Turkey Won't Accept PKK Ceasefire. World Reacts Exactly the Opposite Way They'd React If Israel Refused To Accept Hamas Ceasefire.
An Islamic terrorist group has declared a ceasefire, but the country where they bomb and murder civilians remains unimpressed:
A Kurdish rebel group fighting for autonomy in south-east Turkey has declared a unilateral ceasefire with the government in Ankara. The Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) truce is due to begin on Sunday and fighters will not use weapons unless fired upon. The announcement was made by a senior PKK leader, Murat Karayilan, from a base in northern Iraq. The PKK's conflict with Turkey has claimed more than 30,000 lives since it began in 1984. Speaking from his mountain hideout, Mr Karayilan said he hoped the decision would lead to renewed dialogue with the Turkish authorities...
On Friday, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan rejected Ocalan's ceasefire call. Mr Erdogan said a truce was only possible between two states, describing the PKK as a "terrorist organisation". A spate of bomb attacks hit Turkey over the past month, some of them blamed on a group called the Kurdistan Freedom Falcons (Tak), regarded as an offshoot of the PKK. As violent attacks by the PKK have escalated in recent weeks, Turkey has been talking tougher than ever, even threatening military intervention in northern Iraq where the group has its bases, the BBC's Sarah Rainsford in Istanbul says. The PKK has been classed as a terror group by the European Union and the US, as well as by Turkish authorities.
The Kurds, of course, are a stateless Middle East peoples that have never been offered a state in any form. This distinguishes them from the Palestinians, who (a) have literal cousins in countries like Jordan and Egypt and (b) have been offered a state several times. And yet when they call for a ceasefire, it seems quite natural for Turkey to say 'actually, no - you're a bunch of terrorists and we know how to deal with terrorists'. Can you imagine the global din of outrage if Israel reacted the same way to a Hamas ceasefire call? There's international outrage when Israel doesn't give enough concessions fast enough to fake Palestinian ceasefire calls - just the hint of Palestinian moderation is enough to get Europe and the State Department clamoring for prisoner releases and 'goodwill gestures'. And here is the PKK - including their jailed leaders - calling for a real dialogue - and outrage is more or less muted as Turkey turns it down.
This is why we think that maybe - just maybe - there's more to this 'anti-Zionism' thing than just pure-hearted humanitarian concern for the oppressed Palestinians. When someone reacts one way in a situation but a different way in a seemingly identical situation, everything from logic to common sense to scientific inquiry screams that there must be some reason for the different reaction. There's at least two ways in which human rights activists treat Israel differently: (a) disproportionate focus on even minor Israeli actions (if you're a human rights group looking to devote your limited resources to combating the world's worst human rights abuses, there is quite simply no rational explanation for focusing on Israel... maybe one group, maybe two groups - but that doesn't account for theanti-Semitism anti-Zionism industry (b) differing reactions to Israeli actions (why does Turkey get to reject ceasefire calls while Israel has to free murderers just because Hamas says that they're moving towards maybe considering a very temporary halt to some of their bombings?) We think that the differences are accounted for by latent and not so latent anti-Semitism. If someone has a better explanation, we'd welcome hearing it.
[Cross-posted at IsraPundit]
A Kurdish rebel group fighting for autonomy in south-east Turkey has declared a unilateral ceasefire with the government in Ankara. The Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) truce is due to begin on Sunday and fighters will not use weapons unless fired upon. The announcement was made by a senior PKK leader, Murat Karayilan, from a base in northern Iraq. The PKK's conflict with Turkey has claimed more than 30,000 lives since it began in 1984. Speaking from his mountain hideout, Mr Karayilan said he hoped the decision would lead to renewed dialogue with the Turkish authorities...
On Friday, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan rejected Ocalan's ceasefire call. Mr Erdogan said a truce was only possible between two states, describing the PKK as a "terrorist organisation". A spate of bomb attacks hit Turkey over the past month, some of them blamed on a group called the Kurdistan Freedom Falcons (Tak), regarded as an offshoot of the PKK. As violent attacks by the PKK have escalated in recent weeks, Turkey has been talking tougher than ever, even threatening military intervention in northern Iraq where the group has its bases, the BBC's Sarah Rainsford in Istanbul says. The PKK has been classed as a terror group by the European Union and the US, as well as by Turkish authorities.
The Kurds, of course, are a stateless Middle East peoples that have never been offered a state in any form. This distinguishes them from the Palestinians, who (a) have literal cousins in countries like Jordan and Egypt and (b) have been offered a state several times. And yet when they call for a ceasefire, it seems quite natural for Turkey to say 'actually, no - you're a bunch of terrorists and we know how to deal with terrorists'. Can you imagine the global din of outrage if Israel reacted the same way to a Hamas ceasefire call? There's international outrage when Israel doesn't give enough concessions fast enough to fake Palestinian ceasefire calls - just the hint of Palestinian moderation is enough to get Europe and the State Department clamoring for prisoner releases and 'goodwill gestures'. And here is the PKK - including their jailed leaders - calling for a real dialogue - and outrage is more or less muted as Turkey turns it down.
This is why we think that maybe - just maybe - there's more to this 'anti-Zionism' thing than just pure-hearted humanitarian concern for the oppressed Palestinians. When someone reacts one way in a situation but a different way in a seemingly identical situation, everything from logic to common sense to scientific inquiry screams that there must be some reason for the different reaction. There's at least two ways in which human rights activists treat Israel differently: (a) disproportionate focus on even minor Israeli actions (if you're a human rights group looking to devote your limited resources to combating the world's worst human rights abuses, there is quite simply no rational explanation for focusing on Israel... maybe one group, maybe two groups - but that doesn't account for the
[Cross-posted at IsraPundit]
