It’s Tish'a B'Av and the President Obama has a wonderful Kal El moment where he returns to his Krypton saying, ‘look they made me President.’ Superman is the embodiment of assimilation and the hope that joining the American melting pot makes for something special and here we have the US President partly of Kenyan descent, leader of the free world, champion of politically spun truth  -- the American way, telling Kenya to progress by giving up political corruption and prejudice. What a beautiful message, it’s my hope if he can get Kenya to progress on those two amazing ideals we could try them out here in Chicago. So what in the name of great Caesar’s ghost are we doing with Turkey? Did we really agree that in order to have them help fight ISIS we would let them carve up Syria to prevent Kurdish independence? Turkey has a great society, they are great people but prejudice against the Kurds is as real as PKK terrorism against Turkey. The Israelis are not the only ones who should wonder if Tish'a B'Av is a tough season who are going to have to swallow hard to deal with an agreement with Iran to print money to make rockets and maybe a nuke, Kurds are going to have a slog as well stuck between ISIS and Turkey.
Turkey wants to carve into Syria safe zones where Turkey can deposit Syrian refugees, in all fairness Turkey has taken on more Syrian refugees than anyone, but it so happens those safe zones will be places to prevent a Kurdish State in Syria which will prevent Turkey’s Kurdish areas from joining. Some people might think it is coincidental that the AK party which had taken the initiative to negotiate peace with the PKK suddenly interested in fighting them when the Kurdish HDP party shows up to the elections costing the AKP important votes.  Turkey can pretend it stands against terror and is pro-democratic but it supports the Muslim Brotherhood over democracy, it can claim it fights terrorism but it supports Hamas and the Mavi Marmara had terrorists embedded with civilians on board and whatever the Israelis did wrong on that day the AKP support of terrorism doesn’t go away. If Turkey can support terrorism on principle, it can talk to the PKK too and treat them like a political party as much as Hamas is a political party. I have no love for the PKK, I don’t really think Turkey should tolerate them inside Turkey but it is hypocritical for Erdogan and Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu not to call for the release of their “Yasser” Abdullah Ocalan even if he like Davatoglu look like B movie villains. To avoid hypocrisy the AKP should be providing a “Kurdish Authority” within Turkey to the PKK. Turkey and Israel are making similar mistakes, Turkey is spending its right to govern the Kurds by attacking them inside and outside Turkey just as Israel is doing next to nothing to defend Syrian Druze. If Turkey was helping Kurds realize their dream of an independent state, maybe they wouldn’t want or need to the Kurdish lands that are in Turkey, maybe Turkey could get some guarantees regarding Turkmens in Iraq from Kurds but instead they spend their right to sovereignty over Kurds by attacking essential Kurdish interests. Ironically, Turkey which minimally treated ISIS with benign neglect due to its pro-Sunni radicalism is now getting burned by ISIS  on the Turkish border. Turkey doesn’t need any incentive to cooperate with NATO than what is already being provided by ISIS, there is no reason for the US to sign on to an anti-Kurdish agenda which is both outside of our interests and immoral since Kurds are being persecuted everywhere they don’t have at least autonomy. The Kurds are a people who have been targeted by WMD based on their ethnicity; we don’t need to feed Syrian Kurds to Turkey. If building a better Nation works out for Kenya by eliminating corruption and prejudice like the President suggests and it works in Chicago maybe we could try it in the Middle East or at least apply to American Foreign Policy.  The idea that the US would aid Turkey in the occupation and destruction of the Kurds, especially when the Kurds are so effective at fighting ISIS also undermines the US relationship with Israel and human rights in general. We need the President that gave a great speech in Kenya to clean up this American made mess in the Middle East, someone who won’t abandon viable peoples to religious tyrannies and ethnic prejudices.
Originally published in the Jerusalem Post in the Middle East by Midwest blog.