President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who enjoys surprising the Turkish public, dropped a bombshell earlier this month by proposing citizenship for Syrian refugees in Turkey.
The instant reaction was a rising bias among Turks, who are paying for the country's Syria policy. Some reactions to Erdogan’s proposal were outright racist. Hate speech peaked on social media. Many asked why Erdogan — who recently blackmailed Europe by declaring, “We are not dumb. We will put the refugees in buses and ship them to Europe” — suddenly decided to grant citizenship to millions of refugees.