Jews are the primary group subjected to hate speech in the Turkish media, according to a new report published in the Turkish Jewish newspaper Salom.
The media monitoring report covering news reports and columns published between May and August 2014 was part of “Monitoring Hate Speech in Media” research conducted by the Hrant Dink Foundation, a Turkish non-profit promoting democratic values.
According to the report, in the first four months of 2014, there were 188 articles targeting an ethnic group, of which 130 targeted Jews. Armenians and Christians were the second- and third-most targeted groups, respectively. Greeks of Turkish nationality, Kurds and Syrian refugees were also subjected to hate speech.
Over the following four months, from May to August, the number of articles containing hate speech that targeted “national, ethnic and religious groups” rose to 240. This increase was attributed to the Israel-Hamas armed conflict in the Gaza Strip that occurred in July and August. The study also noted other troubling trends in media attacks on Jews.
In media, it was observed that instead of using the terms “State of Israel”, “Israel”, or “Israeli Defense Forces” in the news regarding the operation, the terms “Jews” or “Israelis” were used.
The media outlets where hate speech was most detected were Yeni Akit, Milli Gazete, Milat, Ortadogu and Yeni Çag.
The Jerusalem Post reported:
According to a poll that the Anti-Defamation League released in the latter half of 2014, 69 percent of Turks harbor anti-Semitic attitudes. Asked if Jews were more loyal to Israel than to the countries in which they lived, 69% of respondents replied affirmatively, and 70% of those surveyed agreed that Jews only cared about “their own kind.”
Two years ago, when he was prime minister, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan called Zionism a “crime against humanity.” And Erdogan’s comments about Israel during the war, including his demands that the Jewish community denounce Israel, led to criticism from Ira Forman, the U.S. State Department’s Special Envoy to Combat Anti-Semitism.
Late last year, a leader of Turkey’s Jewish community lamented that “we face threats, attacks and harassment every day. Hope is fading….My generation is also thinking more about leaving this country.”
In The Global Pogrom, which was published in the August 2014 issue of The Tower Magazine, associate editor Benjamin Kerstein gave an outline of the predicament facing Turkey’s Jews:
Only in one place in the Muslim world does a substantial Jewish community survive: Turkey. And it is they who have become the favored target of the Global Pogrom in the Muslim world itself.
They number only 17,300, but they are a strong and ancient community. In fact, the Jewish presence in Anatolia precedes Islam by at least 1,000 years, if not more. Yet the Global Pogrom has struck them too, particularly after the rise of the Islamist AKP party to power, and the resultant reawakening of publically expressed antisemitism.
Their awakening to the Global Pogrom came early, and it was notably brutal. In 2003, two synagogues in Istanbul—home to what is by far the largest Jewish community in the country—were hit by truck bombs. 27 people were killed.
The situation has only grown worse. And in recent weeks, it has reached a fever pitch, with the AKP and its Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan spewing anti-Semitic rhetoric against Israel and, by implication, his own Jewish community.
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