On June 11, nearly two weeks into the mass anti-government protests that were rocking Turkey, the country’s Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan lashed out against the demonstrators yet again. This time, in a fiery speech before lawmakers from his ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP).
In addition to his well-worn tirades about the protesters being “hooligans” and agents of a global conspiracy, he spoke of the plight of a woman who covered her head Islamic style. The woman in question was the daughter-in-law of “one of my very important and close friends,” he told a rapt audience in parliament. “They dragged her on the streets near my office [in Istanbul] and attacked her and her child,” Erdogan thundered but gave no further details, thereby prompting a flurry of excited speculation.