In countries that have to live with terrorism, suicide bombings, raids on government offices and ambushes of soldiers in rural areas are not uncommon sights. However, every time these things happen, society is shaken once again like the first time. Those countries that have to live with terrorism are more sensitive about their people, principles and values.
Turkey has had to live with terrorism for the past 40 years. There might be some who believe there was only the PKK. It wasn’t. Turkey has witnessed the cowardly attacks of other terrorist groups while the PKK continued its assault during the past four decades. One of those organizations is the DHKP-C (The Revolutionary People’s Liberation Party-Front), which was officially founded in 1994 even though it goes back to 1970s.
The DHKP-C was more active in the 90s, but lost its power and influence over time. Then last week we were suddenly reminded of their bloody nature when they attacked the Istanbul Courthouse. Mehmet Selim Kiraz, was the prosecutor in charge of the case of 15-year-old Berkin Elvan, who was hit by a teargas canister during the Gezi protests and who as a result, was in a coma for 269 days before he passed away. Last week, Kiraz was taken hostage in his own office in the courthouse and was later martyred by DHKP-C terrorists. The following day another terrorist attack on a police station culminated in the killing of the terrorist by the security forces. All these developments sparked heated debates and caused subsequent bans on social media.
The current situation that Turkey faces makes it very clear that there are some very important points that need to be considered carefully. One of these is the fact that the communist terrorism in Turkey has become stronger recently. The DKHP-C, just like the PKK, is a Marxist/Leninist organization and has cooperated with the PKK many times throughout its history. In its manifesto, it declares its goal as dividing Turkey through terrorism to build a communist order. Although it has been quiet since 2008, it suddenly became active — which might well be a part of the PKK’s effort to legitimize itself under the pretense of the peace process. Indeed, there are some journalists and politicians trying to take advantage of the situation to shamelessly portray the PKK “as a Kurdish movement fighting for identity.” On the contrary, it is a communist movement trying to oppress and tyrannize the Kurds.
The second important point Turkey should take into account is the fact that intellectual divide is getting deeper by the day. Surely it is very natural for societies to have people with different opinions and this is a beautiful aspect of democracy. However, when a society is deeply polarized in black-and-white terms, and when people support their side unconditionally and oppose others blindly, this can turn into a meaningless fight where the parties forget about the real problems of the country. Such a process would trigger a downward spiral toward catastrophe. It is this horrible divide that pushed Syria into a nightmare that has enveloped Yemen and turned the Middle East into a sea of blood.
The fact that some famous people defended the horrible terrorist attack on the Istanbul Court, and that they cannot even use the word “terrorism” while talking about the attack, also lead people into further separation. Only for the sake of not supporting the side that they previously opposed these people didn’t refrain from justifying a terrorist attack.
In such a situation, a society cannot fully grasp the problem it is faced with. As they are quarreling with each other, communist terrorism gets stronger and manages to reach even the public offices in Istanbul. Of course security measures are intensified in response, people are searched more often, X-ray devices are used everywhere and this turns society into a fearful one. Compromising with terrorism will always make terrorism stronger and simply push any society into the abyss.
Accept it or not, communist terrorism makes itself audible in Turkey; this is happening because people still cannot understand the underlying nature of the terrorist mentality. They thought that they could reason with them and convince them to be good people. However, communism never accepts democracy or conciliation. The only acceptable way for communists is terrorism. Communists inevitably resort to armed conflict in their bid to bring down governments and they will not accept any other model. For this reason, “negotiating” with communists cannot bring the expected peace; it will only give communists more time to invade the fortress from within.
Turkey should not commit this grave error. Negotiating with the PKK or DHKP-C will not eradicate the communist terror. Hence, negotiation with DHKP-C militants during the attack in the courthouse brought no result, since the two militants were determined to kill the prosecutor and were ready to die from the moment they entered; because this is the only method of communist terrorism.
Turkey should not waste too much time in talks. We should realize the weaknesses of the communists, especially when the communists perfectly know the weaknesses of the government. Their weakness is their ideology: Destroying their ideology would melt a communist away. It is not possible to convince a communist to choose peace before smashing his ideology. So, if there is going to be a negotiation, it definitely has to involve scientific evidence to destroy the communist ideology. It is imperative to target their ideology; the intellectual basis of communism has to be destroyed.
Such an educational movement will benefit the rest of society as well. In this way, people will understand the true nature of the danger they are facing while the hatred and anger spreading in society will come to a halt, having lost its intellectual basis. Such a move would mean dealing a blow to the underlying philosophy of materialism, the source of almost all problems.
Adnan Oktar's piece on Arab News:
http://www.arabnews.com/columns/news/730776
