Timur Hammond and Elizabeth Angell discuss the transformation of Turkey’s public spaces into spheres of public and engaged discourse.

The full text of Deputy National Security Advisor Benjamin Rhodes’ statement concerning the use of chemical weapons in Syria.

Ben Piven and Ben Willers provide an infographic of Iran’s elections, which begin today.

This article was originally published in the Washington Post on Friday, June 7, 2013.

In the past five years, Turkey has veered from what was once a promising path of liberal democracy — and the European Union can pull it back.

The recent massive street protests in Istanbul started as a backlash against the government’s plan to develop a beloved park into a shopping mall, but they also reflect popular frustration at the country’s authoritarian turn, made clear in the rise of crony capitalism, intimidation by government forces and the centralization of power in the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), led by Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan. It was just a decade ago that then-Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul told an audience at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy that the main reason his government was pursuing wide-ranging democratic reforms was the possibility of fully joining the European Union. But as that prospect has faded, so has the drive toward democracy in Turkey.

Even before the AKP came to power in late 2002, the party’s leaders determined that E.U. membership was the best means to resolve Turkey’s perennial culture war between Islamists and secularists. With a legislative majority, the AKP quickly abolished the death penalty, wrote a new penal code, changed anti-terrorism laws to make it more difficult to prosecute citizens on speech alone (though critics claim the changes do not go far enough) and significantly expanded political rights.

Continue reading here…

Suat Kiniklioglu discusses the reasons behind Turkey’s democrats and Liberals’ support for the protests, despite their traditional pro-AKP stance.

The OccupyGezi Tumblr blog, with updated pictures of the protests sweeping Turkey.

Turkish Islamic scholar Fethullah Gulen, living in exile but widely influential, issues a statement about the recent protests in Turkey.

This article was originally published on ForeignAffairs.com on Monday, June 3, 2013. 

When Recep Tayyip Erdogan was mayor of Istanbul in the mid-1990s, he did what successful big city mayors do — he made life a little easier for the millions of residents of his beautiful, maddening megalopolis. Erdogan cleaned up the garbage in the streets, unknotted traffic, and literally cleared the air by introducing environmentally friendlier public transportation. Always one for grand ambitions, during his tenure at City Hall the future prime minister made a now often repeated statement to a journalist from the daily Milliyet, “Democracy,” he declared, “is like a tram. You ride it until you arrive at your destination, then you step off.”

These stories go a long way toward explaining the demonstrations against Turkey’s prime minister over the past several days. Erdogan, who hails from a rough-and-tumble neighborhood of Istanbul, has both an innate sense of what makes average Turks tick and an oddly instrumental view of democracy. He never indicated the “destination” toward which he thought Turkey’s democracy should be headed. But 15 years later, many Turks have drawn the conclusion that Erdogan had always intended to step off the tram as soon he had accumulated unrivaled power.

The prime minister’s party, Justice and Development (AKP), was founded in August 2001 after young reformists broke from the old guard of Turkey’s Islamist movement. Even then, Erdogan was a first among equals, but he had important associates, especially Abdullah Gul, who now occupies the presidential palace and remains officially above politics. Yet, in time, Erdogan became the party and the party became him.

Continue reading here…

This article that I co-authored with my good friend and colleague Michael Koplow was originally published on ForeignPolicy.com on Sunday, June 2, 2013. 

It seems strange that the biggest challenge to Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s authority during more than a decade in power would begin as a small environmental rally, but as thousands of Turks pour into the streets in cities across Turkey, it is clear that something much larger than the destruction of trees in Istanbul’s Gezi Park — an underwhelming patch of green space close to Taksim Square — is driving the unrest.

The Gezi protests, which have been marked by incredible scenes of demonstrators shouting for Erdogan and the government to resign as Turkish police respond with tear gas and truncheons, are the culmination of growing popular discontent over the recent direction of Turkish politics. The actual issue at hand is the tearing down of a park that is not more than six square blocks so that the government can replace it with a shopping mall but the whole affair represents the way in which the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) has slowly strangled all opposition while making sure to remain within democratic lines. Turkey under the AKP has become the textbook case of a hollow democracy.

The ferocity of the protests and police response in Istanbul’s Gezi Park is no doubt a surprise to many in Washington. Turkey, that “excellent model” or “model partner,” is also, as many put it, “more democratic than it was a decade ago.”

Continue reading here…

J.J. Goldberg, writing on his blog at The Forward, discusses the Israeli religious ministry’s new “Jewish Identity Administration.”

Moustafa Amara interviews Sinai tribal council head Sheikh Ali Freij about the fragile situation in the peninsula.

Ihsan Yilmaz gives his opinion on the recent unrest in Istanbul, and the controversial construction project in Gezi Park that sparked it.

A good idea never seems to go unpunished, especially inside the Beltway. My post last Thursday, “What the United States Can Do for Egypt Right Now” ruffled a few feathers. This seems rather odd because I was calling for the United States to offer Egyptians humanitarian assistance.  This being Washington, and the topic being the Middle East, specifically Egypt, there is always something to contest, however.

Some of my critics focused on my call for loan guarantees, which they argue cannot be done “now” for a variety of bureaucratic reasons.  This may be so, but it says a lot about Washington that we can quickly and efficiently kill people via unmanned aerial vehicles with the slimmest of oversight, but marshaling resources to back loans to a country that is in need is too much of a bureaucratic lift.  Can anyone say, “broken government”?  That may be harsh, but too often in Washington the almighty process gets in the way of good ideas.

At the very least one can argue that the folks who make the case that loan guarantees will not happen soon recognize the need for some kind of assistance to Egypt, which is decidedly not the case when it comes to the other group of my critics.

In late January, I wrote a piece about David Goldman (aka “Spengler”), a contributor to The Tablet and Pajamas Media, and Shoshana Bryen of the Jewish Policy Center, both of whom have been at the forefront of a small group of mostly right-wing commentators who “want Egypt to fail.”  Their primary complaint is that the Obama administration let Hosni Mubarak fall, and as a result, post-uprising Egypt is an economic basket case that is hostile to Israel.  Egypt’s economic picture is bleak and the Brothers are anti-Zionists and anti-Semites. Still, I’m amazed that people believe President Obama could have, through some unbeknownst to anyone political-diplomatic-military lever, defused the January 25 uprising from 5,818 miles away.  Goldman and Bryen continue to be marginal in the foreign policy debate, but a more sophisticated group of analysts, former foreign policy practitioners, and influential foreign affairs pundits look at my pragmatic ideas for helping Egyptians and see a lifeline for the Muslim Brotherhood, which runs counter to their preferred policy option—making sure President Mohammed Morsi fails. Here is their argument:

President Morsi and his fellow Brothers are not democrats, they have done damage to Egypt, they do not like the United States or Israel, and the Brotherhood had its chance to rule Egypt and screwed it up. Let Morsi and his associates suffer the consequences.  Offering Egypt assistance now will only help the Brothers.  Food insecurity, public health crises, and fuel shortages all contribute to the end of Brotherhood rule.   There may be chaos, but the military will step in before the country completely collapses.  The officers will organize new elections and someone new will come to power.

Easy peasy. Cakewalk….

Where to begin? Let’s start with a brief stipulation: Readers of this blog and my other work know that I have no brief for the Muslim Brotherhood.

Now down to business.  In order to have a good foreign policy, you need good assumptions about the world.  The Masters of Disaster who believe U.S. policy should be geared toward bringing an end to Morsi and the Muslim Brothers assume that:

1)   The military has learned how to manage a transition and will put their lessons to good use when, in fact, the military has determined that it wants nothing to do with politics because it clearly has no idea how to organize a transition and govern the country on a day-to-day basis.  The Officers also know that not too long after they step in, the very people who wanted them to intervene, including the folks in Washington who want Morsi to fail, will be demanding that the military leave.

2)  The Muslim Brotherhood is not going to give it all up without a fight.  The Brothers have a history of folding in order to preserve their organization and fight another day.  They have played the long game quite well, but now not only are the Brothers in power, but also believe that they have a mandate, there is little reason to believe that Morsi and his associates will determine that discretion is the better part of valor.  No doubt, the Brotherhood has suffered as a result of their many missteps, but they still have considerable networks and mobilized supporters who would likely be willing to fight on the organization’s behalf.

3)  A more acceptable leader or group of leaders will emerge after Morsi’s fall and a military intervention.  If the last two and a half years should teach observers anything, it is that there are no heroes in Egypt.  Narrow interests triumphed not too long after inspiring demonstrations of national unity during the uprising.  Who can capture the imagination of Egyptians that fit the liberal-secular-democratic-pro-West-not-overtly-hostile-to-Israel bill of the “Morsi must fail” group?  Mohammed ElBaradei comes closest to this archetype, but he has consistently failed to develop a mass following.  As an aside, a few of those folks who want Morsi to fail despise ElBaradei for his time as Secretary-General at the IAEA.  What about Amr Moussa? Both he an Abdel Moneim Aboul Fotouh underperformed during the spring 2012 elections, there is little reason to believe they would fare better now, and they are not liberals or pro-West or friendly to Israel. Moussa wanted to expel Israel’s ambassador from Egypt after a mob attacked the Israeli embassy in Cairo in September 2011. Aboul Fotouh was able to draw some liberal and revolutionary support, but he is hardle acceptable to the people who want Morsi to fail. There is always Hamdeen Sabahy, the Nasserist, who remains hostile to virtually everything that everyone who would like to see the Brothers crash and burn, stands for.  There is always the possibility that some new, charismatic leader will emerge to carry Egypt forward, but that is hope, which last time I checked was not a firm foundation for foreign policy.

The bottom line is if the United States wants to support democracy in Egypt, it should support democracy.  That does not involve trying to bring down Morsi—either by omission or commission.  That is a job for Egyptians, preferably at the ballot box.  In the meantime, Egyptians are suffering.  It boggles my mind that the idea of helping them is actually controversial.

Robert Johnson of Business Insider discusses Cairo’s deteriorating conditions, with a slideshow of pictures and captions highlighting the city’s biggest problems under Muslim Brotherhood rule.

Nervana examines the evolution of the use of the phrase, “Allahu Akbar,” and how it has been abused by radical Islamic extremists seeking to justify criminal acts.

Ursula Lindsey, writing on the Arabist, offers an interesting look at revolutionary art in Cairo.

“How can the United States help Egypt?” is a common question heard around the Beltway these days.  There are lots of good ideas, but too often they do not address the country’s immediate and most pressing needs.  It should be clear  that Washington is not going to fix Egypt’s political problems no matter how many times people say, “we need to get Egypt right.”  That complex and difficult task is up to the Egyptians—though there are a few discrete policies that Washington can pursue that might be helpful.  All that said, here are four initiatives the United States can undertake that can make a difference in Egypt over the next 3 to 6 to 12 months:

1.       The United States, European Union, and Asian allies should pool resources and provide loan guarantees for Egypt.  Loan guarantees offer two primary benefits to donors and recipients.  They are  an effective way of leveraging large amounts of money with a limited commitment of resources—unless Egypt defaults—and it allows Cairo to borrow on commercial markets at significantly lower interest rates than a country with a CCC+ rating, such as Egypt, would otherwise obtain. They also leave the decision to use the loan guarantees up to the Egyptians, which is consistent with a central theme of the January 25^th uprising—national empowerment and dignity.  Still, there is no getting around the asymmetry of power between the United States-led consortium of loan guarantors and Egypt.  Recognizing the sensitivity of the terms “conditionality,” “conditions,” and “condition”, there would need to be a prior agreement with Cairo that the loans would be used for Egypt’s greatest needs, specifically food, fuel, and medicine.

As Egypt’s financial crisis has deepened over the last two years, observers have called for greater U.S. coordination of financial assistance with wealthy Arab states.  This is a mistake, as it further entangles Egypt in the poisonous rivalries of the Gulf states.  The idea also presupposes that Qatar, Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates share U.S. or each others’ goals in Egypt.  Instead, the Qataris are seeking to buy regional influence, the Saudis neither want Egypt to succeed nor fail, and the Emiratis want to undermine the Muslim Brotherhood.   In the abstract, undermining the Brotherhood is not a bad outcome, but the clear costs of the policy are likely great and the benefits decidedly uncertain.  The result would not necessarily be the emergence of a liberal democratic polity, but rather a narrower dictatorship or more instability, violence, and uncertainty.  Does anyone seriously believe that the Brothers are going to give it all up so easily?

2.       Food aid to Egypt ended in 1992; it should be started again. As the largest importer of wheat in the world, Egypt is particularly sensitive to changes in the global price of wheat. Indeed, between 2009 and 2011, food insecurity in Egypt increased by three percent.

3.       The United States should continue to backstop Egypt’s public health system through additional investment in NAMRU (Navy Medical Research Unit) 3, which is based in Cairo, though it is responsible for the entire Middle East, Africa, and Southwest Asia.  Egypt has the dubious distinction of having the largest number of Hepatitis-C cases in the world,  with 165,000 new diagnoses every year; avian flu and hoof and mouth disease remain significant problems; and the SARS variant Mers-nCoV virus, which has a 35-50 percent mortality rate, has recently appeared in Saudi Arabia, which, given the large number of Egyptians working and traveling to and from the Kingdom, represents a threat to public health in Egypt as well.

4.       Everyone—Americans, Egyptians, Israelis—recognize that the Sinai is a major problem.  Although it is not just a security problem, in the short run the United States can do some good in the Sinai through the expansion of the Multinational Force Observers that have been stationed in there since 1982 and working with both the Israelis and Egyptians on expanding their communication and intelligence cooperation.  Still, this is no panacea. Largely by design, the Egyptians are unable to operate effectively in the Sinai and the area will be a major political and economic development challenge over time.

These are all things that do not necessarily require significant outlays of U.S. money and they are all initiatives that the foreign policy bureaucracy should be able to accomplish.

As Iran loses ground in Syria, Lebanon, and the Gaza Strip, expect Tehran to try to shore up its ability to influence the Middle East in the most unlikely of places:  Egypt.

Over the last few years there have been numerous signs that Cairo and Tehran were making tentative steps toward changing their previously rather frosty relations, including the transit of Iranian warships through the Suez Canal, open discussion among decision-makers in both countries about normalizing ties, Egyptian President Mohammed Morsi’s August 2012 visit to Iran for a meeting of the Non-Aligned Movement, and his Iranian counterpart’s reciprocal visit to Cairo this past February for the summit of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation.  In addition, the current cause célèbre between the Muslim Brotherhood and the Salafis of the al Nour party concerns whether to allow Iranian tourists to visit Egypt.  The Brothers are for it, while the Salafis, fearing Shi’a proselytizing, are vehemently opposed.

These are tentative, largely symbolic steps most of which can be explained away—at least on the Egyptian end—by the domestic political need for Morsi and the Brotherhood to demonstrate that their “independent” foreign policy is more than just a talking point.  Although the Iranians are likely interested in something much bigger than symbolism, the Egyptians may, out of a combination of desperation and shrewdness, take Tehran up on whatever overtures the Iranians have forthcoming.

Egypt and Iran seem more likely to engage in strategic competition rather than strategic cooperation.  Egypt is a large, Arab, predominantly Sunni country.  Egyptians are inheritors of a great civilization and there is a prevailing sense that given this history, its powerful army, long record as a center of culture and knowledge, as well as its strategic importance to the big powers, Umm al Dunya or “Mother of the World”—as Egyptians lovingly refer to their country—is naturally endowed with the assets that make it the leader of the Middle East.  For its part, Iran is a large, predominantly Persian and Shi’a majority country.  It is also an inheritor of a great civilization and Iranian foreign policy has long maintained that Tehran’s proper role is that of the region’s leader.  Moreover, there does not seem to be much love lost between the Egyptians and Iranians.  When Morsi was in Tehran, he was critical of his hosts’ support for the Assad regime and Ahmadinejad was assaulted with a shoe when he visited Cairo.

For all these reasons, rivalry and mistrust should mark ties between Cairo and Tehran, but at present, circumstances are aligning that provide opportunity and motive to make relations less competitive and perhaps decidedly more cooperative:

1.     Both Egypt and Iran are desperate, albeit in different ways.  The Egyptians need cash and fuel from anyone who is willing to give it to them.  Despite the fact that the Obama administration and the European Union have been saying for months that sanctions on Iran have “begun to bite,” the Iranians have both. Why wouldn’t Egypt respond to overtures from Iran, offering to relieve the financial and economic pressures that are threatening the Brotherhood’s project?  Tehran’s assistance would no doubt help the Egyptians cope. Yet the Egyptians probably would not even need to take a single Iranian rial.  Just the fact that Cairo was contemplating accepting aid from the Islamic Republic might encourage the Saudis, who have heretofore been tight-fisted with the Egyptians, to provide some relief.

At the same time Tehran is facing the prospect of a major strategic setback in the Levant.  If Bashar al Assad finally succumbs to the civil war that is engulfing his country, Iran’s position in both Syria and Lebanon will become significantly more complicated.  Under these circumstances, it is plausible that Tehran might want to exploit Cairo’s interest in improving bilateral relations and its precarious economic situation as a hedge against potential losses elsewhere.

2.     Tweaking Washington, Jerusalem, and Riyadh.  The Iranians and Egyptians both have an interest in signaling to the United States, Israel, and Saudi Arabia that they will not be bought, intimidated, or manipulated.  It was for these reasons that August of last year President Morsi proposed to include Iran (along with Turkey and Saudi Arabia) in a regional contact group on Syria.  The Egyptian president was signaling to Washington, Jerusalem, and Riyadh that no matter what dire straights Egypt might find itself in at home, Cairo still intended on being a regional player with an independent view of how to fix the region’s most pressing problems.  Hosni Mubarak’s Egypt was never as obliging of the United States as the revolutionary mythology of his long rule suggests, but that is less important than the perception that he willingly did Washington’s bidding in the region for three decades without exception;  hence the importance the Brotherhood attaches to foreign policy independence and there is no better way for Egypt’s new leaders to prove that they will not be lackeys of the United States (and by association, Israel) than a dalliance with the Iranians.

The Iranians have never been shy about poking Americans, Israelis, and Saudis in the eye, but establishing cooperative ties with the Egyptians would be a geo-strategic trifecta.  It would go a long way toward demonstrating, especially to the Saudis, that whatever trouble Iran is having in Syria, Tehran can still be influential in the Middle East—and in Egypt’s case, in the heart of the Arab world.  There is a belief in the Persian Gulf and Turkey, not to mention influential public opinion in the United States,  that Iran without the Assad family is out of options.  The Iranians will no doubt be looking for ways to prove this notion wrong and opening up to Egypt is likely part of the plan.

3.  Revolutionaries of a Different Feather Flock Together.  Neither Egypt nor Iran is a status quo power in the region.  Cairo and Tehran may want different things, but they do share one common goal—reducing as much as possible the exercise of American power in the region.  This is why the Muslim Brotherhood talks about holding the United States “accountable” for its actions in the region and establishing a “partnership of equals.”  Given the very real asymmetries of power between Washington and Cairo, the Egyptians are likely to be frustrated in these goals, but it suggests an area of common interest with the Iranians.  Under the Shah and Hosni Mubarak, Iran and Egypt—in different eras—were leading players in a regional political order that made it relatively easier for Washington to pursue its regional goals.  And while the changes in Iran in 1979 were  far more dramatic than what has happened in Egypt, the Muslim Brotherhood, like Iran’s clerical establishment, is not likely to accommodate themselves comfortably to American power.

The Iranians have a lot less to lose than Egypt and are thus more likely to pursue Cairo than are the Egyptians to go after upgraded and expanded relations with Tehran.  The shoe throwing incident in February and the Salafist opposition to Iranian tourism in Egypt indicates that at least among some Egyptians, Iran is not all that popular. This is not 2006 when, in the aftermath of the Israel-Hizballah war, the Iranian leader was popular in Egypt. President Morsi would have to weigh whether foreign policy independence in the form of better ties with Iran is worth the domestic political fallout—something he can ill-afford if recent polling is accurate.  In addition, it is hard to imagine how the Egyptians would go about busting sanctions on Iran without eliciting the ire of both the United States and Europe.  Then again it is not like Washington has been generous with Egypt and Morsi may reason that he can benefit from a spat with the United States given the role that America played in supporting Hosni Mubarak and the importance of national dignity and empowerment as animating factors in the January 25 uprising.

Hooking up with the Iranians does fit in with Egypt’s overall “positive neutralist” approach, which in the 1950s was Nasser’s way of playing powers off of one another in an effort to extract resources from them.  Morsi seems to be playing a similar game, but may overplay his hand when it comes to the Iranians. Other than some quick cash and subsidized energy, there is nothing that Tehran can offer Cairo that will, in the long run, be to Egypt’s benefit.

Thanassis Cambanis claims that Lebanon’s Hizballah and the clerical regime in Iran are now fully vested factions in Syria’s civil war.

Hicham Mourad discusses the uneasy relationship between Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood and the leaders in Saudi Arabia.

Angie Balata explores the history of rock music in Egypt.

This article was originally published on The Atlantic on Monday, May 12, 2013.

Egyptian Prime Minister Hisham Qandil announced a cabinet reshuffle recently that included a number of new ministers from the ranks of the Muslim Brotherhood’s leadership. This development seems to have confirmed the worst fears of the Egyptian opposition, which has raised concern over the “Brotherhoodization” of the country. Although the increased representation of the Brothers in the government is cause for alarm for Egypt’s secularists and liberals, they should be concerned about a quieter, but more worrying process — the Islamization of Egypt’s political institutions — which is likely to be far more durable than the Brotherhood’s grip on political power. This phenomenon is not just underway in Egypt, however. Islamist power and the Islamization of society are what the the future holds for Egypt, Tunisia, post-Assad Syria, and likely other countries in the region.
Given that the noticeable evidence of the Islamization in the Middle East is few and far between, the idea that Islamization is the trajectory of the region might seem misplaced. Egypt’s Muslim Brothers and Tunisia’s Ennahda have not declared alcohol forbidden, forced women to don the hijab, or instituted hudud punishments (i.e., specific punishments for specific crimes set forth in the Qur’an or hadiths).

Continue reading here…

The Turkish government’s tepid response to the car bombings in Reyhanli last Friday should help bring to a merciful end the prevailing meme in Washington that Ankara is poised to lead the Middle East.  Rather than providing leadership and a source of stability in the region, Turkey is now a party to regional conflicts, especially the civil war in Syria.  It is true that Turkey did not necessarily seek the position that it now finds itself in, but the mismatch between its grand ambitions and Ankara’s capacity to provide order to the Middle East contributed mightily to its problems. Despite all the talk of models and rising to the level of U.S. traditional allies in Europe—code for the United Kingdom and France—over the last few years, Turkey, like a variety of other countries in the region, needs rescuing.

In what seems like Cold War redux, Washington and Moscow are stepping in to do what they can to prevent the Syrian conflict from engulfing the region.  Although Washington and Ankara have shared interests in Syria and other regional hotspots, the United States and Russia are likely to pursue a political solution to the Syrian civil war—Turkey’s most pressing foreign (and suddenly domestic) policy problem that is consistent with its interests.  Since the summer of 2011 after trying in vain to persuade Bashar al Assad to reform and negotiate—two things the Syrian leader was never going to do—the Turkish leadership has consistently called for Assad’s ouster and the end of the regime he leads.  It is a principled position, but not one that is likely to serve Ankara well if the United States and Russia preside over a political solution in Syria that includes regime figures, if not members of Assad’s inner circle.  Although Erdogan remains a popular figure among the Syrian opposition, leaving former regime players in place will likely complicate Ankara’s efforts to be a player in post-Assad Syria.  Some observers  have suggested that the Turks (as well as the Saudis and Qataris) would be able to “kiss and make-up” with the regime holdovers or even Assad should he prevail, but this is a profound misreading of Erdogan who does not forgive and forget easily.  Just ask Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu or Iraq’s leader, Nouri Kamal al Maliki.

It would be extremely difficult for Erdogan to be magnanimous toward Assad or his supporters after 80,000 Syrians have died and a staggering ten percent of Syria’s population has been displaced, including anywhere from 322,845 refugees (at the time of writing) who have found safe haven in Turkey.  In addition, before Friday’s bombing Assad has killed approximately nineteen Turks, dropped ordinance on Turkish territory, allegedly shot down a Turkish surveillance jet operating in international waters, and is believed to be behind the Reyhanli bombings with forty-six dead and at least one-hundred injured.  And yet, with the exception of the artillery barrages in October 2012, the Turks have let Assad get away with these provocations.  Turkey is in the worst of all possible positions: Unable to corral the opposition; at odds with its ostensible partners, Riyadh and Doha; it has become a party to Syria’s civil war, but is unable to respond to Bashar al Assad’s periodic taunts because Erdogan’s Syria policy is generally unpopular in Turkey.  With all of Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu’s eloquence about history endowing Turkey with special responsibilities in the region, the caution associated with Ataturk’s “Peace at Home, Peace in the World” still makes sense to many Turks.

One could argue that much of what has befallen Turkey in Syria is not of Ankara’s own doing, which is partly true, but it still was not supposed to be this way. Turkey, with the 16^th largest economy in the world, has historical and cultural legacies in the region that were assets, a political and economic system that is attractive to Arabs, and its use of soft-power galore was going to be a regional problem solver and economic engine, making it another Turkish century in the Middle East and in the process relieving the United States of some of the burdens it has carried in the last six decades.  Yet here we are, heading to Geneva or some other anodyne place for a peace conference under the auspices of Washington and Moscow.  At best, Prime Minister Erdogan and the Justice and Development Party leadership will emerge from this episode with egg on their faces but with enough of their position intact to help implement whatever solution (if one materializes) the big powers coerce out of the players in Syria’s tragedy.  At worst, it will reveal once again the hollowness of their aspirations and dependence on great power patrons.  The saving grace for Erdogan is that he has no credible domestic political opposition capable of capitalizing on his foreign policy problems—the main opposition Republican People’s Party supports Bashar al Assad.  Consequently, Syria may have put only a small dent in Erdogan’s domestic political aura, but it should smash Washington’s incongruent belief in “Turkey’s rise as a regional power.”

Steven A. Cook probes the arguments against a No-Fly Zone over Syria.

Gary Schmitt says it is doubtful that the Pentagon really believes that Syria’s air defenses are a significant hurdle to intervening in that country’s war.

Michael Koplow argues that a No-Fly Zone over Syria would present obstacles for the United States.

Dan Trombly claims that a No-Fly Zone over Syria would have a huge cost, and would likely result in minimal returns.

In what the Turkish press is building up to be a “historic” trip, Turkey’s Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan will be visiting Washington next week.  Much has changed since he was last here in December 2009.  In particular, Turkey’s position in the region has, despite its strong economic performance and rising diplomatic stature, deteriorated markedly:   Iraq is teetering on the brink of another round of civil war; Iran’s nuclear program has proceeded apace; Turkey’s ally in Libya, Muammar Qaddafi is dead; and Bashar al Assad, in whom the prime minister invested so much time, has killed somewhere between 70 and 80 thousand of his own people and has made millions of others refugees.  The only recent geo-political bright spot has been Israel’s apology for the 2010 Mavi Marmara incident.  That is not saying much given that bilateral ties between Ankara and Jerusalem are likely to remain strained.

In a region that is in turmoil and where some of Washington’s partners are gone or under political pressure, Prime Minister Erdogan stands tall as an important partner.  That is at least what the two governments would like everyone to believe, but even as American and Turkish interests align, there are significant differences about how best to achieve them.  Nowhere is this more the case than in Syria and Iraq.

In the spring of 2011, Prime Minister Erdogan and his Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu sought to convince Bashar al Assad to negotiate with his opponents and undertake significant political reforms.  They failed, miscalculating their own ability to influence Assad’s decision-making and underestimating how much, despite their best efforts, the Syrian leader relied on Iran.  Since they were rebuffed and Syrian refugees began pouring over the Turkish border in increasing numbers, Turkish policy has moved 180 degrees.  Giving Assad time to reform morphed into “Assad must go” and, in the process, Ankara has tried to enlist a deeply reluctant Washington to play a role in helping to topple the Assad regime through stepped up support for the rebellion, the establishment of safe zones within Syria’s territory to relieve pressure on Turkey, and a No Fly Zone.  For Turkey, the Syrian civil war has all kinds of effects on its national security ranging from the challenges of playing host to anywhere between 325 and 450 thousand refugees and the complications the conflict has on the nascent peace process with the PKK and Ankara’s relations with Erbil.  There is a broader issue at play as well.  Ankara now finds itself in a proxy war with Iran in Syria and would like Washington’s help rolling back Iranian influence.  Turkish policymakers are confounded that Washington does not see Syria as a place to deal Tehran a blow.   Although it seems that some change in U.S. policy is in the offing, Washington is clearly wary of a Syrian quagmire and does not believe that the end of Assad means the end of Iran’s role in Syria.  Under these circumstances, whatever the Obama administration has to offer Prime Minister Erdogan, it is likely to fall short of what Ankara believes it needs.

If the Syrian civil war had never happened, Iraq would likely top the U.S.-Turkey agenda.  From the perspective of the Turks, Washington’s Iraq policy is, well, nuts. To Ankara, Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki is an authoritarian pursuing a sectarian policy in Iraq and has become increasingly aligned with Iran.  They point to the pressure on Iraqi Sunni politicians and leaders, notably the case of Tariq al Hashimi, Iraq’s Sunni vice president who is enjoying safe haven in Turkey after being charged with terrorism and sentenced to death.  More generally, Maliki is clearly favoring the Shi’a, which has only stoked frustration among the Sunnis.  This is giving al Qaeda of Iraq material with which to work, threatening to undermine a lot of the hard work—political and military—that the United States put into keeping the country together during and after the surge.  Yet from Ankara’s perspective, it cannot understand why Washington has done precious little to pressure Maliki or arrest the decline in Iraqi security.  Ankara also is not quite sure of what to make of Washington’s policy regarding Turkey’s relations with the Kurdistan Regional Government.  Everyone applauded as Turkey went from being the “most likely to invade” northern Iraq to a diplomatic and economic partner of the Kurds in the service of a unified, federal Iraq.  Yet Ankara is dismayed at the growing tension between Kurdistan Regional Government and Baghdad and lack of U.S. attention to the problem.  Of course, Ankara contributed to these strains when, over Iraqi and American objections, they signed a gas deal with Erbil.  Still, the deal itself was indicative of the fact that neither the Turks nor the Kurds had much faith in Maliki’s faith in a unified Iraq.  Add to this mix Turkey’s charge that Iraq is complicit with Iran in Tehran’s efforts to arm the Assad regime.  Ankara was stunned in early April that there were no consequences for Maliki when he rebuffed U.S. requests that Iraq inspect Iranian aircraft destined for Syria traversing its airspace and Syrian aircraft on their way back from Iran.  More recently, the Iraqis have conducted the inspections, but have generally allowed the planes to continue to their destinations, claiming that no weapons were found..

The Turks have a point: Maliki is no democrat, he is pursuing sectarian policies, and he has aligned Baghdad with Tehran on important issues.  Of course, Iraq is far more complicated than Turkish complaints suggest, but that does not mean that Ankara is wrong.  It is time for Washington to rethink its approach to Iraq.  That said, for the moment Washington is stuck with Maliki and seems to have very little in the way of leverage to influence the direction of Iraq’s politics.  Consequently, President Obama is unlikely to have much to offer Prime Minister Erdogan on Iraq other than platitudes about American commitments and engagement.

One area where Washington can deliver is on trade.  As the United States and Europe undertake free trade agreement negotiations, the Obama administration should make sure that Turkey can benefit from the massive new free trade zone of almost a billion consumers that will result.  Beyond that, the Erdogan visit will be important, but heavier on symbolism and positive rhetoric than it is on substance.

Muftah analyzes the Muslim Brotherhood’s appropriation of revolutionary symbols, such as the Ultras,  to claim popularity among the youth in Egypt.

Egypt Monocle discusses Salafyo Costa, a group seeking to restore religious tolerance in Egypt.

The Times of Israel says, “Israel is not feeling lucky.”

Since I first broached the subject of intervention in Syria sixteen months ago, I have had episodic debates with various former military officers and defense intellectuals concerning the wisdom of a more robust approach to the insurrection that began against Bashar al Assad in March 2011.  The most recent installment came last Friday in response to the following tweet:

Serious question:how come Syria’s air defenses present a problem for US aviators but not Israeli pilots?

— Steven A. Cook (@stevenacook) April 26, 2013

The tweet itself was prompted by a National Public Radio story on Syria in which the correspondent gravely intoned, “Syria’s formidable air defense system.”  I have heard this over and over again in one form or another and it has always struck me as odd.  Why does it seem that Israel’s air force can penetrate Syria’s alleged superior air defense network at will and with impunity, but whenever the idea of using American and allied air forces to help the rebellion comes up, the Syrians are 10 feet tall?

My question on Twitter was serious, but I was also attempting to draw my sometimes interlocutors Peter J. Munson (@peterjmunson) and Andrew Exum (@abumuqawama) into another discussion.  Perhaps having had enough of me they didn’t bite or didn’t see my tweet, but I did have an extended repartee with Dan Trombly (@stcolumbia) and Brian Haggerty (@brianhaggerty) over the issue.  Let me just start out by stipulating that both Exum and Munson have a perspective and gravitas on issues related to foreign interventions that is unique given their military service in Iraq and Afghanistan.  Trombly and Haggerty are civilians, but with strategic studies specialties.  I am neither a battlefield veteran nor a guns and trucks kid.  Still, just because I did not serve and someone had to tell me the difference between a Maverick missile and a Maverick does not disqualify me nor other civilian Middle East analysts from offering credible analyses of what can/should be done in Syria.

To date, the answers to my questions about Israel’s capability to penetrate Syrian airspace and American disinclination to do the same and more generally concerning intervention in Syria amount to the following:

1)  Israel’s brief incursions are different from the sustained campaign the United States—and presumably allies—would have to undertake to establish a no-fly zone (NFZ) in Syria.

2) Israel’s missions have been on the “periphery” of Syria and have never had to contend with the dense network of air defenses  in and around major population centers.

3) The Assad regime has placed air defenses within population centers, putting both Syrian civilians and American aviators at risk during any air campaign.

4) Intervention in Syria would be costly and detract from the U.S. military’s ability to conduct operations in other areas.

5) Syria is complicated and military intervention may not help the situation; in fact, it might make the situation for Syrians a good deal worse.

With the exception of the last, none of these claims is convincing either in part or whole.  It is true that enforcing a no-fly zone is an entirely different undertaking than Israel’s bombing of a Syria-based Islamic Jihad training camp in 2003, the destruction of Syria’s suspected nuclear facility in 2007, or high-speed overflights of Latakia intended—literally—to rattle Bashar al Assad in his summer palace in 2003 and 2006, but that does not mean the United States should not or cannot prevent Assad’s forces from flying.  When analysts and others first broached the idea of establishing a NFZ in Syria, they were told that, among other reasons, this was not a good idea because there was nothing to enforce.  Assad was not using aircraft to attack his own people.  That has not been true since at least the summer of 2012.

The second claim—that the Israelis have only penetrated along Syria’s “periphery”—does not ring true.  Is Latakia, where the Syrian president has a summer residence, the periphery?  It is also only 55 miles from Latakia to Tartus, where Russia maintains a naval base.  I don’t know, but I would bet that Syrians have put up air defenses in this area.  Once more, the periphery claim suggests Israeli pilots are somehow getting off easy.  Ask the Turks.  They lost the two crew members of an F4 Phantom II operating off the coast of Syria in June 2012.  Now, the Syrians may have gotten lucky or they may be pretty good at defending their airspace, but the record suggests the former.

It would be tough going for American pilots, hoping to avoid civilian casualties, if they were asked to establish and enforce a no-fly zone.  This type of operation entails destroying the Syrian air defenses.  Without being glib, complications and all it seems that Syrians are at far greater risk from the Assad regime and its supporters than from U.S. aircraft.  That said, it is a given that civilians will perish in the process of setting up a NFZ—one of the grave and unfortunate complications that Syria presents.

Then there is the claim that the United States cannot get involved in Syria because of other pressing international problems and the prospect of war in another theater.  I can understand why observers might advance this claim; it has been a long and costly decade in the Middle East. That said, the last time I checked, the U.S. armed forces were designed to fight on multiple fronts.

Before moving on, let’s get a few things clear:

• Syria’s GDP is $65 billion; The United States’  is $15 trillion.
• Syria spends $2.5 billion on defense; The United States spends $500 billion.
• Syria officially has 600 combat aircraft, though it is not known how many can actually be deployed; The United States has a lot more.
• Syria possesses five squadrons of attack helicopters; The United States has many more.

I recognize that raw numbers cannot always tell very much about capabilities.  The Israelis were outgunned in terms of the amount of planes and tanks they could bring to the battlefield in June 1967, but they nevertheless prevailed.  Still, given all the caveats one could possibly think of concerning the particularities of the Syrian “battle space,” the regime’s use of irregular soldiers, and terror, Assad is a military pipsqueak in comparison to the United States.  That is not suggesting that intervention in Syria will be a “cakewalk,” but that the United States’ capability to establish and enforce a no-fly zone in Syria should be beyond dispute.

If that is, indeed, the case (if it isn’t I want my taxpayer money back) then the real issue in Syria is both reason #5—military intervention might not attenuate the civil war or might make things worse and, I would add, the American people do not want to become involved in another Middle Eastern imbroglio.  Both are important arguments, though I would suggest that the second is the more compelling.

It is important to remember that there are no risk free policies.  If the United States is determined to stay out of Syria in any meaningful way, there are also grave moral and strategic consequences.  Many more Syrians are likely to die and leaders in the region will draw the conclusion that they can pursue malign policies with little cost.  I too am reluctant to see the United States militarily engaged in yet another Middle Eastern country, but I also do not want to live in a world where dictators can kill their own people with abandon, develop nuclear technology without fear of punishment, threaten to destabilize a region, and drive millions of their own people into the wretched conditions of refugees and displaced people.

The complete final issue of Egypt Independent, which was not allowed to go to print.

Sarah Carr takes down Al Masry Al Youm chairman and director, Abdel Monem Said Aly.

Alaa Abd El Fattah provides an “obituary” for the shutdown Egypt Independent.

The West’s overall approach to Syria since the uprising began in March 2011 has been a combination of empty sloganeering (“we strongly and unequivocally condemn this violence”), wishful thinking (“it is only a matter of time before Assad falls”), and hand wringing (“Syria is not Libya”).  Yet recently, there seems to have been a subtle, yet important shift that would augur a more active American and European role in managing the conflict.  The recent Friends of Syria meeting in Istanbul gave Secretary of State John Kerry an opportunity to signal an evolution of U.S. policy and the British and the French have publicly entertained  the idea of lifting the arms embargo on the rebellion. This all seems to be good news, yet it may be more apparent than real.  This is not to suggest that Washington will renege on the pledge that Kerry made in Turkey or that the Foreign Office and Quay d’Orsay are not serious about the prospects of supplying weapons to the Free Syrian Army, but this support is far from unequivocal.

The rethinking in Europe about how best to assist the rebellion masks a continuing deep ambivalence about Syria’s civil war and the prospects for bringing it to an end.  Like American officials, Europeans tend to mouth all the right words about the “cost of doing nothing being too high” and that “Assad has to go,” but it is hard to be convinced that they believe what they are saying.  If you listen carefully and parse the Europeans’ comments about Syria, they actually contradict the more robust policy they are suggesting by lifting the embargo.  They say:

1)      There is no magic formula for resolving the conflict in Syria;

2)      While Assad has already lost, the opposition can only win at high cost;

3)      As a result of 1 and 2, plans must be made for a “political transition” central to which is “re-opening political space.”

This strikes me as European prevaricating at its best.  In essence, they are calling for that mythical “Russian solution,” which would have Bashar and Asma living out their days in the company of other discredited dictators on the outskirts of Moscow while the rebels make a deal with regime loyalists who were not part of Assad’s inner circle.

In the abstract there is, of course, a compelling logic to this plan.  If you want to mitigate the possibility that Syria rips itself apart in a post-Assad maelstrom of factional violence, you have to avoid the mistakes the United States made in Iraq with de-Baathification.  Fair enough, but both the regime and the rebellion have taken the Russian solution off the table and Moscow has little influence over Assad’s decision-making.  Who exactly from the opposition is willing to talk to whom within the regime?  It is clear that the fight has become existential for both sides, making compromise difficult even with the intervention of the most skilled diplomats.

There is a sense that the Europeans know they are being unrealistic, leaving one to wonder why they are even peddling the idea.  Even though they emphasize the importance of a political solution when pressed, the Europeans freely admit that the prospects for a negotiated transition “may have been overtaken by events.”  Indeed, they have.  Many months ago.  Syrians are thus left to draw the conclusion that despite some movement in Washington, London, and Paris, they remain on their own.

“Recep Tayyip Erdogan is Turkey’s first Pharaoh!” a contact in Turkey declared to me recently over breakfast in Ankara.  “Not a Sultan?,” I countered teasingly.  “No, the Sultans had some checks on their power.  Today Tayyip Erdogan’s power is absolute.”  My friend, who would fall within the category of right-of-center nationalist, assured me that his Pharaoh comment was not meant to be an insult, but rather a statement of fact.   That’s hard to believe given what the leaders of ancient (and not so ancient) Egypt stood for and the principles by which Erdogan and his associates claim to have governed Turkey for the last almost eleven years.  Indeed, when Erdogan, Abdullah Gül, and the people around them broke from Turkey’s Islamist old guard and established the Adelet ve Kalkinma Partisi (Justice and Development Party, AKP) they offered Turks a vision of a democratic and prosperous Turkey.

Between 2002 and 2007, the Justice and Development Party, first under Abdullah Gül’s brief tenure as prime minister and then Erdogan, delivered on both.  In those five years, the Turkish economy grew an average of over 6 percent annually and the AKP-dominated Grand National Assembly passed a range of significant political reforms that resulted in the European Union’s official invitation to begin negotiations to join that exclusive club of democracies.  It seemed clear that by the time AKP won 47 percent of the vote in the July 2007 elections, the Islamists (they prefer “conservative democrats”) had actually done what the  country’s secular nationalists had only claimed to do—which was in the words of Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, “raise Turkey to the level of civilization” through the modernization and democratization of Turkish political institutions. The AKP also invested in services for Turkey’s middle and lower classes, who value the advances in transportation and healthcare as much, if not more, than the successful efforts to subordinate the military to civilian leaders, for example.

Since 2007, however, AKP’s reform efforts have slowed and in some areas there have been notable reversals, especially when it comes to freedom of expression.  Moreover, the party has become a machine par excellence with its connections to media outlets, business, and government contractors,  which only bolster its monopoly on political power at the local and national levels.  A decade after assuming power, Prime Minister Erdogan is the sun around which Turkish politics revolves—a fact he both knows and seems to relish. He seldom seems to wrestle with a decision, enjoys swatting away questions from observers who clearly “do not pay close enough attention,” and brooks no criticism from an opposition that he does not take seriously.

Of these, the latter is the most salient politically, but there is very little reason for Prime Minister Erdogan to give his primary opponents—the Republican People’s Party (CHP) and the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP)—much in the way of respect.  The CHP has 135 seats in the Grand National Assembly and the MHP controls 53 mandates in the 550 seat parliament.  These may seem like a lot, but the vote totals for both parties are confined to specific regions of the country (the Aegean coast and European parts of Turkey for the CHP and mostly Iğdir province for the MHP) whereas AKP has significant cross-regional appeal and thus enjoys a parliamentary majority of 327 seats.   More importantly, while both parties have become adept at complaining about Prime Minister Erdogan and criticizing the AKP, they are unable to articulate an alternative vision for Turkey’s future.  I have a good understanding of what the CHP and MHP are against, but I have a harder time understanding precisely what they are for.  I’m willing to allow for the fact that I might be missing something in translation, but it seems that millions of Turkish voters are also confused.

The inability to offer Turks a vision goes hand in hand with what seems like a strong aversion to modernize their internal structures and political processes.  Take the CHP, for example.  As I was departing Turkey on Saturday, the papers reported that the party’s Deputy Chairman, Gülseren Onanç, was forced to resign.  Ms. Onanç is a young, well-educated, successful businesswoman who was responsible for CHP’s public relations.  Her crime?  She appeared on a television program against the expressed wishes of party chairman Kemal Kiliçdaroğlu and dared suggest that 65 percent of the CHP’s grassroots support the government’s efforts to bring the war with the Kurdistan Worker’s Party (known as the PKK)—a terrorist group that has waged a campaign of violence in Turkey since 1984 that has cost 40,000 lives—to an end through negotiations.  In other words, Onanç was doing her job, but in the CHP’s patriarchal politics, nothing happens unless Kiliçdaroğlu says so.  It was not too long ago that analysts regarded Kiliçdaroğlu to be the savior of the CHP, which was reeling from a sex scandal and poor electoral performances.  There have not been any more illicit videos of CHP officials, but further loss of momentum for the party has marked Kiliçdaroğlu’s tenure.  On the substance of what Onanç said, it seems clear that the party leadership would rather censure one of its potential future leaders than take part in a process that may finally bring peace to Turkey.  Either Kiliçdaroğlu and the people around him do not want to bring the conflict to an end because of an attachment to an ethnic based nationalism (a problem also among Kurdish opponents of peace) or they see it as a wedge issue.  Either way, Onanç’s dismissal reflects a political party that has yet to come to grips with how much Turkey has changed.  The old truths and myths no longer apply in a more complex and differentiated society whose people want more than the drab political conformity that Kemalism (and the CHP) demand.  The AKP surely wants to take credit for Turkey’s transformation, but it was happening well before Erdogan and Gül defied their mentors way back in 2001.

This all brings us back to Erdogan and his alleged Pharaoh-ness.  Not to diminish either Erdogan’s achievements or his faults but the desultory state of the opposition has no doubt contributed to his mastery of the political arena.  I know Turks who don’t share AKP’s views on a variety of issues, but nevertheless vote for the party because they have no other real choice.  Others choose not to vote.  Without any viable options among the opposition an important check on Erdogan and the AKP does not exist, which does not bode well for the consolidation of democracy in Turkey.  When journalists are jailed, corporations are punished with huge tax levies because their owners are deemed unfriendly to the AKP, and the courts are used to dole out political payback, it is the fault of Erdogan and his party’s other leaders whose authoritarian tendencies are clear, but it also the  responsibility of Turkey’s other political parties who are all at once ineffective, insular, and feckless, rendering them trivial in Turkey’s fascinating transformation.

The debate in Washington about Syria has picked up a bit lately.  The Obama administration is stepping up its aid to the rebellion and the civil war will no doubt be on the President Obama’s agenda when he meets with a parade of regional leaders at the White House starting next week. Although many members of Congress—taking cues from their constituents who are weary of the Middle East—are resolutely opposed to American involvement in Syria, others have expressed frustration that the United States is not doing more to bring the crisis to an end.  Like all things related to Syria there is little agreement even among the people who would like to see a more robust policy on what form a more active approach to the conflict would take.

The state of the debate essentially revolves around two options, which have been articulated before, but they contain some new twists:

1)    Arm the rebels with the kind of weapons that can tip the battlefield advantage and establish a no fly zone.  In the process of pouring guns into Syria and denying Assad the ability to use planes and helicopters Washington will place itself on the side of morality and demonstrate to the Iranians, who are providing men and materiel for the fight, that Washington is not going to hide behind the Turks, Qataris, and Saudis.  There are, this argument goes, consequences to inaction in Syria not least of which is the continuation of the war and a likely increase in Iranian regional adventurism.

2)    A diplomatic solution to the Syrian conflict is possible, but only if Washington “engages with the Iranians.”  The logic here is fairly straight forward—Tehran is continuing to support to the Assad regime because Iran has interests at stake in Syria and thus far the only way to protect these interests is by joining the fight.  If, however, a deal can be reached with Tehran where its position in Damascus would not be fatally compromised with Assad’s ouster, the war can be brought to an end sooner rather than later.

The problem with both “solutions” is that they are likely to do the exact opposite of what they are intended.  There is no doubt that ramping up support for the rebels and eliminating the one clear advantage Assad has—airpower—can make a significant difference.  Yet almost everyone agrees that the fight will not be over when the Syrian president flees and/or is killed.  Tehran and the remaining supporters of the Assad regime will likely burn Syria down in order to deny their opponents a victory or at least, bleed the rebellion badly on its way to one.  What good will a no fly zone do then? Not much.  Then there is the thorny problem of what to do after Assad is gone.  The impulse will be to support the development of a democratic, prosperous Syria, but that is hard to do in a war zone (see, Iraq 2003-present).  Regardless of what Washington does, the Syrians, Iranians, Turks, Saudis, Qataris, and others like the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant are going to fight it out in Syria for a long time.

The diplomatic option is not the equivalent to the Leverettian “Grand Bargain” that never was, but it has similar problems.  Proponents of engagement always assume that the “engagee” shares the same interests or can be made to share interests through dogged diplomacy.  Yet Iranian and American interests conflict sharply in Syria.  Washington is unlikely to settle for a diplomatic solution in which a post-Assad Syria remains a place from which Iran can continue to support Hizballah and Hamas; and Tehran is not going to accept a deal where its ability to extend its influence in the region is sharply curtailed.  In addition, the engagers tend to forget that a deal with the Iranians is not going to sit well with the rebels, Turks, Saudis, and Qataris.  They will likely do everything possible to preclude or undermine such a deal, which would no doubt entail a lot more violence.  Some might argue that each of these actors can be bought off in some way that would improve the chances of an Iranian solution, but that is highly unlikely.  The rebellion wants to chase Iran out of Syria; the Saudis are deeply paranoid of all things Iran, especially an American dialogue with the Iranians; and Tehran’s gains from any agreement that protects its interests is a net loss for both Ankara and Doha.

I once thought the use of American power in Syria could make a difference.  More than a year later, I have serious doubts about getting involved in someone else’s civil war. It seems that Syria is a problem that has no answer.

Dahlia Scheindlin evaluates the pragmatism of Ghazi Hamad,  Deputy Foreign Minister of Gaza, who publicly recognized the 1967 borders last week.

Tarek Osman provides his insight on the sectarian issue in Egypt, after Muslim-Coptic violence struck Cairo once again earlier this week.

After unsuccessful talks between Iran and P5+1 in early April, Gholam R. Vatandoust assesses Iran’s options to remain confrontational or pursue a more constructive position in the international community.

When you travel in the Middle East you are bound to have multiple “Holy Moly!” moments.  My wife and I had one of those last Thursday.  Yet we weren’t touring the Temple of Karnak in Luxor, gazing upon the Khazneh in Petra in the late afternoon when the Nabatean capital seems to glow a rose red, or marveling at the ancient ruins of Ani on the Turkish-Armenian border.  We were in Turkey, in Istanbul, in Kadikoy to be exact, but it was not some Ottoman gem of a mosque or palace that caused our eyes to go wide.  Nope.  It was the Şükrü Saracoĝlo Stadyumu and the 52,000 fans of the Fenerbahce Sports Club’s football (i.e. soccer) team—it also fields basketball, boxing, table tennis, and sailing teams—who were near delirium even before their team took the field against Italy’s Lazio.

I have been a casual fan of Fenerbahce’s soccer team since my first trip to Turkey in October 1992 when a new Turkish friend told me that I “must” have the team’s jersey if I wanted to bring something authentic back to the United States.  My one-time Turkish teacher was and remains a fan of the blue and gold.  I remember one lesson during which we only worked on cheers one would hear at a Fenerbahce game.  The team actually has a rather long reach with a Fenerbahce club branch based in New York City.  A few years ago when I still lived in Gotham, my wife and I were strolling down 2^ndAvenue on a weekend afternoon.  Over her objections I was wearing my Fenerbahce jersey—by then a vintage variety—when a stranger came upon us, shouted in Turkish, hugged me, and walked away.  My wife was quite startled, but I played it cool, “Fenerbahce fan,” I informed her as I continued toward our destination.  There have been many a jet-lagged nights and early mornings when I stared at CNN International hoping for a baseball, football, or basketball score after the onslaught of cricket results, but also keeping an eye out for how Fenerbahce fared.  Just as when the New York Yankees, New York Giants, or New York Knicks won, if Fenerbahce prevailed, I gave the team a lonely, tired, “Yes!” with a fist in the air.

So when we arrived in Istanbul last Tuesday morning to an email from my tweep and friend, Okan Altıparmak, asking if we would like to go to the game, I leapt at the chance.  Surely, whatever we had planned for Thursday could not be as much fun…or as fascinating as the Fenerbahce-Lazio game turned out to be.  I always claim that I am genetically encoded to be a Yankees fan due to my late father’s devotion to the team, but I’ve got nothing on Okan. He literally has Fenerbahce in his blood, being the oldest son of Ogün Altıparmak who scored 67 goals for the team in 173 games in the 1960s and early 1970s (Ogun also played for the Washington Whips—a distant forerunner to DC United).  Over the course of a beautiful afternoon on the Asian side of Istanbul (which evokes Los Angeles or dare I say…Tel Aviv?), Okan schooled us on Fenerbahce history, game day etiquette, the perfidy of European side rival, Galatasaray; and the politics of Turkish soccer.  I cannot say that I understood the latter completely, though it is wrapped up in an apparent just-under-the-surface political rivalry between supporters of (Fenerbahce loving) Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s Justice and Development Party and the Gülen Movement over the control of the boards and management of various clubs.  Turkish soccer has long been a high stakes affair.  In 2000 there was a gangland hit on some soccer officials in the lobby of the Ankara Sheraton Hotel and Towers, which is why I never meet Turkish friends for tea or coffee in hotel lobbies.

One of the most interesting things that Okan said to us as we ambled down Bagdat Caddesi, which he called Fenerbahce’s “Citadel,” was his belief that “football is one of the few outlets where Turks can express themselves freely.”  I had not thought about it until then, but Okan was pinpointing a nagging contradiction in Turkish politics.  Despite all of the extraordinary changes in Turkey over the last decade that have led to endless declarations among Ankara’s boosters in Washington and Europe that Turkey has “made great democratic strides,” almost eleven years after the Justice and Development Party (AKP) came to power, there is certain conformity within the political arena.  Those who challenge the AKP do so at significant risk.  This is not to suggest that Turkey is an authoritarian police state, but there are features of Turkish politics that seem to be indistinguishable from non-democratic polities.

The numbers may have decreased since April of 2012, but there are still a fair number of journalists in Turkish jails, a greater number who have lost their jobs for criticizing the government, and still a greater number of journalists who, due to the exigencies of feeding sons, daughters, husbands, wives, or parents, compromise their professional integrity and self-censor.  The day of the Fenerbahce game, I heard a Turkish journalist, who I know to be a critic of Erdogan and the AKP, publicly extol the prime minister and his party’s stewardship of the country.  Furthermore, on Friday, a well-known journalist named Amberin Zaman was dismissed from her post at the daily Habertürk under ambiguous circumstances, though she has been rather critical of the government’s Syria policy, leading people to conclude that she was sacked for that reason.

The sad state of Turkish journalism is but one example of Turkey’s backsliding.  There are many more.  So the next time you hear a Turkish official, American foreign policy intellectual, or a particular subset of European elite declare that “Turkey is more democratic than it was a decade ago,” they are speaking the truth, but also keep in mind that the country is less open than it was seven years ago.  In the meantime, “Fenerbahçem sen çok yaşa… Canım feda olsun sana… Hiç bir şeye değişilmez… Senin sevgin bu dünyada!” (Long live my Fenerbahçe… It’s worth sacrificing my life for you… Unmatched in the world… Is the love for you!)

Al-Monitor outlines the investigation of Egypt’s beloved comedian, Bassem Youssef.

Muftah discusses how nuances of the Arabic language reflect and affect the ever turbulent politics of the region.

A new resource, Syria Video, which compiles war videos and other information related to Syria’s ongoing civil war.

April 3—Istanbul

A draft of Turkey’s new constitution was supposed to be finished on Monday, but the members of the Constitutional Reconciliation Commission say they need about another month to produce a draft.  The missed deadline prompted Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan to float the idea that the Justice and Development Party would circumvent the Commission and take its own version of a new constitution to the Turkish people in a referendum.  Not surprisingly, the prime minister’s proposal was met with considerable criticism from the opposition parties in the Grand National Assembly all of which have representatives on the Commission.  In the English language daily, Today’s Zaman, the Nationalist Movement Party’s Faruk Bal said, “The prime minister is looking for excuses to break his promise that his party would not quit the negotiating table.  He is working to disperse the commission.”

The AKP denied that it was looking to make an end run on the constitution, but it would not be surprising if it did.  More than a decade of prosperity, foreign policy successes, a growing middle class, and new services (especially in health and transportation) have placed Prime Minister Erdogan and the AKP in a commanding political position.  As a result, they have very little incentive to negotiate with an opposition that is clearly determined not to hand Erdogan everything he wants.  The party’s spokesmen will claim that it is committed to the Constitutional Reconciliation Commission process in the name of building a democracy, but that’s not the way these kinds of things generally work.

The AKP may indeed stay within the framework of the Commission, but it will make sure that the new constitution faithfully reflects its wishes. Institutions— which, contrary to widespread misconception, are laws, rules, decrees, and regulations or, for example, a bunch of these things put together in a constitution—are always the product of heated political debate and contestation.  Yet these “frameworks for social action” are rarely neutral.  Instead they reflect the interests of the elite that is in power at the time those institutions are conceived.  And given that institutional development takes place in the context of existing institutions and previous institutional innovations, Turkey’s new constitution will set the country on a particular political trajectory potentially for generations, which is why the stakes are so high for everyone involved.  After all, if the AKP’s vision for Turkey is enshrined in the country’s constitution it will be a crowning achievement in Erdogan’s effort to transform the country.