Last week, during a visit to Vienna, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan initiated an international controversy by condemning “Zionism,” albeit in passing. "As is the case for Zionism, anti-Semitism and fascism,” he said, “it is inevitable that Islamophobia be considered a crime against humanity.”
Soon objections came. U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon found the comment “unfortunate” and “hurtful and divisive.” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu was expectedly sharper, by defining Erdoğan's words as “a dark and mendacious statement, the likes of which we thought had passed from the world.”
