by Oğuzhan Bilgin
In the last few days, we have all been following and discussing with interest the capture of Aleppo by anti-regime opposition groups and the completely changed situation afterwards. However, while the process in Syria was still ongoing and had only just begun, remarkable “expert” attitudes immediately emerged. What needs to be discussed is the motivation behind these “expert” attitudes.
At the forefront of these attitudes were those who, in the first hours of the advance of the anti-regime forces, decided that this was categorically “bad” and made a fuss. It was noteworthy that these “experts” said this when the Assad regime burned Aleppo to the ground with massacres and chemical weapons, when millions of Aleppinians had to seek refuge in Turkey, and moreover, when these “experts” themselves frequently brought up the problem of refugees in Turkey.
It was also seen that those who commented on how bad the recent developments were were evaluating all these developments within the brackets of HTS. The perception that HTS is the only group fighting the regime has been pumped up. As if the Syrian National Army, supported by Turkey, was not also fighting against the regime in Aleppo and against the PKK in the northern neighborhoods of Aleppo and Tal Rifaat and clearing those areas of terrorism, the analysis based only on HTS was not only inaccurate but also to a great extent deliberate.
Perhaps there was also a lack of knowledge about Syria since its civil war and the groups involved. But more importantly, an understanding that presented Assad’s, Iran’s or Russia’s interests and security as if they were Turkey’s interests and security immediately manifested itself. So much so that even in the US and Israel, there were discussions that Assad was preferable to the opposition, and comments like “this is being done to pave the way for Israel” were made in the very first minutes. Well, if all this is being done to pave the way for Israel, how to explain the uprooting of the PKK terrorist organization, the most important proxy of the US-Israel, from the places where it has been nesting for many years? Moreover, why did a significant number of those who made these remarks remain silent when Israel was committing genocide in Gaza? Is there a need for such premature comments when the process is still ongoing and it remains to be seen how it will evolve?
There were even some who called on Russia and Iran to intervene before Russia and Iran had even made an official statement. It is obvious that there is a significant sectarian perspective behind these oddities. One could argue that there are other relationships besides sectarianism.
But is it only Assadists, Iranians and Russians who reacted this way? No.
The Westernist, Israelist circles in Turkey have also poured a rhetoric reminiscent of “DAESH” terrorism on us in an irrelevant way. There was an air of panic in these circles, from the FETÖ fugitives who fled abroad to the PKK’s party calling on the US and Israel to intervene. So much so that even the SMO was called “jihadist”.
We have seen those who are very uncomfortable with the capture of the 1000-year-old Turkish city of Aleppo by the people of Aleppo and the expulsion of PKK terrorists from Aleppo and Tel Rifaat, and those who express this in indirect ways; we have also seen those who suffer from the hanging of the Turkish flag on the Aleppo Castle. From the very first moments, those who tried to drown the joy of the people of the region who were freed from the oppression of Assad and the PKK, and those who expressed happiness on their behalf, attracted a lot of attention.
In other words, the state of the experts that emerged as a result of these events actually revealed another problem beyond general ignorance. A significant number of the actors who still determine public opinion in Turkey do not have a Turkey-centered mentality. Some “motivations” and network relations constitute the center of their perspectives and Turkish public opinion is tried to be manipulated through these actors.
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