In addition, Iranian regime supported the Islamist extremists in Turkey for the decades, and some of the secret Iranian state bodies still back Islamist extremism in Turkey. Iran is also a bridge between Afghanistan and Turkey. Many Afghan War ghazi came to Turkey thorough Iran. The chaos in Iraq provides a training school for the Islamist and other extremist groups in Turkey.

Not only Iran and Iraq but also the Caucasus conflicts helped the religionist terrorists. The Chechen War in particular triggered the nationalist-Islamist feelings in Turkey. Some of the terrorists took training in the Caucasus; used this region as a base to move Turkey and finally they abused the poor circumstances the Caucasus Muslims faced. The victims of Armenian occupation in Azerbaijan, tortured and killed people in Chechnya were all used as part of the religionist propaganda. The most crucial factor in blooming of religionist terrorism in Anatolia has been the Palestinian issue. Not only religionist terrorism, but also the moderate Turkish Islamic movements have been nourished by the Palestinian Problem. The Palestinian issue provided propaganda materials and training camps. There is no single terrorist organization in Turkey which had no link with the Palestinian terrorists in the past, including the Marxists and Kurdist groups. The Palestinian camps in Lebanon in particular became the school of regional terrorism as Afghanistan functioned that role in Central Asia.

Apart from all these factors, the ultra-laic military and bureaucracy’s involvements to the civilian politics and the laic-motivated coups have damaged the relations between religious people and the State.

Another reason which makes Turkey a perfect target for the religionist terrorist is Turkey’s close relations with the EU, US and Israel. Al Qaeda threatened Turkey many times for recognizing Israel and permitting US bases and called all Muslims to resist Turkey-West alliance as witnessed on 3 July 2006.[1]

Turkey has been part of all European integration and co-operation initiatives. The negotiations for EU full-membership still continues between Turkey and the EU. Turkey is member of all pan-European organizations except the EU. Turkey as a member of the NATO since 1952, has been one of the most loyal ally to the US and the Western Block during the Cold War years. Turkey’s relations with Israel is also an exceptional one among the Muslim countries. Turkey recognized Israel’s right to exist since the beginning. Turkey even established military co-operation with Israel. Israeli air forces make training flights in Central Anatolia. Contrary to the expectations, Turkish-Israeli relations developed during the AK Party Government: The Israeli Ambassador to Ankara, Pinhas Avivi, stated that the good relations between the two countries have reached its peak in history during the current Turkish government. Delivering a speech at ISRO (USAK) on September 6, 2006, the Ambassador said that the economic relations between two countries have for the first time passed $10 billion and described the relations as “strategic”. Turkey’s good relations made Turkey one of the most important targets for Al Qaeda because the organization aimed to create a polarization between Islam and the West, and Turkey was undermining such a polarization plan.

Turkey joined the America-led global war combating campaign and even sent soldiers to Afghanistan in solidarity with the American soldiers against religionist terrorism. Turkey’s support to the US and its allies also makes it a target for Al Qaeda like organizations and anti-Western extremist groups.

Al Qaeda-like terrorist organizations foremost challenge the Muslim and Turkish values and very essence of Islam religion. There is a huge gap between Turkish Islamic interpretation and Al Qaeda organization. That’s why Turkish politicians and many Turkish spiritual leaders condemned Al Qaeda attacks, and even named Al Qaeda “terrorist organization”.

Briefly, Islamist extremists and the religionist terrorists have a lot to abuse in Turkey to increase their influence. Turkey with its location, history and political relations, seems very vulnerable country to the Islamists. However, strangely it can be argued that Turkey is the most successful Muslim country in combating against the religionist terror. In this paper assuming Turkey is successful and can be a good model in struggling against global terrorism, the secrets of this success will be researched. We’ll try to find whether there is a Turkish model or not.

RELIGIONIST TERRORISTS ARE SUCCESFULL OR NOT IN TURKEY?

Turkey has exposed the ethnic, ideological and other kinds of terrorism. The PKK for instance caused more than 35.000 lives in more than two decades. Similarly the economical, political and security chaos of the 1970s was a direct result of the right-left terrorism which resulted in 1980 coup. The DHKP-C terrorism also damaged economy and political stability. We should also mention the Armenian terrorism. The ASALA and the JCAG terrorists attacked Turkish diplomatic representatives and killed more than 40 Turkish diplomats and other representatives. Many Turkish Airlines offices and bank branches in abroad were bombed by the Armenian terrorists.

As a matter of fact that considering all these, Turkey’s terrorism combating experience may not be considered as a success story. However the Turkish struggle against the religionist terrorism is an exception. Though almost all military coups legitimated their action by arguing that Turkey was under an Islamist threat, the ‘Islamist terrorist organization’ could never become a serious and massive threat to Turkey’s security as much as the PKK or the DHKP-C could do.

The religionist organizations’ attacks remained limited in certain social groups and limited regions. When we compare the religionist terrorist attacks with the other Muslim countries we see the vivid difference between Turkey and other countries. In Egypt for instance, 1500 people were killed between 1992-1997 in religionist terrorism, and then the attacks continued in the following years. About 20.000 suspects are in the prisons and many tourists and Christians were targeted by the militants. The Islamist terrorists are similarly big issue in Saudi Arabia since 2003. More than 200 people were killed in last two years in terrorism in Saudi Arabia. In both countries, the terrorists have significant support from the people and they threaten the stability, security and political system of the countries. In many Muslim countries the terrorist groups are perceived as alternative to the current governments. The picture in Turkey is quite different. The terrorists, Islamist or Marxists, are terrorists in the name of the people. Even the Islamic groups accuse the terrorists of dirtying the holiness of Islam.

Islamists in Turkey: IBDA-C and Hezbollah Cases

IBDA-C

IBD-C for instance could never be an influential organization over the masses. The number of the IBDA-C members remained very low, and the organization made some assassinations, but it could not access the very heart of the society and the political system. Most of the leaders and members of the organization are in the prisons.

Hezbollah

Turkey Hezbollah was more successful than the IBDA-C. However it was again limited to certain social groups and geographic regions. We should first note that there is no direct connection between Turkey Hezbollah and Hezbollah in Lebanon although some of the members of Turkey Hezbollah were trained in Iran’s Kum city. The organization had limited financial and other Iranian links as well. The organization was however a domestic terrorist group concentrating on mostly Sunni Kurdish people in the eastern and South Eastern Turkey. Turkish security forces at the begging did not fully focus on the Hezbollah due to the organization’s thorny relations with the PKK; another Kurdish terrorist group in the region. The PKK’s ideology was based on separatism and Marxism while Hezbollah was Islamist, and the ideological differences caused great competition to surpass each other. Many PKK members or sympathizers were murdered by the Hezbollah. Hezbollah also tried to control the mosques in the region.  1999 estimates suggested that Hezbollah members as may have as many as 25.000 adherents, including 4.000 armed militants. Based in southeastern Anatolia, the Hizballah originally operated mainly in the cities of Diyarbakir, Van, Batman and Mardin. Members of the terrorist group habitually gathered in and around religious bookstores, where they discussed their ideologies and spread their propaganda. The organizational structure and main aims of the Hezbollah were similar to the Al Qaeda’s structure and aims. The organization was a chain of the loose cells, and the ultimate aim was to destroy the secular order. However at the first stage they did not attack the security forces. They first try to digest the religious groups’ opposition. Apart from the PKK militants they killed many Islamist and liberal Islamic people. Yet they did not kill the people to become more popular at national level. All knew who killed the victim in the close circles of the Islamist groups, yet the rest of the country had no interest in the murders. The security forces at that time mainly concentrated on the PKK terrorism as the Kurdist separatist terrorism was at its peak. The Hezbollah enjoyed the lack of enough interest on it.

Hezbollah had bookstores in many cities. The bookstores which sell Koran and other religious books were the heart of the movement. Then they started to control the mosques and the other religious institutions. Hezbollah even killed some imams who resisted to the Hezbollah demands. The districts mostly populated by the new Kurdish immigrants from the South East Anatolia provided a perfect environment for Hezbollah to gain militant and supporters. A 2000 indictment of high-ranking Ilimciler members actually specified that the activities of Hezbollah in Turkey ‘included shootings, arson, assault with meat cleavers, kidnapping, beatings and attacks with acid on women not dressed in an Islamic manner.’

Due to ideological divergences and leadership disputes, Turkish Hizballah separated into two major groups: Ilimciler (Scientists) and Menzilciler (Rangers). The Ilimciler, led by Huseyin Velioglu, met at the Ilim Bookstore, whereas the Menzilciler, led by Fidan Gungor, congregated at the Menzil bookstore. Beside leadership struggle, the two factions were opposed in the tactics they used to accomplish the goal of the terrorist organization. While the Ilimciler defended armed struggle and comprised Hezbollah’s most brutal factions, the Menzilciler believed it was too early for such radical action and opposed, for instance, attacks on suspected PKK-KONGRA GEL members.[2] The internal struggle caused death of more than 100 people from two fractions.

In the late 1990s the Hezbollah’s Ilimciler wing widened its operation area to the big cities, namely Istanbul and Bursa. Ilimciler’s attacks to Menzilciler and other Islamist groups continued. The group also kidnapped more than 60 people and killed many more. However the capture of Abdullah Ocalan, the PKK leader, and the decrease in the PKK terrorism allowed the police to focus on Hezbollah. Thanks to the police measures and operations against the Hezbollah, one of the bloodiest religionist terrorist organization in Turkish history was ended. In this process Turkey carefully avoided from the classical mistakes made in combating terrorism, and a successful example emerged which could be a good example for other cases and other countries:

First of all, almost all Hezbollah activities were in the police area (metropolitan areas), not the gendarme’s. The Hezbollah was not the foremost priority of the National Intelligence Organization (MIT), and the MIT also did not intervene the police’ strategy against the Hezbollah. Thus all operations were operated by single security force: the police. This was vital, because the co-ordination problem between the police, gendarme, army and the MIT has always been a big problem in combating terrorism. The Turkish police at that time had the capacity to make synchronic operations at the same time in many cities.

Second measure was not to publicize the Hezbollah. Contrary to the usual fighting strategies against terrorism, the Turkish police kept the operation preparations secret. Name of Hezbollah was not repeated too much and the issue did not find more room in Turkish media. The Government did not declare a war against Hezbollah in media and nobody accused any social group for the Hezbollah murders. Thus the terrorists could not find opportunity to appeal to the public fears, prejudices and expectations.

Third, the Turkish police did not arrest anyone and waited more than 8 months for the great operation. All Hezbollah militants were found and followed by the police intelligence during all these 8 months. The police even ignored their some small crimes. The sympathizers were never disturbed by the police, and some of the intelligence police were embedded into the organization and they lived inside for the months.

In addition, the police decided not to make any security operation in the holy places, like mosques. No police was allowed to enter the mosques even to arrest or capture Hezbollah members, although the police officers time to time knew some of the militants hid among the cemaat (mosque community). The aim was not to alienate the ordinary religious people from the State. The Hezbollah was propagandizing that Turkish State was atheist and against Islam, and an operation in a mosque would may strengthen this propaganda. The police was careful not to be seen as anti-Islam during these operations.

Another measure taken by the police was co-operation with Turkish Department of Religious Affairs (Diyanet). The religious experts analyzed the Hezbollah’s claims and prepared the anti-dote of these arguments. All these documents were put on the educational web sites of the Diyanet. The imams were trained to face the Hezbollah challenge. No Hezbollah name was mentioned in the anti-Hezbollah training materials.

Police officers leaked into the organization and more than 20.000 Hezbollah documents were captured, and analyzed by the experts. Also the police collected all information about the Hezbollah. The analyses from these captured and collected documents shaped the whole strategy. According to this strategy Turkish police did not aim to destroy the terrorists but terrorism.

During the long waiting time, security forces showed the virtue of the ability to endure waiting without annoyed or upset.  Contrary to the PKK or the other terror cases, there was no revenge in the very nature of the operations.

About 400 people linked to the terrorist group by local authorities were arrested in February 1999. When they felt ready enough, the police launched synchronic planned security operations in 57 provinces in 2000. The terrorist organization was collapsed and all leaders were arrested or captured. Just as Hezbollah leaders were attempting to restore the strength of their group, the police operations reached a great success against the Islamist fundamentalists. The security forces continued their professional struggle against Hezbollah after killing of the leaders. Hezbollah safe houses were raided methodically and mass graves of victims tortured and executed by Hezbollah members were discovered throughout the country by the police. The pictures showing the savageness of the organization were serviced to the mass media and the people condemned the Hezbollah members. Hezbollah’s actions alienated more members and sympathizers and the public even renamed the group Hizbul Vahset, or Party of Slaughter. By the fall of 2000, nearly 1.000 alleged members of the radical Islamist group were taken into custody although the real number of the members was more than 1.000. The police did not want to question more people not to make them victimized. About 20.000 pages of more documents were also recovered from Hezbollah computer archives. There were thousands of names on the documents, however increasing the number of arrested people would not help to combat religionist terrorism.

If the security forces focused only on the terrorists, and if they followed a classical terrorism combat approach, the Hezbollah may have made “Turkey a lake of blood with a group of 20 or 30 people” as the alleged deputy leader of the group, Edip Gumus, declared in 2000. However the police’s different way of fighting undermined the Hezbollah’s ideological power. The police did not sacrifice the long-term targets for the short-term considerations. The importance was given to the people the Hezbollah concentrated on, not only the organization itself. Both Hezbollah and the Police strived against each other for the purpose of attaining the hearts and minds of the people. The Hezbollah lost the competition.

There are many lessons in the Turkey Hezbollah Operations the security forces should take in Turkey and in other countries. Turkish security forces could not follow such a way in combating the PKK terrorism. The institutional co-ordination between the police, Army, gendarme and the MIT could not be maintained against the PKK and some other terrorist organizations. The Turkish forces attacked directly to the terrorists without enough preparation time. And maybe the most important problem has been that Turkish security forces tried to destroy the PKK militants, not the PKK terror. Enough care and importance have not been given to the people the PKK targeted.

Al Qaeda in Turkey

The Hezbollah Case gave more experience to the Turkish police about the fundamentalist terrorism. More experts who know Islam and extremism very well were employed the police departments which deal with the religionist extremism and terrorism. Similar to the Hezbollah Case, Turkish officers did not arrest the sympathizers or supporters of Al Qaeda and Hizbut Tahrir organizations because there is no organization named Al Qaeda, like the PKK, which is united and disciplined organization, but there is an organization where people gather around an idea and carry out operations all over the world.[3] If you directly and impatiently attack such an organization, you could never follow the tracks which will take you to the big names of the organization. Arresting the sympathizers or low-ranked militants may have spoiled everything in Al Qaeda operations. Therefore the police followed the idea and relations, not only the militants.

They followed the suspected members of the organization for a long time and reached the greater terror networks. All operations made outside of the mosques, and the police gave great importance not to be perceived as anti-Islam by the people.

Another advantage in combating Al Qaeda is Turkish Islamic understanding. The Turkish people have very different religion understanding than the Al Qaeda has. If the State does not alienate the ordinary people from itself, the people would not help the terrorists. Al Qaeda faced a strong resistance from ordinary people and, contrary to Saudi Arabia or Pakistan, could not establish its cell groups easily in Turkey. Many attack attempts were prevented before conducted, except 2003 Istanbul Bombings.

On 15 November 2003, two truck bombs slammed into two Istanbul synagogues and exploded devastated the synagogues and killed 27 people. Most of the killed people were Turkish Muslims. 300 more injured in the attack. 5 days later two more truck bombs exploded near HSBC Bank branch and the British Istanbul Consulate killing 30 people and wounding 400. Most of the victims were again Turkish.

The bombings did not cause any sympathy for the Al Qaeda in any social group in Turkey. Just a opposite, the assaults created a massive hate against the terrorists, made it more difficult to gain militants in Turkey for the organization. Apart from the secular institutions, all Islamic spiritual leaders condemned the attack and blamed Osama Bin Laden. 74 people charged with involvement in the bombings, including Syrians (like Sakka and Obysi). Most of the Turkish citizens were Kurdish origin and from the eastern part of the country. Harun Ilhan, Habib Akdas and Gurcan Bac were responsible Turkish citizens for the attacks. Akdas fled to Iraq, and later killed by the coalition forces in Fallujah. Al-Saqa and Ilhan were convicted and sentenced to life in prison, as were five other Turkish men convicted of organizing the bombing.

The security forces could not prevent Istanbul bombing, yet the entire Al Qaeda network in Turkey was revealed in a short time. Compared to the US, Spain and UK cases, Turkey became the first country which uncovered the whole national Al Qaeda network. After the Istanbul Bombings, some other attacks were prevented by the police, including attack plans against the Israeli ships and other targets. In Israeli ship case, the organization had to use the foreigners instead of Turkish people, because they had no enough Turkish members to make the attack. When 3 Al Qaeda suspects arrested in February 2002 at a checkpoint after crossing the border illegally from Iran, it was understood that two of them were Palestinian and the other was Jordanian.

Al Qaeda abused anything possible to manipulate the Turkish people: The cartoon crisis, the Pope’s visit to Turkey etc. were all exploited by the Al Qaeda, however it could not increase enough its terrorist number in Turkey and many attack attempts were stopped by the police. Police arrested 10 people before the Pope visit. All of the 10 suspects had been watching by the police for a year and security forces arrested them after tracking e-mail exchanges on the purchase of bomb-making materials in December 2006.

Recently 47 people in 6 different cities were arrested on suspicions of having links with the Al Qaeda. The security operation came after more than one year of intelligence work by security forces.

Openness of the Turkish Political System

We listed and discussed in detailed the main reasons of the Turkish success. However may be the most important factor is openness of Turkish political system for the Islamic opposition. The religious people can defend their ideas and their objections about the system. Not only the governing AKP (AK Party), but also almost all other centrist and righteous political parties consider themselves religious, or conservative in terms of religion and traditions. Another important factor is that the people find legal ways to express their critics about the US and Israel. Contrary to many Arab regimes in the Middle East, ordinary Turkish man or woman know that their government, media and institutions give the needed messages to those who make mistakes in the region. Thus the Hezbollah or Al Qaeda cannot abuse the religious or East-West problems in order to gain public support.

CONCLUSION

In conclusion, when we compare the Al Qaeda and other Islamist activities in Turkey and other Sunni Muslim countries of the Middle East, we see a success story in terms of murders, number of terrorist attacks and the people’s support to the security forces.

There are many reasons yet the most important ones for that result can be listed as follow:

1)      Turkish Islam: Turkish people do not allow spreading of the religionist terrorism in society. This is a civilian resistance instead of official fight, and the Turkish security forces realized this advantage and encouraged the civilian resistance against religionist terrorism. Terrorists could not abuse the Islamic matters as much as they do in different countries. Turkish society does not see the terrorists as representatives of Islam, and thus terrorists cannot take hostage the religion.

Turkish Islamic understanding is more critical, and not only accuse the other faiths or peoples in the problems. At the same time Turkish Islamic interpretation is the most liberal one in the Muslim world.

Turks mostly do not equate Christianity with the West and Judaism with Israel. They have learned through experience that religion has a larger meaning than political factions. Since a significant proportion of the population was Christians and Jews during the Ottoman times, these religions are not alien to Turkish people.

Turkish Islam does not interpret worldly affairs solely through religious dogma. The Turkish tradition is noted for its pragmatic and practical approach.

Turkish Islam did not evolve in a conflict environment. Instead of accusing the other faiths, Turkish Ottomans first questioned their own mistakes in interpreting the religion. Turkish Islam was the first mainstream Islamic interpretation to witness the conflict between modern political thinking and religion. The Turks searched the possibility of the co-existence between Islam and modern life during the last century of the Ottoman Empire.

Turkish Islam, contrary to Wahabism in Saudi Arabia, is not the result of a project. It is not artificial or fabricated by certain individuals or groups. It has evolved over a long duration and as a result of certain geographic and historic developments.[4]

2)      There is a strict division between politics and religion in Turkey, different from many other Muslim countries. Imams and other spiritual people cannot make politics when they are in service of religion. Even speaking the political matters in the mosques are not welcomed by many. This tradition limits the entrance of the terrorist groups into the mosques.

3)      Fundamentals of political democracy (separation of Mosque and State, and the political sovereignty of the people) have roots in the Ottoman period. These are not foreign imports. They are now Turkish tradition, since they were developed in Istanbul in the 19th century, they were also developed in Cairo and Damascus, and so progressive political reform is within the tradition of the whole region. The clash between moderate Islam and Al-Qaeda like fanatic Islamic interpretation is not new and Turkey won the war after difficult times. Now Turkish society is ready to overcome any kind of extreme ideological-religious attacks.

4)      The conservative and ‘Islamic Democrat’ AKP Government is a chance for Turkey in combating religionist terrorism. The AKP is a conservative and very sensitive party about Islam, but at the same time AKP is the most pro-EU party in Turkey. The AKP Government has given great importance to relations with the US, Israel and the EU, meanwhile it has not hesitated to harshly criticize them when they made mistakes. As a result the Government did not allow the religionist groups to abuse the problems with the West. In Turkey not only the Government but also the leftist, nationalist and other secular political parties are critical about the Western and Israeli Middle Eastern policies. So there is no absence of opposition against the West and Israel that could be used by Al Qaeda like organizations. This makes a polarization between Islam and the West more difficult for the religionist terrorists. Turkish government, political parties and media harshly criticized the US’ Iraq policy, Israel’s human rights abuses in Palestine, Denmark’s confusion between freedom of express and religious discrimination  and the EU’s unjust polices etc. When the people find legal and legitimate ways to express their opposition, the terrorists cannot abuse the problems.

5)      Self-confidence towards the West and the world is striking characteristic of Turkish Islam. In Turkey people never felt victimization as the Arab world went through. Turks, even during the catastrophic years after the First World War, did not obey what imposed on them. Turkey was the only country which rejected the FWW agreements and changed the Sevr Agreement. Turkey has been part of the European balance of power for the centuries. It maintained its independence during the Second World War too, although the Nazis and the Russians threatened to occupy some parts of Turkey. The Cyprus has been another source of confidence: Despite of the direct threats from the European Community, United States and Soviet Union, Turkey sent its forces to the island to save the Turkish Cypriots. Similarly Turkish Parliament rejected the American demands to use Turkish territories to occupy Iraq in 2003, although the Government needed US financial and political help a lot after the economic crises of 2001.

6)      New fighting understanding of Turkish police. The Turkish police have not targeted the terrorists but religionist terrorism. They successfully separated Muslims and terrorists, and did not harm the broader social groups in fighting against terrorists.

7)      Ideological isolation of the terrorists: Security forces give importance to strictly isolate the terrorists by getting help from the insiders and the professionals from Turkish Department of Religious Affairs, religious studies of the universities and the imams in the area. Before the police operations, the maneuver area of the terrorists was narrowed, and the connections between the terrorists and the society were weakened.

8)      The security forces made close co-operation with other religious, but legal, groups to understand the weak sides of the terrorists.

9)      Apart from the US and Israel, Turkish forces made co-operation with Syria and Iran as well because the Hezbollah and the Al Qaeda militants use these two countries to escape from the operations or to get the fake documents (passports, ids etc.)

LESSONS FOR THE US’ FIGHT AGAINST GLOBAL TERRORISM

-          First the US naming the religionist terrorists ‘Islamic’, ‘Islamist’ or ‘Jihadist’, includes many innocent Muslims into the terrorists networks. ‘Islamic’ for example means ‘something according to Islam’. If you name Al Qaeda ‘Islamic’, you lose the vital public support against terrorism. The US has to separate very well the terrorists and the ordinary Muslims,

-          The US’ terrorism combat is based on fear caused by 9/11, and the struggle became a revenge campaign in the eyes of many experts and layman.

-          The US security forces do not respect enough the holly Muslim places in operation areas. They arrogantly enter the mosques and houses of the Muslims. Each terrorist killed or arrested in these holly and special places by the US soldiers create more and more terrorists.

-          The US has no close partner in Muslim world in its combat. Strangely the US politicians do not give enough importance to the ideas of the Muslim leaders. As a result, US is alone in its combat and its anti-terror campaign has been perceived as an anti-Islamic attack against the Muslim peoples. As a matter of fact that Al Qaeda foremost challenges the Muslim states including Turkey, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Egypt etc. There is no Islamic State in the world has good relations with the Al Qaeda. So, if the US cannot find a close partner in this picture, it means that there is some problem with the US anti-terror strategy.

-          The US aims to change the borders, leaders and regimes in the Middle East, heart of the global terror according to the US. However the main target should have been the terrorists’ ideological challenge and the environment causing terrorism. The Iraq case vividly showed that changing the leaders do not end terrorism, but nourishing and spreading terrorist movements.

-          The US needs a combat philosophy and internal partners in its struggle. Turkish Islam provides the needed ideological tools and the Turkish security forces could be the insider partner for the Americans in their global terror ‘war’.

-          Fundamentals of political democracy (separation of Mosque and State, and the political sovereignty of the people) have roots in some Muslim countries. The Muslim intellectuals in Istanbul, Damascus etc. have long struggled to co-exist Islam and modernity.  Progressive political reform is actually within the tradition of the whole region. But encouragement and co-operation between the US and the Middle Eastern countries needed for success stories.

-          Turkey also may lead the anti-terror campaign at institutional level. Turkish security forces, in co-operation with the US, may train the police and special departments in other Muslim countries. As a matter of fact that Turkish, Egyptian, Pakistani etc. police can overcome the terrorist movements if the Western financial and technical supports are provided. The leading actors in combating terrorism should be the Muslim police not the ‘Christian American soldiers’. Turkey attempts to open police offices in Pakistan and Afghanistan, yet the financial problems slow down the initiative. Turkish Police Academy and security institutions also give training and anti-terrorism courses to high-ranked police officers from the Balkans, Middle East and the Central Asia. However the financial limits again do not allow greater projects on combating religionist terrorism.