'Apology' Not Part Of Turkey’s Lexicon
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's apology to Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has led to questions about why Turkey has yet to apologize for incidents from its own past, writes Semih Idiz.
There is an air of triumphalism in Turkey’s Islamist media, as well as among members and supporters of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP), regarding Israel's apology to Turkey for the raid on the Mavi Marmara aid ship, during which nine Turkish pro-Palestinian activists (one also a US citizen) were killed by Israeli commandos.
The Israeli apology provides a fresh opportunity to turn the spotlight on Turkey’s own record of formal apologies for historic and current mistakes. The tragic events of 1915 involving the Armenians — before the Republic of Turkey was founded — will no doubt be the first thing that comes to many minds here. But this is by no means the only case where someone has demanded, and failed to receive, an official apology from Turkey.
The list of those demanding a formal apology from Turkey today includes Kurds, Assyrians, Greeks, Alevis, liberal intellectuals, left-wing writers, musicians, film directors and torture victims of various political shades — not to mention believers hounded for their faith in the past by “Jacobin secular elitists.”
A living case in point is the so-called “Uludere Massacre” (or “Roboski Massacre” in Kurdish). On the night of Dec. 28, 2011, Turkish F-16 fighter jets — later reported to be acting on intelligence provided by US drones — showered bombs on a group near the predominantly Kurdish town of Uludere, who were crossing from Northern Iraq to Turkey with a pack horse.
