Many, who, like myself, defended for years that Kurds were oppressed, voted for their party so that they can have representation in Parliament, brought up on the agenda – no matter what – the tyranny of the state in the 1990s through various channels during the opening and reconciliation processes, are today, greatly disappointed.
As if to mock the steadfastness of the families and friends of soldiers and police, who, at the prime of their life, including children and civilians, were treacherously slaughtered in an ambush while they were with family, in civilian life: The political leader of the Kurdish movement in this country has the nerve to say that Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) deputies who fail to attend the funerals of PKK terrorists will be prosecuted. Right before the elections... And by saying, “Peace, no matter what.”
Nobody questions the close affair with aggressiveness and violence of those who recruit children as young as 13 to 15 to train them to use weapons, yet they are able to shout “peace, no matter what” on behalf of the oppressed. While they expect us to believe the martyrs – whether Kurd or Turk – were killed “fighting for the palace,” they have the nerve to ask for votes for the oppressed people they call “us.” Whether they are aware or unaware of the great emotional disengagement this dangerous discourse causes!
When those who say “you are the murderer,” as though the ruling party raised suicide bomber teams and blasted itself at the heart of its own state, continue their peace demonstrations no matter what, saying “justice, no matter what,” becomes meaningless and so general amid the scores of polarized individuals. It is not easy to call to think, to intend or put effort to understand, those whose minds and hearts are taken hostage with hatred toward President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.
The players within and without the country, which has been struggling especially in the last three years for the polarization of Turkey, managed to eliminate the concern for fairness through the polarization trend. Hence this caused confusion. By advocating actions that contain no interpretation, observation, effort to understand, knowledge, investigation, questioning, analysis, et cetera, we are becoming polarized against one another by the hour.
Here's a fresh example. A public opinion researcher, whose job is to take the people's pulse, said on live television that up to 5 percent of Turkey's population sympathizes with the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham's (ISIS) actions (and it is highly likely that this is true), and that this in terms of the population, equates to some 3 million people. Fine. However, you only understand what he means when you look at his concerned face: He believes there are some 3 million potential murderers or suicide bombers in the country and this is what he was implying.
In the face of this approach, which is no different to implying that each one of the few million people who have sympathy for the Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP), the political wing of the terrorist organization called PKK, are potential terrorists, surely those supporting this party would have gone on a rampage. With the presupposition that a socialist, secular terrorist is not as dangerous as an Islamist terrorist, I have to say, “justice, no matter what,” against this approach which can't restrain the subconscious. We saw this once more and very clearly in the bloodiest attack of the Republic's history, which took place before the peace meeting in Ankara, the heart of Turkey. Social division actually hurts us in our own conscience, pushes us away from ourselves and drowns us first in our own blood.
Everything to negate efforts for a 'ready atmosphere'
Without even touching on the decision they made for a civil war ahead of the Suruç massacre, those who deny that this latest dirty battle started with the PKK's attacks... Those who are trying to convince us that this war is the result of the ambition of a president, who they call a dictator, but was elected by 52 percent of the people... Whoever they are... Whether political figures or voters: They all see these bloody attacks as attacks by the state, targeting pacifists at Ankara train station, very much like the one in Diyarbakır, in Suruç, before the elections.
That is when people like myself, who have been living in this country for half a century, need to say one more time, stop, don't do it. We saw it happen in the 1970s as well. Amid the violence and anarchy in streets every day, for the leftists the sole murdering fascists were the rightists. And for the rightists, it was the leftists. Kenan Evren, who was personally responsible for the coup had later confessed: The atmosphere had to be ready to carry out a coup, that's what we waited for.
The so-called Alevi-Sunni conflict in Çorum was erupting. In times requiring chaos, of course this was also one of the many operations that would always end with the oppression of Alevis. In order to wind up the Sunni majority, just like those who in the current day make countless false news against the government and never even once apologize, back then, those who were planting the seeds of disunion and hate through twisting news, hearsays and slander, were on the job to prepare the atmosphere.
The journalists we lost in unsolved murders were also being killed, et cetera. The atmosphere was turned into a fault line from all corners. Everybody was declaring its own “other” as murderer. This scenario has been written and played out numerous times in this country. We fell into a similar trap during the latest Ergenekon period: For decades, we were afflicted with violence within a very heavy, very strict tutelage system. That is why we were very late to realize that by believing “whatever the soldier does is bad,” we played into the hands of those who wanted to pave the path for their own men by sending to the judiciary even the innocent. We shouldn't be so quick to facilitate those who serve polarization.
Surely the government and state need to self-criticize in many aspects in order to push this plot to fail this time round. It needed to conduct a serious investigation into those who turned the country into a battleground for Kobani and wrongfully killed tens of people on Oct. 6-8. The police officers who brutally dragged a body in recent days, should have been discharged a lot quicker. At this time when suicide bombers are being captured one after the other, tighter measures had to be taken at the Ankara train station, too.
In brief, whether as the people or politicians, we all need to discover the “politics of unity” and work to speak the language of the heart that bring us together, for the benefit of all living in Turkey.
