Turkey’s top cleric, Mehmet Gormez, the head of the Directorate of Religious Affairs (DRA), unveiled a new project earlier this week while speaking to a group of Turkish journalists. Turkey will soon have an “International Islamic University,” Gormez said, adding that Islamic universities in Egypt, Pakistan, Iran and Malaysia were “unable to find solutions to problems in the world.” By that comment, he implicitly signaled that Turkey is getting ready to make bolder claims in the Islamic market of ideas.
First, a few observations: Gormez’s remarks came in Mecca, where he was heading the Turkish delegation for the hajj, or the Islamic pilgrimage. Moreover, Gormez had also criticized Saudi authorities during the same trip, blaming them for “destroying history” by building huge skyscrapers that overshadow the Kaaba. This was, besides being a personal remark, an objection by the history-sensitive “Turkish Islam” to the literalist “Saudi Islam.”
