Earlier today Turkish hackers took down the websites of the Times of Israel, the country’s largest-circulation news group, as well as Asia Times. Both sites were defended by top-of-the-line Israeli cyber-security systems, which would indicate that the hack was conducted only with the resource of a state intelligence service.
The hackers posted a pro-Palestinian message with reference to Gaza. That conforms to official Turkish policy, which backs the terrorist group Hamas as well as its mother organization, the Muslim Brotherhood.
This is Turkey’s response to the hundredth anniversary of the Balfour Declaration, which led to the Establishment of the State of Israel.
Asia Times has hosted my “Spengler” column since 2000. In 2015, the news site was relaunched under new management and I serve on the board of directors of its parent company.
The cyber-terrorist attack on the Israeli and Asian sites is consistent with Turkish government attempts to intimidate press criticism of Tayyip Recep Erdogan’s government, which has become a bizarre Islamist dictatorship.
Since the June 2016 coup attempt by military officers seeking to oust Erdogan, the government has jailed 152 journalists and closed 173 media outlets. Turkey has jailed several prominent German journalists working in Turkey, despite the vehement protests of the German government, as well as foreign journalists of other nations. Earlier this month a Turkish court sentenced a Wall Street Journal reporter, Ayla Albayrak, to two years imprisonment for alleged “terrorism.”
Erdogan also provoked a diplomatic crisis with the United States by arresting a Turkish employee of the US embassy in Ankara last month.
The cyber-attack on Times of Israel and Asia Times, though, is the first time that Turkish actors – presumably with the tools available to state security services – have tried to silence foreign media outlets entirely.
Erdogan operates with a sense of existential doom. His November 2015 election campaign included a campaign of violence against the Kurdish-majority Southeast of the country.
As Fréderike Geerdink wrote in the Huffington Post:
He killed civilians in the Kurdish majority Southeast during day-long curfews and “operations,” bombed the PKK in Turkey and in the Qandil mountains in Iraq, jailed democratically elected mayors, didn’t do anything to prevent violence against offices and rallies of the HDP (the leftist party rooted in the Kurdish movement) and increased the pressure on newspapers not yet under his control. And it worked — he won 49 percent of the vote.
As I wrote in 2011 book How Civilizations Die and more recently in Asia Times, the Kurds are having twice as many children as ethnic Turks and will be a majority of Turkish citizens under 30 by the early 2040’s. That will collapse Erdogan’s dream of an Islamic Caliphate centered in Turkey. He will go to any length to postpone the demographic reckoning.
Notionally a member of NATO, Turkey has turned its back on the alliance by purchasing Russia’s S-400 air defense system. Erdogan has decided that his country’s future lies in the East, as a collaborator of Russia and an economic satrapy of China, rather than with the European Union and NATO, as his predecessors believed.
As the Middle East Forum’s Daniel Pipes wrote recently:
NATO seems unfazed that Ankara helps Iran’s nuclear program, develops an Iranian oil field, and transfers Iranian arms to Hezbollah. Erdoğan’s talk of joining the Moscow-Beijing dominated Shanghai Cooperation Organisation ruffles few feathers, as do joint exercises with the Russian and Chinese militaries. A Turkish purchase of a Russian missile defense system, the S-400, appears to be more an irritant than a deal-breaker. A mutual U.S.-Turkish ban on visas fazed no one.
At some point the West must tell Erdogan that enough is enough, and that his betrayal of the Western alliance, his violent suppression of political opposition, and his penchant for dirty tricks have excluded Turkey from the community of civilized nations.
For those of you who have a short history attention span, Edrogan has been fighting the secular front in Turkey even before he took power. He is unashamely using Islam as his weapon and underming all the secular customs. The battle with the military (who supports secularism) is not over even though at this moment, they are down. So Kevin is correct. Well he might still be KKK but thats beside the point
I.thought Huffington is prestigious newspaper. Turkish hackers and Erdogan ? As I know.this hackers known as secularist and nationalist definitely not on Erdogan side. PKK is a international terror organization like ISIL.Qandil is military and geurilla base more than then1500 PKK terrorists which you can see with Kalashnikov not civilians if you write kandil dagi as Turkish on Google you will see that terrorists. USA attacked Iraq Turkey had.to open borders for Kurdish Citiziens more than 2 millions. When you involved in Syria Turkey got 3 million Syrian people.So take this guys who is innoncent. we dont need to clean your shit there.Of course Turkey will buy S-400 and has 950 km borders with Syria which is not stable and also Iraq which is everyday fight there and bombs.As well had coup as well On that day Airforce was bombing the parliament building. As well all 5 country of NATO has it similar defense system.USA has it. Israel has it. Turkey is Nato Member and strong Army why not they cant have it? I dont like Akp because I support secularism. I dont like HDP because they are Kurdish nationalist and they are.against any Turkish goernment and army. Most of the relatives of parliamenters of HDP is PKK member. Including Major of HDP Selaattin Demirtas’s brother. When my teacher friend do his obligatory first year in Southeastern area in Turkey, before election Hdp guys visiting him ask to vote. This is the sentence.”Mr Teacher if you vote us you will always know nobody will attack to your house or you will not be kidnapped by Pkk because we know them and we have good relations with them. Better select us for your future” This how Kurdish and Turkish people threaten there.Regarding journalists, if journalist’s leaking government secrets or selling the important data other Countries. If Edward Snowden back to USA would you not arrest. As I know there is one reporter just arrested for Dan Neyman wanted to ask a simple question. The reason was arrested was question considered as insult.In Turkey on law you cant insult Turkish president this is protection law. you cant say burglar president or dishonourful words.Because presidents reflects Turkey and Turkish nation directly.
Sorry, are you sure the hack comesbfrom Turkey? You don’t mention the source of that information… Thank you.
Good point, mr. Vitenberg. There are so many false-flag attacks these days, it could have been anyone who wanted to cast a suspicion or reaction towards Turkey. But I agree with dr. Goldman that the hackers must be unusually resourceful, it can not be easy to take down Israeli webservers, if it were they would be down very often.
99% of the time I agree with you, dr. Goldman, but I feel that maybe this time the West is quickly losing a once-in-a-millennium opportunity. Yes, Turkey was and should still have been our ally in NATO, but I think for Turkey, the Nato membership was a steppingstone towards full EU membership, something they never got. Not only was Turkey kept out, but the decades-long, on-and-off membership negotiations could possibly have been perceived by the Turks as deliberate delays and political theater from EU. There is also the case of the US harbouring and suppporting Turkish dissidents like Gulen. You write that at some point, the West must tell Erdogan that enough is enough, I am afraid that what we see in the news is the opposite, this is Erdogans’ way of telling the West that enough is enough. I am not sure if it is helpful to threaten Erdogan with exclusion from NATO. The community of civilized nations is growing smaller, maybe soon it will be a minority, and of lesser interest to Erdogan than before. If the United States, UK and some alliance partners manage to contain and sanction China, Russia, Iran, Turkey, DRNK, Syria, the list is growing, then who is really containing who? Exclusion from NATO could trigger events similar to the ones that wrecked CENTO and SEATO. I think that if the West was serious about "staying friends" with Turkey, then the US should offer better deals and contracts than the Russians do, and EU should welcome Turkey to full membership. If that is too dear a price for the civilized nations to pay, then we should step aside for higher bidders. These days, who can blame anyone for having more faith in a partnership in Shanghai CO, than in an EU they seemingly never will join.
" This is Turkey’s response to the hundredth anniversary of the Balfour Declaration, which led to the Establishment of the State of Israel. "
Well, the Muslim Brotherhood to which Spengler refers, was created by the Brits a few years after their other Balfur creature…
And about zig-zag Erdogan, it is true that he has been and is a real liability for his country and not an asset.., but how would you compare him with Netanyahu, the Bush cabal, Tony Blair, the US guest Gulen, and all their other guests from Al Qaida to ISIS…. Fortunately we may hope for some light from the East, from Beijing to Moscow to Teheran
i have allways argued,that israels problem is not the non arab countries or peoples,simply because israel is not in europe or asia,israel exists in the arab world,the schizophrenic iranians are obssesed with the saudi and emirati agenda,turkey has allways had good relations with israel or the west,but the fact that the americans bow to the saudis,and emiratis has allowed the russians to intervene in syria for its own interests,erdogan is merely saving turkey,the kurds are also non arabic-iranian people,it was the persians who saved the jews from nebuchadnezzar,with the old idea of an enemies enemy can be a friend,israel will have to come to a solution with the arabs soo ner or later..if it wants to be in peace,turkey or the kurds have no strategic policy or interest against israel..in fact before the coup,turkey worked well with the west,it was the coup on the advice of the arabs that square footed the west,and remember after the coup turkey all of turkey united against the coup that included the kurds,nobody wants a divided country because after all the turks are part of nato..simple israel and the west will have to end the 100 years of diily dancing with gulf rulers..there is no other solution
its now fashion to criticize who is not towing west. cyber attack origanating originating from turkey then Erdogan is respomsible but what cyber attacks originating from west and israel? is that lone wolf?
The writer seems to be extremly biased against Turks and Erdogan.
Just another senseless Erdoğan bashing, the author of this story should examine the facts more closely from all angles before writing a anti Erdoğan propaganda novel. I live in Turkey, and I am just amazed at the cheap propaganda western jurnalist are engaged in. The west is loosing it’s moral high ground it was enjoying versus the east at a fast clip. Erdoğan is very vocal at holding the mirror in front of Western leaders, and they don’t like what they see in the mirror. I have witnessed an increase in freedoms in Turkey for all, but the former secular elites. The Kurds have profited the most from this increase in freedoms, but tried to abuse it. The Kurdish autonomy in northern Irak and gains in Syria, and the battle for Kobani they won from ISIL emboldened them to free "Turkish Kurdistan". That was a step too far, and resulted in several Kurdish majority towns beeing destroyed, Kobani style. Nearly 10.000 young foolish Kurdish fighters died with 1000 security forces casualties. The country has been in a near state of war for the last three years. The struggle for power between Gülen and Erdoğan and the resulting coup attempt was the icing on the cake. The western media attacks on Erdoğan for jailing journalist is hipocritical at very least, compared everything else we went through. Erdoğan is no longer doing the bidding of the west, that is what this is all about. The west lacks a Statesman, I think Turkey has found it in Erdoğan
Ok you accuse Erdogan of many things but You forget Violent suppression of political opposition (Syria, Iraq, Iran, Panama, etc, etc,)and dirty tricks (arming the PKK, EU not honoring treaties like with Cypriot assession) is what the west specializes in.
The west has to stop its patronizing and disdainful treatment of other countries. It cannot expect sovereign nations to ask for permission to arrest its own citizens and to toe the line or suffer the consequences every time . It has to realize that that the world .
no longer revolves around it. This arrogance will only make more nations slip away the first chance they get – Which is probably what Turkey is doing.
i think change ur editors , the things that u talked about Turkey all r wrong informations.
in my country there is a government that won the election and respect citizens votes , so ur words changes nothing in Turkey . just u r believing words that u said .
I read many doomsday articles about Istanbul before Erdogan was major. He fixed the place up. Now he is doing the same for Turkey. Even his enemies respect him. And that is why he gets more than 50% of the votes and that is why the foreign press is talking about him. What makes you an expert on Turkey ? Have you ever visited the place ? The article above is an obvious hit piece. Armchair expert idiots like you make me sick. The only reason Erdogan gets badd press is because he is independent. Deep down even idiots like you know that. The writer of this article definitely knows that but this gets him more $$$ from his overlords.
Agree 100%
Adel Kharufeh Right casue turks ain’t racist – they just murder people who aren’t like them.