Since the corruption and bribery investigation into businessmen and senior government officials, including four then-ministers, went public on Dec. 17 and Dec. 25, 2013, thousands of police officers have been removed from their posts and reassigned to other positions because of alleged links to the Hizmet movement.
Erdoğan risks his own Islamic beliefs just to lead his voters to believe that Gülen and his followers are not Muslims, but puppets and even agents of the United States Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) — just like Ivan Watson of CNN International! — and Mossad. Erdoğan also keeps claiming that Fethullah Gülen and Hizmet movement supporters are terrorists.
The Supreme Board of Radio and Television (RTÜK) has been harassing TV networks that it deems to be anti-government, and Samanyolu TV has become one of its major targets. The fines have mostly come following the Dec. 17, 2013 corruption operation, in which several businessmen close to Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and the sons of three ministers were detained over corruption charges.
There are now serious question marks over whether the government orchestrated the operations at TİB to libel Hizmet for wiretapping with the aim of diverting attention from the separate spying case under way in Ankara and saving those uniformed men from facing judicial scrutiny over charges of spying.
Several claims and accusations have been voiced, and the Hizmet movement has been described as a gang and a “parallel structure,” Are these accusations based on concrete evidence? No. Fabricated news published by pro-government media outlets, unfounded accusations and slanderous claims that are legally null and void have been refuted one by one. However, the pro-government media does not care about this, since they do not care in the least about rights or the rule of law.
Political madness in Turkey is at its peak. Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan does not even refrain from using the term “witch hunt” against the Gülen followers. When Erdoğan and his circle don’t find any evidence, they allegedly try to produce evidence. Bureaucrats who don’t want to be part of Erdoğan’s witch hunt have sent letters to the media and prosecutors confessing what they are doing. Unfortunately, what they said in those letters has been confirmed by later developments.
Presenting the Gülen movement as the architect of the court ruling may help the government deal with a possible backlash from families, the İHH — an outspoken supporter of the government’s Middle East policies — and a wider segment of its own voters who want Israeli officials to pay for the Mavi Marmara raid, in case a reconciliation deal with Israel goes into effect. Internationally, it may help the government deal with Israeli and Western criticism that it is not committed to reconciliation with Israel despite officially vowing that it is.
The report claimed that large-scale profiling activities have been launched against personnel who possibly have links to a “parallel state” — a term used by pro-government circles to define the faith-based Hizmet movement — upon orders from Science, Industry and Technology Minister Fikri Işık. Those being profiled by the center are being systematically dismissed.
Gülen’s unwavering stand against Erdoğan’s cycle of corrupt power despite pressure, threats and intimidation has already exposed how much damage political Islamists have dealt to the religion of Islam as well as the Turkish nation. The appeal of politically exploited Islamist ideology has lost its shine and its strength has been diluted or broken during Erdoğan’s version 2.0 regime.