Written on 11 February 2016.

   When Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, an Arab warlord, declared himself Caliph of all Muslims on 1 July 2014, the world laughed. Osama bin Laden had already been bold and presumptuous but his disciple al-Baghdadi outclassed him.

   The world laughed: not only the billions of infidels but also many apostates, heretics, Shiites and plain Sunni Muslims who dislike the political Islam.

   However, the Salafists, Wahhabites, the Muslim Brothers and their ilk did not laugh. They took the matter seriously. Many felt that establishing a caliphate was a timely and necessary step, and that Sheikh al-Baghdadi was an appropriate candidate for the position because of his descendency from the Qureishi, the tribe of the Prophet Muhammad.

   According to tradition, the Caliph is seen as the spiritual leader of all Sunni Muslims, and also the chief of a state called caliphate. A state can exist without a caliph but no caliph can exist without a state. That is why the area in Syria and Iraq occupied by Daesh was called “Islamic State” and was given many attributes of a state, except for a diplomatic service, an airline and a seat at the United Nations.

   Why were so many puritan Muslims jubilant, when the Caliphate was announced?  Because it offered the possibility of pledging allegiance (baya’a) to the Caliph. According to religious tradition, any Muslim will die ignorant (jahil) and in disbelief if he has failed to pledge allegiance to the Caliph. Which means billions of Sunni Muslims will have died ignorant since the last caliphate was abolished by Atatürk in 1924, as Graeme Wood pointed out.

   It's the religious aspect which prompted all sorts of terror chiefs and Islamist warlords in distant countries to declare allegiance to the new Caliph. A pledge not to be taken too literally but understood as strengthening their religious credentials.

   Apart from the statehood it requires and the salvation it ensures, a caliphate also offers many practical advantages. Working to establish or strengthen a caliphate equals jihad and allows to circumvent and disobey many rules of Sunni Islam. Muruna means 'flexibility' and allows Muslims striving to advance Islam to deviate from their Islamic laws without suffering a bad conscience.

   Muruna and Tawriya, meaning 'pretending', are exceptions permitting the Caliph and his followers in their act of creating the Daesh-Caliphate to break the religious rules as they deem appropriate without risking their spiritual salvation and without incurring criticism by other Muslims.

   The enormous advantages inherent in declaring a caliphate have been recognized not only in Raqqa but also elsewhere, for instance in Ankara.

   Since his early days as mayor of Istanbul, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan was surrounded by a closely knit group of admirers and supporters. Among them were what could be called “religious facilitators” who paved Erdoğan's ascent with suitable fatwas. Turkey is by the priests seen as a non-Islamic country (Atatürk's legacy!) and the Islamists understand themselves as conducting Jihad, thereby permitting themselves to practice Muruna.

   By interpreting Erdoğan's career as leading up to a new caliphate – the allegedly ideal form of governance for Turkey – they exonerated him from religious rules binding common mortals.

“President Erdoğan belongs intellectually to the Muslim Brotherhood. Consequently, he believes that, if the situation changed in Syria, Egypt, and Iraq, it means the creation of a new sultanate; not an Ottoman sultanate this time, but a sultanate for the Brotherhood extending from the Atlantic to the Mediterranean and ruled by Erdoğan.”

   Replace the word “sultanate” with “caliphate” and you get a pretty good picture of what Erdoğan's inner circle is up to, as many observers suspect:

   “ Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, (is) among the world’s most significant and influential Muslim leaders and a longtime member of the hard-line Muslim Brotherhood.”

   “What this [presidential system] looks like is the Islamic caliphate system in terms of its mechanism. In this system the people choose the leader,  the Prince, and then all will pledge the Bay’ah [allegiance].”

   The leading scholar supporting Erdoğan, Hayrettin Karaman, is for Turkey as important as Yusuf al-Qaradawi in the Arab world. Karaman replaced Fethullah Gülen as Erdoğan's main religious supporter. He provides the fatwas needed to justify practices such as the custom that winners of public tenders donate large sums to the charities of politicians.

   With his pious electorate safely supporting him despite scandals, there is small wonder that Erdoğan has already been “elected” Caliph of all Sunni Muslims:

   “As he wrote for Yeni Safak, the pro-Erdoğan main newspaper ….regarding the new presidential system which Erdoğan wants to establish, Karaman desperately defended Erdoğan and declared what we were saying all along they will do; that Erdoğan will soon become the Caliph for all Muslims” ( Dec 29, 2015)

   A Belgian voice comments: “Les ambitions d’Erdoğan, en forme de rêves ou de cauchemar concernent la restauration de l’empire ottoman, le rôle d’inspirateur et de quasi-Calife du monde musulman. Pour certains, il est un Prophète, sinon un Dieu ; pour d’autres, il n’est rien de moins que l’Antéchrist. Un personnage d’époque, dans aucun doute.”

   Remains the interesting question: how do the two caliphates co-habitate in the Sunni world? From Raqqa's perspective Erdoğan should pledge allegiance to al-Baghdadi, from Ankara's vantage point, al-Baghdadi and his state should be grateful for years of support they received from Turkey, should refrain from sending suicide teams, and enter the planned Erdoğan galaxy of Muslim Brotherhood-governed states, the latest of which is Libya where the Turks with great effort prop up the Tripolis Brotherhood government.

   Interestingly, here in Libya the two caliphates are clashing: Ankara is supporting Tripolis, Raqqa is busy strengthening its new Daesh statelet in Sirte; aleady now Tripolis troops are fighting the IS militia. It's an open ended battle. 

Ihsan al-Tawil

Update

Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu has criticized a bill recently approved by the US House of Representatives Judiciary Committee that calls on the Department of State to designate the Muslim Brotherhood a terrorist organization. Speaking at the parliamentary Foreign Affairs Commission on Feb. 26, Çavuşoğlu said, "Parliaments cannot decide on whether the Muslim Brotherhood is a terrorist organization or not." "We don't see the Muslim Brotherhood as a terrorist organization. And we have previously shared our views with others, including Americans," he added.

The House Judiciary Committee approved H.R. 3892, or the Muslim Brotherhood Terrorist Designation Act of 2015, with a vote of 17-10 on Feb. 24. The bill cites national security as the reason the designation is needed. (Today's Zaman)

Update II

Call for caliphate made from municipal vehicle in İstanbul

Written on 06 February 2016.

   When German Chancellor Angela Merkel announced last August that her government would allow unregistered refugees to come to Germany, she set off the biggest migrant wave since the Second World War.

   Despite the negative effects this huge influx of people has had on the German economy and society, such as the mass sexual molestation and rape of hundreds of women last New Year’s Eve in Cologne, increased crime and concerns for personal safety among native Germans, supporters of Merkel’s action believe it was nevertheless justified by the humanitarian emergency and the need to save lives.

   But in an exclusive and revealing interview with the German newspaper Die Welt, an internationally recognised migration and Third World expert, Paul Collier, author of the book Exodus: How Migration Is Changing Our World, convincingly debunks this myth. Collier, a former director of the World Bank who currently holds an economics professorship at Oxford University, believes Merkel’s open-doors decision “…did not save a single Syrian from death.”

   “Despite best intentions, Germany has, instead, dead people on its conscience,” Collier told Die Welt. “Many people understood Merkel’s words as an invitation and only after that did they actually set out on the dangerous journey, sacrifice their savings and entrust their lives to dubious smugglers.”

   Meant as a humanitarian gesture, Collier maintains Merkel’s announcement had the opposite effect in regard to migrants’ safety and well-being. The refugees, he said, were already in safe, third states, such as Turkey, Jordan and Lebanon, and did not come to Germany directly from “war and crisis countries.” But it was this “invitation” that caused them to leave these relatively safe havens, where most lived in tolerable conditions, and risk their lives on the arduous trip to Germany.

   "With her communication,” Collier said, “she (Merkel) made migrants out of refugees.”

   And for some, the journey was deadly. Three-year-old Alan Kurdi was the most famous child/refugee death that occurred after Merkel’s “invitation.” Along with his mother and a sibling, he drowned trying the smuggler’s route of reaching Europe, travelling by boat with his family from the Turkish coast to a nearby Greek island. A picture of him lying dead on a Turkish beach where his little body washed up flashed around the world, generating deep concern and much sympathy for the migrants. One report stated his father had paid smugglers more than $5,000.

   While there is no exact figure regarding how many unfortunates have lost their lives on the trek to and through Europe, drowning deaths have increased in recent months. It is believed more than 250 people perished last month alone trying to reach a Greek island. And many of those who drowned were also children like Kurdi. They obviously would be the least able to fend for themselves in an emergency.

   And even if the migrants reach the Promised Land, the “affluence heaven” of Germany, their suffering often does not end there. In fact, for some, this may constitute the worst part of their ordeal. In the refugee asylums the Germans hastily erected, life can be very dangerous. As is now well known, violence between young men of different ethnic groups is rampant, and the police’s ability to control it is minimal. But even worse, it is the women and children in these cramped accommodations who are most often victims of sexual assault.

   In his Die Welt interview, Collier expressed a special interest in potential African migrants, especially the 100 million people living south of the equator. He cites a former World Bank economist, Serge Mikhailov, who holds that this region is “the next Afghanistan.” And it is this mass of humanity that could pose Europe’s next huge migrant crisis. 

   “The chaos in Africa is definitely increasing,” he said. “… above all, the situation in Mali and Niger is already very unstable. And then the German chancellor comes along and announces that Europe’s doors are open. Simply consider for a moment how that catches on with these people.”

   When one speaks of Syrian refugees, Collier says this concerns 14 million. But hundreds of millions more living in poor countries “are setting out for the rich, western world." 

   “A colossal mass, which, when it is once set in motion, is scarcely still controllable,” he said.     

   To avoid such a frightening prospect and human tragedy, Collier states that “a radical swing” in communication has to be made.

   “Europe must clearly state that economic migrants should not even bother to set out on the journey at all,” he said.

   And while Collier believes it is essential for Europe to help genuine refugees, those who fled their countries for reasons of “sheer survival,” this should be done in the secure, neighbouring countries of the conflict regions. These neighbouring nations are the ones legally obligated under international treaties for accepting them. They are also much easier and much safer to reach than Europe for those fleeing war. Besides, even genuine refugees have “no claim to a place” in Europe. And Collier can’t understand why this claim is even being discussed, calling it a “false debate.”

   “Under international law, the European Union is not responsible for the acceptance of refugees,” he said. “It is however responsible for securing its own borders, either together or, when that is not possible, then just every state on its own.”

   European aid to genuine refugees, Collier says, should take the form of helping the safe, third countries bear the costs of hosting the refugees. This is the policy Saudi Arabia and the Gulf States follow. The United Arab Emirates, for example, financially supports a camp in Jordan that houses thousands of refugees.

   Collier would also like to see the European Union help create jobs for the refugees in these third countries. It is this lack of “prospects,” he says, that cause many to set out on the dangerous trip to Europe to seek their fortune there. Collier agrees with German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schauble’s proposal for a Marshall Plan for refugees in the countries bordering the Syrian conflict.

   The recent, mass influx of migrants will, in the end, benefit neither Syria nor Germany, Collier believes. Regarding Syria, educated and qualified Syrian migrants will want to set down roots in Germany. But these are exactly the people Syria will need to rebuild once the fighting stops.

   As for Germany, the arrival of such large numbers of migrants will make integration “difficult.” And the more that arrive, the more challenging the integration task will become.

   “For then the necessity to really open oneself language-wise and culturally to the host country sinks,” he said. “In future, difficult to control parallel societies will come into being.”

   Collier says he cannot understand “even until today” why Merkel took the action that she did last August. Until last year, refugees were “no great theme” for Europeans. The Oxford professor blames the German chancellor for the refugee crisis, telling Die Welt: “Who else?”

   “With that, she has definitely burdened Germany and Europe with a colossal problem, which no longer can be so simply solved.”

Stephen Brown -- Frontpage Mag

Written on 08 February 2016.

    As government forces are moving in on Aleppo, thousands of Aleppines are fleeing toward the Turkish border. Officially they are fleeing because of intense Russian bombardments and street fighting. For many this could ideed be true. But others are terrified by a threat worse than bombs: Assad's vengeance.

   All Aleppines who collaborated with the insurgents during the period they controlled most of the city are likely to be persecuted, once the government has re-established control over the city, that's for sure. Which means all citizens suspected of being members or sympathizers of the Muslim Brotherhood or being Salafists have reason to fear for their lives.

   Assad has shown his determination to crush all Sunni Islamist movements spawned by the Brotherhood by killing or expelling members, their families and supporters. Which means trying to get rid of many of the Sunni Muslims who constitute the majority population, a strategy close to genocide, which a recent UN report called a "state policy of extermination of the civilian population." 

   It is true that Assad is conducting a war against his own population. His father already demonstrated the intention to eliminate all Islamism (political Islam) in Syria, tolerating only those Sunni citizen who refrain from practicing Islamism. In fact, many Sunnis actively support the Assad regime.

   Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan recently closed the borders with Syria and Iraq. Both Iraqis and Syrians have to apply for visa before presenting themselves at the border or at the airport.

   Since the start of the Syrian civil war, Turkey maintained an open border policy, accepting an estimated 3 million Syrians as official and unregistered refugees. There were several reasons why Turkey accepted these people. The border was originally porous and still is, to some extent. Many of the first arriving Syrians were rich: they bought real estate and drove up prices in the border region.

   Later arrivals showed that the Assad regime proved surprisingly resilient: the refugees were a pawn in Erdoğan's hands who not only wanted to topple Assad but ensure that the new Syria would be ruled over by Sunni Islamists of the Brotherhood stamp.

   When despite Turkey's full barrel support the Islamists failed to achieve victory, the millions of refugees – with another half million of Iraqis, Afghans and Iranians added – proved increasingly burdensome for Turkey. The mass migration across the Agaeian Sea to Greece was a mixed blessing: the affluent and with an average of 40 percent literacy best educated Syrians left – mostly young men. The largely uneducated (93 percent illiteracy) rest, consisting mainly of women, children and old people, remained in Turkey and posed a heavy burden on the society and the local governments.

   Now that Assad's part of Syria has become a fearsome Russian protectorate and colony, Turkey's position is desperate. Hundreds of thousands more Syrians could stream to the Turkish border if Aleppo falls to the government forces. The much talked-about possibility of a Turkish military intervention in Syria would be dicy. The Russians and their allies would probably make mincemeat out of the Turkish military which has shown its ineptitude in many years of a futile campaign against the small and outgunned Kurdish insurgents.

   Furthermore, the heavy influx of refugees has, in recent years, changed the demographic balance in Turkey's border provinces, especially in Hatay. Since World War I, Syria had in vain claimed these provinces, It is quite possible that the population majority in Hatay is now (again) Syrian which means Assad could claim the province if Turkey is defeated by a Russian-led coalition.

   Recognizing the danger of the shifting demography for Turkey's territorial integrity was probably the main factor forcing Erdogan to stop admitting Syrians. As a stopgap operation he revived the plan of creating a “safe zone” on the Syrian side of the border to accommodate the new refugees (and keep the Russians at bay). Also, the zone could in Turkish view serve its original purpose of preventing the Kurdish YPG forces from creating a land bridge between their largest “cantons”.

   However, Mr Assad does not like the project of a safe zone which he understands as an effort of the Turks of creating a colony along the border dominated by their ethnic brothers, the Turkmen tribe.

   It is likely that a small strip outside the Bab-as Salaam border station will hence mushroom into one of the world's largest makeshift refugee camp,  housing most of Aleppo's residual population waiting for a peace settlement unlikely to come.

Ihsan alTawil

Update

Former Foreign Minister Yaşar Yakış has warned that Turkey may risk losing a portion of its own territory should it decide to intervene militarily in Syria amid an intensified military campaign by regime forces backed by Russia. In an interview with Today's Zaman, Yakış stated that Turkey may look to occupy the region between Azaz and Jarablus in Syria, which is known as the “Mare Line,” to protect rebels from the opposition but warned that Turkey may very well lose the Hatay province from its territory if things do not pan out the way Ankara expects.

Update II

Turkey's wrong policy in Syria, a fixation with ousting Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, risks costing Syrian Turkmens the land in which they were established even before Turks settled in Anatolia following a victory against the Byzantine Empire in 1071.Turkey pushing Turkmens into the fight to topple the Syrian government was not a good idea, as Turkmens would be seen as traitors by the government. “Theoretically, Turkmens may lose for good the land in which they settled,” Hüseyin Bağcı, a professor of international relations at Middle East Technical University (ODTÜ), told Sunday's Zaman.

Written on 02 February 2016.

La rassegnazione del Meridione

    In un suo editoriale Ernesto Galli della Loggia evidenziava l’indifferenza degli stessi meridionali rispetto alla drammatica condizione del Sud. È vero, molti meridionali hanno rinunciato ormai da tempo a pensare a come il Sud è e a come lo vorrebbero. Lo vivono ogni giorno, ma è come se non sapessero. La corruzione e il malaffare hanno prodotto i panorami terrificanti, gli ospedali malfunzionanti, la Salerno-Reggio Calabria ancora da completare, ma hanno soprattutto fatto piazza pulita di aspettative e ambizioni. Hanno impedito ai meridionali di essere orgogliosi della loro terra e di sognarne un futuro.

    Più che di indifferenza, si tratta di rassegnazione. Quella descritta da Carlo Levi con il famoso “Io pensavo a quante volte, ogni giorno, usavo sentire questa continua parola (…). Che cosa hai mangiato? Niente. Che cosa speri? Niente. Che cosa si può fare? Niente”.

    La sensazione di impotenza coinvolge anche molti intellettuali meridionali che nel denunciare le condizioni di arretratezza economica e sociale del Sud si scoprono nell’imbarazzo di non riuscire a individuare adeguate risposte. Chi vuole cambiare il Sud sa che fornirgli risorse non basta. Sa che sono del tutto inappropriati i paragoni con la Germania che nel suo Mezzogiorno (la ex Ddr) ha investito il 5 per cento del Pil. Il Sud, nel corso degli anni, ha ricevuto soldi che però non hanno innestato nessun processo di crescita (si vedano, ad esempio De Blasio e Accetturo, 2012, Ciani e De Blasio, 2015 e il volume della Banca d’Italia “Mezzogiorno e Politiche Regionali”, 2009).

    Se il Sud avesse ricevuto più risorse le cose sarebbero andate diversamente? Difficile averne la certezza, è molto probabile però che non sarebbero comunque bastate. Il Sud ha sprecato denaro sia nazionale che europeo (ad esempio, per finanziare scadenti corsi di formazione o per creare imprese che non hanno funzionato neanche un giorno). È successo anche in altre parti d’Italia certo, ma maggiore è lo stato di bisogno, minore è l’ammissibilità degli sprechi.

    C’è qualche segnale che ci lascia sperare che quanto accaduto in passato non accadrà in futuro? Bisogna ammettere che la classe dirigente del Sud, la società che la esprime e che dovrebbe controllarla, non hanno dato grandi segni di cambiamento.
E allora, nessuna politica per il Sud? Col tempo si è anche persa la speranza che lasciandolo da solo il Sud trovi il suo modo per avviarsi finalmente sulla strada dello sviluppo e del riscatto. Il federalismo fiscale doveva responsabilizzare le amministrazioni locali attraverso un più stretto controllo da parte dei cittadini e permettere una migliore selezione dei politici-amministratori. Invece, ha portato a un incremento della pressione fiscale e a poco altro.

    Non ha funzionato neanche l’approccio bottom-up che affidava a livelli decentrati di governo la funzione di individuare progetti e programmi. L’intenzione di valorizzare le competenze locali si è scontrata con la tendenza dei politici a cercare consenso e quindi a frammentare gli interventi, oltretutto molto spesso realizzati senza neanche aver definito in maniera chiara gli obiettivi da raggiungere (il più delle volte è impossibile fare una pur grossolana analisi dei costi e dei benefici delle politiche).

Priorità e strategie

    Che fare dunque? Non ci sono ricette miracolose. È possibile però cercare di evitare di ripetere gli errori commessi in passato. Con il Masterplan per il Sud, presentato dal governo, in cui si demandano le scelte operative concrete ai quindici patti per il Sud si rischia la stessa frammentazione di interventi già vista. Il Sud rappresenta una risorsa cruciale per la crescita dell’intero paese ed è a livello nazionale che devono essere individuate le priorità e le strategie che lo aiutino a utilizzare a pieno le sue risorse, compreso un impegno a combattere la criminalità che con le sue attività nell’economia legale altera le regole di mercato. Dopodiché è necessario realizzare progetti strutturati in modo tale da poter essere opportunamente valutati. Le valutazioni sono di importanza vitale perché permettono di capire cosa funziona e cosa non funziona e gettano le basi per una efficiente spesa futura (nel documento del governo non se ne parla da nessuna parte).

    Se si vuole intraprendere un’azione decisa a favore del Sud, le politiche nazionali devono tener conto delle differenze territoriali e garantire standard minimi uniformi nei servizi essenziali.

    Ad esempio, non si può sperare che bastino le ore di formazione organizzate con i fondi comunitari a compensare la peggiore qualità complessiva delle scuole nel Mezzogiorno. Bisogna pensare a come migliorare la qualità dell’istruzione nelle aree a forte disagio sociale ed economico, a come incentivare buoni docenti e buoni dirigenti a lavorare in quelle scuole. Lo stesso vale per le università. Ben vengano i sistemi di valutazione, ma non ci sarebbe nulla di scandaloso nel premiare di più chi fa bene al Sud: servirebbe solo a compensare le maggiori condizioni di disagio. Sistemi di questo tipo aiuterebbero il Sud a non continuare a impoverirsi di capitale umano.

    Il Sud continua a perdere le sue risorse migliori, i più talentuosi e quelli che sono più dissonanti al sistema. È importante, quindi, contribuire a creare le condizioni che permettano loro di restare e che anzi attraggano forze nuove (anche non meridionali) che possano infondere nuova linfa al tessuto sociale e produttivo. Lo si può fare creando meccanismi automatici che non richiedono l’intermediazione dei politici e dei dirigenti locali.

Maria De Paola -- lavoce.info