The rise of the Islamic State’s Caliphate prompted the United States and European powers to partner with the YPG, in spite of their own classification of its mother organization, the PKK, as a terrorist organization.35 While Western powers stretched credulity by claiming the YPG was really separate from the PKK, they were left with no other viable option on the ground to fight back against the Isl. [...] When the Republic of Cyprus – internationally recognized as the government of the whole island but controlled by the Greek Cypriots – began unilaterally developing the energy resources in the island’s Exclusive Economic Zone, Turkey and the Turkish Cypriots in Turkish-occupied northern Cyprus objected. [...] The Turks and Turkish Cypriots insisted that exploitation of those resources await a settlement of the Cyprus problem; the Greek Cypriots hoped to use the development of the resources as leverage to achieve a more favorable settlement. [...] The rift between Erdoğan and the Gülenists occurred at the exact moment when Turkey’s neighborhood caught fire, and Erdoğan sought to embrace a role for Turkey as the leader of a new Middle East, led by the Islamist ideology of the Muslim Brotherhood. [...] In the June 2015 parliamentary election, the AKP for the first time failed to capture a majority of the seats, while the Kurdish HDP emerged as a would-be kingmaker in Turkish politics with an unprecedented thirteen percent of the vote.65 While Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu, sought to build a coalition government with the center-left opposition, Erdoğan undermined those efforts.
- Pages
- 33
- Published in
- United States of America
