Turkey, France and the lesson of the Islamist massacre in Nice
The massacre in Nice by a man shouting Allah Akhbar confirms that the Islamist scourge continues to represent a serious threat to national and citizen security. The comment by Gianandrea Gaiani, director of SviluppoDifesa
"The Islamic threat facing France today, with terrorism (including that considered" do-it-yourself ", the many churches burned and entire urban areas dominated by Sharia law, is the same that sooner or later all those European states that will have to face have long ago made the unfortunate choice of accepting massive Islamic immigration as ineluctable or with supine resignation. The massacre of Nice carried out this morning in the church of Notre-Dame by a man who, shouting Allah Akhbar, stabbed three people to death (decapitating a woman) wounding others before being wounded and captured by the police, confirms that the Islamist scourge continues to represent a serious threat to national and citizens' security (the mayor of the city has accused "Islam-fascism") ".
This is what Gianandrea Gaiani, director of SviluppoDifesa writes : "For these reasons, the temptation to turn away from France or Macron, expressing only the usual façade solidarity, or even to take advantage in commercial terms of the boycott of" made in France "products , not only would it be in antithesis to all the proclamations to European unity that have been proffered in all circumstances for years, but it would represent a dangerous own goal that would further galvanize those who believe Europe is ready to give up its values and principles, its civilization or too weak to defend it. Is Europe that has renounced with ease its Christian roots willing to at least defend its secularism? ”.
Here is an excerpt from Gaiani 's analysis :
For many analysts, the "Islamic question" is just a pretext in the hard verbal and commercial tug-of-war between Emmanuel Macron's France and Recep Tayyp Erdogan's Turkey.
The two states and the two presidents are rivals in all crisis scenarios: Paris supports Greece against Turkish claims on the Eastern Mediterranean and supports Armenia against the Azeris backed by Ankara in the conflict in Nagorno Karabakh while also in Libya Paris is unbalanced to side of General Khalifa Haftar defeated in the battle of Tripoli by the Turkish military intervention.
Relevant reasons but perhaps not entirely sufficient to explain a confrontation that is already involving other states and many Islamic circles in a dialectical and commercial "jihad" against Paris that exploded after the words pronounced by Macron in the commemoration speech of Professor Samuel Paty, beheaded by a Chechen terrorist for having offended Muhammad. “We will not give up cartoons, even if others retreat, because in France the lights do not go out, ours is a story of struggle against tyranny and fanaticism. We will go on, ”Macron said, denouncing“ Islamic separatism ”and affirming the need to“ structure Islam ”in France.
After recommending psychiatric treatments to Macron for his "mental problems", Erdogan upped the ante in his usual histrionic and over-the-top style by calling for a boycott of products made in France. “In France they said not to buy Turkish products, I turn to my country and ask you to absolutely avoid buying French products”, said Erdogan who has found enthusiastic support in a large part of the Islamic world.
"Muslims in Europe are subject to a lynching campaign like the Jews before the Second World War," said with contempt for the ridiculous Erdogan (who in this regard should perhaps blame the Chinese repression in Sinkiang), whose propaganda usually has a notable effect among the Turkish Islamic masses and other Muslim states. Erdogan then accused European governments of being "fascists in the true sense of the word" and "links in the chain of Nazism" for the propagation of Islamophobia: "Anti-Muslim hostility has spread like the plague, workplaces , Muslim homes and schools are attacked by fascist groups almost every day, ”he said, appealing to world leaders to stop“ the persecution of Muslims in France ”.
A very harsh reaction to the measures against jihadism and political Islam announced by Paris after the beheading of Professor Paty, "guilty" had shown in the classroom the caricatures of Mohammed published by the satirical magazine Charlie Hebdo (which in recent days has increased the dose by making fun of Erdogan ) to discuss it with students.
Measures announced by Macron against "Islamic separatism" which has now wrested from the control of the Republic many peripheral urban areas where Sharia law is applied and where the police often cannot even enter. Areas in which the culture of political Islam is spreading and affirming itself, which opposes, in the heart of France and Europe, the rule of law, freedom of expression and the secularism of the state, pillars on which not only the France but the whole of Europe and the whole West.
In addition to the Franco-Turkish confrontation in the geopolitical field, it is better not to forget that Erdogan and part of the Islamic world are irritated with Macron because he defends the freedom to publish cartoons, even those against the Prophet Mohammed and to discuss them freely in schools.
Pakistani Prime Minister, Imran Khan, pressured by the opposition and Islamic movements, accused Macron of "encouraging Islamophobia", there are protests in Gaza, Mali, Yemen, Iran, Saudi Arabia, in the United Arab Emirates (Sunni allied monarchies of Paris) and in Libya, in Bangladesh thousands of people took to the streets as in Kuwait where shops have withdrawn French food products from the shelves while in Qatar a university has canceled the week of French culture.
Even in Egypt, the archenemy of Ankara and friend of Paris, President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi said that Islam supports "freedom of belief and opinion" but "these freedoms are not absolute. If some have the freedom to express what is in their thoughts, I imagine this stops when it comes to offend the feelings of over 1.5 billion people ”.
Paris is worried about the spread of protests and adhesions to the boycott of French products, especially in circles close to the Muslim Brotherhood and other jihadist movements.
Macron with a tweet written in French, English and Arabic, sought the “rational” dialogue but reaffirms that “we will never go back. We respect all differences in a spirit of peace. We do not accept hate speech and defend reasonable debate. We will always be on the side of human dignity and universal values ”.
EU High Representative for Foreign Policy Josep Borrell called Erdogan's sentences "unacceptable". The same term was repeated by Giuseppe Conte, according to whom "personal invectives do not help the positive agenda that the EU wants to pursue with Turkey but, on the contrary, they distance solutions".
The spokesperson of Angela Merkel also spoke of "defamatory and absolutely unacceptable" statements, while Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte sided "firmly" with France and "the collective values of the European Union" and the Austrian Sebastian Kurz condemned the insults of Erdogan as did the Danish government.
Israel also criticized Erdogan also rejecting the comparison between Muslims and Jews during the Second World War.
Criticism of Erdogan and the “Islamic mobilization against Paris is also expressed by moderate French imams such as Hocine Drouiche from Nimes. The problems are resolved "through dialogue, not political exploitation", in a historical moment in which "there are winds blowing on the fire" and arriving from abroad, in particular "from Turkey" reads a note from the cleric vice-president of the Conference of Transalpine Imams who, on behalf of the French imams, said that "no one, not even Erdogan, can speak on our behalf".
The confrontation with Macron, however, cannot be reduced to issues of mere geopolitical rivalry because it contrasts Islam with freedom of expression (which if it is partial or conditional, it is not) and more generally with Freedom. If on the one hand political and economic realism requires Europeans to safeguard relations with an uncomfortable neighbor (and an ally, in NATO) such as Turkey and with the jagged Islamic world, on the other it should not escape that the battle of principles in act between France and a relevant part of Islam concerns all of us, the founding values of our society and the very essence of civilization based on those rights recognized as universal by the United Nations in 1948 but never "digested" by Islam.
This is a machine translation from Italian language of a post published on Start Magazine at the URL https://www.startmag.it/mondo/nizza-turchia-francia-strage/ on Thu, 29 Oct 2020 15:15:28 +0000.