks are not directed against Jews and that
it is a poor defense to accuse him of being anti-Semitic. At the same
time it is ostrich-like to think that at least some of the enthusiasm
which greeted his remarks is not based on racism. I think back on the
hundred-thousand-strong funeral cortege that assembled after the
murder of Hrant Dink, as near to a demonstration against the latent
racism in society that Turkey has seen. Yet one has only to look at
the education curriculum or at any number of mass-circulating
newspapers to see that those who shout the equivalent of "Armenian is
beautiful" are bucking their own socialization. To fight racism, it is
not enough to prosecute those who would manipulate public opinion.
There has to be a counter effort to prompt public awareness, to
reconsider hardened prejudice and ensure that the evil seed falls on
infertile soil.