Turkey: What Ally?

by Burak Bekdil • September 22, 2014 at 5:00 am

The Turkish government "frankly worked" with the al-Nusrah Front, the al-Qaeda affiliate in Syria, along with other terrorist groups.

The Financial Task Force, an international body setting the standards for combating terrorist financing, ruled that Turkey should remain in its "gray list."

While NATO wishes to reinforce its outreach to democracies such as Australia and Japan, Turkey is trying to forge wider partnerships with the Arab world, Russia, China, Central Asia, China, Africa and -- and with a bunch of terrorist organizations, including Hamas, Muslim Brotherhood, Ahrar al-Sham and the al-Nusrah Front.

Being NATO's only Muslim member was fine. Being NATO's only Islamist member ideologically attached to the Muslim Brotherhood is quite another thing.

"The friend of my enemy is my... frenemy?" U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry shakes hands with the new Turkish Foreign Minister, Mevlut Cavusoglu, before a bilateral meeting on the sidelines of the NATO Summit in Newport, Wales, Sept. 4, 2014. (Image source: U.S. State Dept.)

Last week, the U.S. Secretaries of State and Defense, John Kerry and Chuck Hagel, were in the Turkish capital, one after the other, to ask for Turkey's contribution to a coalition of allies in a U.S.-led war on the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria [ISIS, aka The Islamic State].

Not only will Ankara take no military action, it will also forbid the U.S. from using a critical U.S. air base in southern Turkey to conduct strikes against the jihadist terrorists, the Turks told Messrs. Kerry and Hagel.

Earlier during the week, Turkey also abstained from signing a communiqué which Arab nations penned, seeking stronger action against ISIS.

Some call Turkey "a U.S. frenemy," others refer to it as "NATO's Qatar." Unsurprisingly, on Sept. 9 the U.S. Congress delivered its staunchest warning to date that Turkey and Qatar could face financial and other penalties if they continue to support Hamas and other U.S.-designated terrorist organizations.

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UK: More Taxpayer Funds Go to Extremist Charities

by Samuel Westrop • September 22, 2014 at 4:00 am

British politicians seem to be trapped in an endless debate over how to curb both violent and non-violent extremism within the Muslim community.

A truly useful measure might be to end the provision of state funding and legitimacy to terror-linked extremist charities

The charity Orphans in Need has promoted preachers such as Zahir Mahmood, pictured above, who has claimed that, "Hamas are not terrorists; they're freedom fighters, they're defending their country." (Image source: tune.pk video screenshot)

The British government is, incredibly, still continuing to fund charitable UK-based organizations with links to the Muslim Brotherhood, terrorist groups and domestic extremism. Simultaneously, lawmakers seem to be having trouble thinking of ways to tackle extremism and terrorist incitement within Britain's Muslim communities.

In early 2014, the Department for Communities and Local Government provided a grant of £18,000 ($29,000) to the Muslim Charities Forum [MCF], a charitable body and umbrella group for a number of leading Islamist charities, most of which are members of the Union of Good, a fundraising body established by the Muslim Brotherhood to raise money for the terror group Hamas.

The MCF is made up of nine member organizations, all of which stand accused of funding terror or promoting extremism:

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