Ally Turkey comes under increasing criticism from some lawmakers

A U.S. military ally has come under increasingly withering criticism
from Capitol Hill due to its role in the flare-up over the Gaza aid
flotilla.

Turkey was the country from which the flotilla left, and a charitable
organization based there helped organize the relief aid trip to Gaza.
Israeli Deputy
Foreign Minister Danny Ayalon said Sunday on CNN’s “Fareed Zakaria GPS” that there were about 75 “mercenaries” on the one ship that resisted efforts to be taken to shore, adding that “they were associated with al Qaeda and other terror organizations.”

{mosads}Lawmakers have vigorously defended Israel after that one ship — out of the six in the flotilla — was raided by Israeli commandos on May 31, resulting in the death
of nine activists and several injured soldiers. 

In turn, Turkey, often lauded for its Western-style democracy and
strong military ties to the United States, has come under attack from
members of Congress. Many have suggested that the country is not the
strong U.S. ally that they expected, even implying it may be America’s enemy now.

It is a marked shift from months ago, when several lawmakers came to
the defense of Turkey when they were lobbying against a non-binding
congressional resolution that would recognize the Ottoman Empire’s
World War I-era killing of 1.5 million Armenians as genocide. The
flotilla incident, along with Turkey’s vote last week against a new round of
United Nations sanctions against Iran, has many in Congress moving
against Turkey.

Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-N.Y.) did not mince words when he discussed the flotilla’s supporters on the House floor Wednesday.

“It
had an enormous amount of support by some of the worst enemies of peace
in that region, and some of the worst enemies, quite literally, not
only of Israel, but of the United States as well. And I mean Turkey,
Iran, Hamas. These are not entities that were looking for some peaceful
resolution here,” Weiner said.

In a statement last week, Rep. John Sarbanes (D-Md.) suggested
Turkey should share some of the blame for the skirmish between the
Israeli commandos and the activists.

“Some have expressed the
view that Israel alone should account for this incident. That
perspective neglects the role that Turkey played in staging the
flotilla and Turkey’s readiness to condone this kind of brinksmanship,”
Sarbanes said. 

Criticism of Turkey has been bipartisan as well, and from self-proclaimed Turkish supporters in the past.

“The
complicity of Turkey in launching a flotilla to challenge the blockade
in Gaza, the ensuing violence that occurred, the grievous loss of life
is deeply troubling to those of us who have supported the U.S.-Turkish
alliance in the past,” Rep. Mike Pence (R-Ind.) said on the House floor
Wednesday. “Turkey needs to decide whether its present course is in its
long-term interests, but America will stand with Israel.”

U.S.-based Jewish lobby groups, traditionally supportive of Turkey
during its congressional battles over the Armenian genocide resolution,
have begun to distance themselves. For example, the Anti-Defamation
League has called for the State Department to designate the
Humanitarian Relief Foundation — the Turkish-based charity group that helped to organize the flotilla — as a terrorist group.

Turkey’s government has reacted harshly to Israel’s Gaza flotilla
raid. They have recalled their ambassador from Tel Aviv, and Abdullah
Gul — Turkey’s president — has said relations with Israel would “never be
the same.” 

But Turkey has defended their relations with the West, saying they
are not at risk due to their criticism of Israel.

“Those who say that
Turkey has broken away from the West are the intermediaries of an
ill-intentioned propaganda,” Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip
Erdogan said Thursday, according to Agence France-Presse.

Turkey’s American defenders have taken on a more measured tone than
the prime minister and other Turkish government officials. A
spokeswoman for Rep. Ed Whitfield (R-Ky.), a co-chairman of the
Congressional Caucus on U.S.-Turkey Relations, said there should be “no
question” that Israel has a right to defend itself.

“That said, it should come as no surprise that the Turkish
government would have a strong reaction to an incident where nine of
its citizens were killed, one of whom, a teenager shot four times in
the head and chest, also held American citizenship. It is important to
note that the Turkish organizations who organized the flotilla did so
without any official support from the Turkish government,” said Kristin
Walker, Whitfield’s spokeswoman. She added the United States
should encourage the two U.S. allies “to resolve this dispute with an
open and honest dialogue.”

Walker also said Whitfield believes that “it is time to revisit
certain aspects of the blockade” to better secure Israel and provide
aid to Palestinians. She noted that several businesses in Gaza have
closed down and ordinary citizens there have suffered.

The Turkish Coalition of America also is taking a calmer tone than
the Turkish government, saying the bond between Israel and Turkey “runs
deep.”

“Turkey is a democratic country, and its people are
freely expressing a number of different views about the flotilla aid
tragedy. The friendship between Turkish and Jewish people runs deep and
we are hopeful that cooler heads will prevail. It is clear that Turkey
and its institutions share our values and want them to be uniformly
applied in the whole region,” G. Lincoln McCurdy, president of the
Turkish Coalition of America, said in a statement.