Turkey's Reign of Terror: The Persecution of Minority Alevis

by Uzay Bulut • December 2, 2018 at 5:00 am

The Alevi-owned broadcaster, TV10, for example,was closed down in September 2016, two months after the failed coup attempt against Erdogan, for allegedly "threatening national security and belonging to a terror organization."
A TV10 cameraman, Kemal Demir, was taken into police custody on November 25, 2017 and arrested on December 2. Veli Büyükşahin, TV10's chairman of the board, and Veli Haydar Güleç, a TV10 producer, were arrested on January 10. All are still in prison.
"TV10 did not belong to a major business. While it was trying to carry out its activities with its few employees and very limited resources, it was closed down by executive order. Moreover, its properties were seized [by the government] and then sold by the Savings Deposit Insurance Fund (SDIF)... The indictments against them contain no criminal element and judges have turned down the indictments twice. Yet, these people have been detained for 10 months and there is still uncertainty as to when they will be tried in a court and when a result will be obtained from the hearings." — Kemal Peköz, MP from the opposition Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP), in a speech before parliament November 1.

Many Alevis in Turkey have protested that their houses of worship, know as cem houses, are not officially recognized by the government. Yet even these protests are quashed. Pictured: The Kartal Cemevi Alevi cem house in Istanbul, Turkey. (Image source: Cemyildiz/Wikimedia Commons)

In Turkey, several methods are employed to eliminate religious minorities, not only by physical violence. Instead, the government of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan tries to erase minority faiths by preventing their ability to function by denying them the freedom to establish and safely operate their own institutions and places of worship. The Alevis, for instance, a historically persecuted religious minority in Turkey, are all-too-familiar with this form of oppression.

The Alevi-owned broadcaster, TV10, for example, was closed down in September 2016, two months after the failed coup attempt against Erdoğan, for allegedly "threatening national security and belonging to a terror organization."

A TV10 cameraman, Kemal Demir, was taken into police custody on November 25, 2017 and arrested on December 2. Veli Büyükşahin, TV10's chairman of the board, and Veli Haydar Güleç, a TV10 producer, were arrested on January 10. All are still in prison.

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"Burnt Beyond Recognition": Extremist Persecution of Christians, August 2018

by Raymond Ibrahim • December 2, 2018 at 4:00 am

"The non-implementation of the law has brought us a gang of hardliners who have become above the law." — Human rights activist, World Watch Monitor, Egypt.
A group of Muslims thrashed Vishal Masih, an 18-year-old Christian, after he repeatedly defeated a Muslim teen at arm-wrestling." — Persecution, International Christian Concern, Pakistan.
"We cannot watch our children joining infidels' church," explained a local sheikh. — Morning Star News, Uganda.
Comoros: Sunni Islam was formally declared "the religion of the state." "An ultra-conservative group of radical scholars ... are pushing the country to a more extreme view of Islamic law (sharia) in the country and are against Christians." — World Watch Monitor, August 3, 2018.

Turkey's government has kept the Christian Orthodox theological school (Halki Seminary) shut for 47 years, while the Orthodox Church waits to be allowed to reopen it. Recently, Turkish authorities declared that a major Islamic Education Center will be built right next to the closed Christian building. (Darwinek/Wikimedia Commons)

Christians Burned Alive and Churches Torched

Ethiopia: Approximately 15 Christian priests were killed—at least four burned alive—and 19 churches torched during Muslim uprisings in the east, where most of the nation's Muslim population, consisting of 33% of the population, is centered. "Similar tensions are bubbling under the surface in other parts of Oromia," which is approximately 50% Muslim, said a local source. "We have even heard of places where Muslims had asked Christians to vacate the area. And though this call is veiled as ethnic rivalry by some media and observers, it is at its very core a religious matter."

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