"We are going through critical days in terms of the history of the region and Turkey." This sentence actually expresses a situation repeated on several important occasions in the same way in the past decade.
In particular, similar statements were made following the overthrow of the Ben Ali administration, after a street vendor in Tunisia set himself on fire and after Hosni Mubarak's loss of power in Egypt. The massive mobilization of the Arab world, the political conjuncture that emerged after the demand for democracy and good governance led to critical but hopeful days for the Middle East geography in the shadow of dictatorial regimes.
However, before long, in the countries where mass mobilization had taken place, the old regimes or their extensions strangled democratic revolutions one by one and displayed the will to return to the status quo--- which led the process to another critical point. Hence, from the perspectives of peoples living in Arab countries, the wall of fear was broken in the process embodied in the examples of the overthrow of Ben Ali and Hosni Mubarak. Therefore, the political actors pledging a return to the status quo would have needed to commit more intense violence to curtail the social masses.
Besides, the establishment of the old regimes on the newly formed political and social structure and their demand for support from outside the region to return to the status quo, has led us from critical but hopeful days to the days when hope is considered as something extremely optimistic.
The waves of mass mobilization taking place especially around Turkey affected border security, economic policies and the political engagements of Turkey. Let’s briefly remember. In Iran, with whom we share a long border line, from 2009 onwards, major mass demonstrations against the regime occur almost every two years.
After the vacuum created by the withdrawal of U.S troops in Iraq, we experienced a process in which Daesh expanded the scope of its influence and where allied forces, under the leadership of the U.S., got involved to limit the effects of this influence. Meanwhile, the Regional Government in Northern Iraq declared its independence by carrying out an illegitimate referendum. This has also led to the weakening the central government, which already had difficulties controlling its country.
In Syria, where pro-democracy protests as part of the Arab Spring turned into a civil war, the regions out of the control of the Syrian regime, particularly the ones along the Syrian-Turkish border, passed into the control of terrorist organizations.
In the course of these developments around the southern and southeastern regions of Turkey, we have to bear in mind the Georgia-Russia war, Russia intervening in Crimea, the collapsed Greek economy creating an area of collapse in the northwestern part of Turkey and the discussions about the transformation of the EU from a supranational organization into a loose international organization intensifying parallel to the increasing political influence of far-right parties.
Furthermore, when we add the tragedy of Obama, who came to power with great hopes and who was expected to fortify the regional and global leadership position of the U.S. with euphonious strategies, ending in utter disappointment and fiasco and also the mismanagement of his successor Trump, we can easily claim that a hopeless situation has emerged.
In such a gloomy international environment, we can say that the moves made by Turkey, particularly in Syria in Iraq, have reinvigorated hopes at least for the future of our country.
Furthermore, with its determined and strong stance, Turkey has created hope not for only the Turkish people but also for the peoples of the region. Today you can easily see the expectation and hope around the leadership of Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and the role of Turkey among the peoples of the region ranging from Kuwait to Morocco.
We can read the excitement created by Operation Olive Branch in the countries of the region in this regard. It can be easily observed that the propaganda of terrorist organizations based on fabricated news in the western world has no significance to the peoples of the region. This is because both the people in the region recognize the real face of the PKK terrorist organization and its extensions; they know that it is the most brutal crime mechanism in history, and also the reception Erdogan's leadership has gained gives him the ability to say the final word.
Therefore, things are going badly for the outsiders and those who count on them.
They will be looking for a place to hide the day when the external support ends, but that day it will be too late.
