TURKISH LEADER ERDOGAN DECLARES JIHAD ON KURDS, DISPATCHES SOLDIERS TO "DECIMATE" THEM

 

 

UPDATE:

Turkish leader declares jihad on Kurds, 

dispatches soldiers to “decimate” them

BY CHRISTINE DOUGLASS-WILLIAMS

SEE: https://www.jihadwatch.org/2018/02/turkish-leader-declares-jihad-on-kurds-dispatches-soldiers-to-decimate-them;

republished below in full unedited for informational, educational, and research purposes:

Erdogan launched what Islamists are openly calling a jihad against the Kurdish 

YPG faction. Thousands of Turkish soldiers, along with tanks and artillery, have 

blasted their way across the Turkish border into Syria.

Recep Tayyip Erdogan is the model of a clever jihadist leader who employs a combination of stealth and violent means to attain his expansionist dreams of a revived Ottoman Empire.
After the fall of the Ottomans, and soon after the declaration of the Republic of Turkey, Ankara’s goal became to destroy all non-Turkish elements within the Republic, with a primary target being the Kurds and the Armenians. Now Erdogan has taken up that effort once again. As he aims to destroy the historic culture and identity of the Kurds, he has deceptively (and cruelly) called his jihad invading death squads “Operation Olive Branch.”
On January 20 and 21, 90,000 mosques prayed Qur’anic “conquest” prayers calling on Muslims to be “ruthless against unbelievers” and for victory against the Kurds, right before Erdogan’s thousands of soldiers were dispatched.
Yet despite Erdogan’s unsavoury record, he still manages to sell to Western leaders the idea that he is “moderate.” Earlier this week, Pope Francis rolled out the red carpet for him; Erdogan took opportunity to ask the Pope to help lead a “concerted and continuous international effort to fight Islamophobia.” He also deceitfully “discussed the plight” of Christians in the Middle East and “promised to mobilize Turkish support to help them in every possible way, just as the Ottomans did in their 600-year history.”

There are a couple problems with his hollow “promise”: Christian persecution has dramatically increased in Turkey under his hardline rule. Erdogan has even brought changes to school curricula: “Islamic law class and basic fundamental religion lectures will include lessons on jihad.” Also, Christians were not supported under Ottoman rule as Erdogan states. As Robert Spencer has noted: “In reality, the Christians in the Ottoman Empire suffered the institutionalized discrimination and harassment of dhimmitude, punctuated with occasional open persecution.”

Erdogan has also declared that the European headscarf ban started a battle between the Cross and the Crescent. He continues to deny the atrocious Armenian genocide; has supported the Islamic State and the Muslim Brotherhood; and has long been on a global campaign to compel Western nations to criminalize “Islamophobia.”
All world leaders, especially the Pope, should be condemning Erdogan and his unrighteous persecution of the Kurds, particularly now that Erdogan has “dispatched his army into Syria to decimate them.”

“Turkey’s Erdogan Declares Jihad on Religious Minorities in Syria”, by Lela Gilbert, Newsmax, February 6, 2018:

Turkey’s irascible President, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, is once again infuriated with a Kurdish group and has dispatched his army into Syria to decimate them.
On January 20, Erdogan launched what Islamists are openly calling a jihad against the Kurdish YPG faction. Thousands of Turkish soldiers, along with tanks and artillery, have blasted their way across the Turkish border into Syria.
With a cynical choice of words, the Turks have code-named their invasion, “Operation Olive Branch.”
Under Erdogan’s leadership, Turkey’s military is believed by some to be a threat to Middle East peace. Perhaps more alarming is that Erdogan’s troops also comprise NATO’s second largest army.
Since Operation Olive Branch was launched, Turkish soldiers have been making their way toward Afrin City. But their progress has been slower than expected.
Egypt’s Al-Ahram reported on Feb. 4, “Ankara is heightening the pitch of its chauvinistic rhetoric on Kurdish militias and U.S. policies in northern Syria, but is making painfully meagre progress in its ground offensive….”
Afrin is a canton in Syria’s northwest, populated largely by Kurds. Many in Afrin’s population belong to the YPK, a Kurdish militia that has heroically fought alongside United States forces against the Islamic State/ISIS.
In the complicated Middle East, however, one man’s hero is another man’s terrorist. In Erdogan’s narrow-eyed view, the YPK (and several other Kurdish groups) are terrorists.
So the Kurdish communities in the Afrin region — many of them civilians alongside displaced minority families who fled the Syrian war — are once again literally under the gun.
Since the fighting began on Jan. 20, Turkish fighters have slaughtered over 900 soldiers and civilians, including Christians, Yazidis, and other unarmed civilians.
Many of the displaced people in the region were originally from Aleppo, a city that has historically had a Christian community of about 250,000. Aleppo used to be the largest city in Syria. But with the rise of sectarian violence beginning in 2010, many displaced Christian families were forced to flee to Afrin, Idlib, and other northern safe havens. There they were joined by Yazidis and other minorities.
Tragically, those safe havens are now warzones.
According to UN figures, today 323,000 people are living in Afrin and nearby areas under Kurdish control. Of them, 192,000 are in need of humanitarian aid and 125,000 are what the UN terms “internally displaced persons,” or IDPs, from other parts of Syria.
As this latest fighting began to heat up, Twitter was alight with warnings from church groups in Afrin and nearby communities, pleading for help.
Some refugee parents posted online photos of their children living in tents, entirely unprotected as shells and shrapnel rained down on them. Others were photographed hiding in caves, cringing at the sound of incoming bombs and bullets.
Scores of appeals for help from trapped Christians have been tweeted and retweeted. One message from a local Pastor Hanan pleaded for international intervention and protection.
“As the Good Shepherd Church in Afrin city,” he wrote, “we demand urgent international protection for the believers in Afrin and the cease of this Turkish shelling….”
Pastor Hanan also pointed out the very real danger that the present upheaval may help ISIS or al-Qaida to make a regional comeback.
Meanwhile, The New York Times reports that foreign fighters are joining the battle against Turkey in support of the YPG.
One volunteer posted online, “We have fought Daesh [ISIS] before in Raqqa, in Deir ez-Zor, and now with the fascist Turkish state that we are fighting here in Afrin.”
Unrepentantly, Erdogan has threated to extend Operation Olive Branch further into Syria, and to remove all “terrorists,” so he can transport some three million refugees, presently sheltering in Turkey, back in to Syria for repatriation.
One Feb. 3 report quotes Erdogan saying that the fighting is about to end. At the same time, Hurriyet, a Turkish news source, reports that the Turkish army is getting close to the Afrin City Center. It also reports that Erdogan’s AKP party is seeking approval from Parliament, “for Turkey’s ongoing military operation into the Syrian district of Afrin.…”
Will Erdogan’s ever-expanding ambitions succeed? Will anyone — NATO, Russia, Iranian, Syrian, or any other force — stand in Erdogan’s way?
The Economist sums up the very volatile situation, and warns the conflict could spiral out of control…..