Gülen movement

Last updated

Gülen movement
Gülen hareketi, Hizmet hareketi
Also known as
Founder
CountryTurkey, United States, Canada, Finland, Sweden, European Union
Headquarters İzmir, Turkey (1969–1999)
Saylorsburg, Pennsylvania, United States (1999–present)
Active regionsWorldwide
Ideology Gülenism
SizeFormerly estimated at 200,000 to 4 million,
currently unknown.
Designated as a terrorist group byFlag of the Cooperation Council for the Arab States of the Gulf.svg GCC
OIC Logo since 2011.svg OIC
Flag of Turkey.svg  Turkey
Flag of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus.svg Northern Cyprus
Flag of Pakistan.svg  Pakistan
Website fgulen.com
gulenmovement.com

The Gülen movement (Turkish : Gülen hareketi) or Hizmet movement (Hizmet hareketi) is an Islamist fraternal movement. It is a sub-sect of Sunni Islam based on a Nursian theological perspective as reflected in Fethullah Gülen's religious teachings. It is referred to by its members as the "Service" ("Hizmet") or "Community" (" Cemaat ") and it originated in Turkey around the late 1950s. It is institutionalized in 180 countries through educational institutions as well as media outlets, finance companies, for-profit health clinics, and affiliated foundations that have a combined net worth in the range of 20-50 billion dollars as of 2015. [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6] [7] [8] [ excessive citations ]

Contents

Its teachings are considered conservative in Turkey but some have praised the movement as a pacifist, modern-oriented version of Islam, and an alternative to more extreme schools of Islam such as Salafism. [9] On the other hand it has also been reported to have a "cultish hierarchy" and as being a secretive Islamic sect. [10] [11] [12] The movement is also known for initiating forums for interfaith dialogue.

The movement was previously led by the Islamic preacher Hoca Fethullah Gülen, who left Turkey in 1999 after being threatened by lawsuits and settled in Saylorsburg, Pennsylvania.

The Gülen movement was a former ally of the Turkish Justice and Development Party (AKP). When the AKP came to power in 2002 the two groups formed an alliance against military and the Turkish secular elite despite their differences. [13] [14] It was through this alliance that the AKP secured national electoral victories sufficient to form majority governments consecutively in 2002, 2007, and 2011. During this time, hundreds of Gülen supporters were appointed to positions within the Turkish government. [15]

Once the old establishment had been defeated, disagreements began emerging between the AKP and the Gülen movement. The first breaking point was the so-called ″MİT crisis″ in February 2012 which has been interpreted as a power struggle between the AKP and the pro-Gülen police and judiciary. [16] [17] [18] After corruption investigations in 2013 into several politicians and family members of the ruling AKP of Turkey by the Gülen friendly judiciary, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan claimed the movement had initiated the investigations as a result of a break in previously friendly relations. [19] [20] [21] [22] President Erdoğan said Gülen had attempted to overthrow the Turkish government through a judicial coup using the investigations. In response to the investigations, the government seized the group-owned newspaper Zaman , which was one of the most circulated newspapers in Turkey, as well as several companies that had ties to the group. [23]

Since May 2016, the Gülen movement has been classified by Turkey as a terrorist organization under the names Fethullahist Terrorist Organization (Turkish : Fethullahçı Terör Örgütü) (FETÖ) and Parallel State Structure (Turkish : Paralel Devlet Yapılanması) (PDY). [24] The movement has also been designated as a terrorist organization by Pakistan, Northern Cyprus, and the Gulf Cooperation Council. [24] [25] [26] After the failed coup attempt in July 2016, the government blamed the group for the coup and authorities arrested thousands of soldiers and judges. Other members of the group who worked for Turkey’s governmental agencies were dismissed and over ten thousand education staff were suspended and the licenses of over 20,000 teachers working at private institutions were revoked due to their affiliation to Gülen. [27] [28] Gülen condemned the coup and denied any involvement. [29] [30]

Scandals and allegations

Bombing of Şemdinli Bookstore, 2005

On 9 November 2005, a bookstore was bombed in Şemdinli. The prosecutor for the case, Ferhat Sarıkaya, prepared a criminal indictment in which Turkey's Commander of Land Forces, Yaşar Büyükanıt, was accused of forming a gang and plotting the bombing. In 2016 Sarıkaya confessed that he was ordered by Gülenists to include General Yaşar Büyükanıt in the criminal indictment to prevent his promotion in the army and to ease the pressure on Gülenist structures within the army. [31] The defendants, Ali Kaya, Özcan İldeniz, and Veysel Ateş, were acquitted of the bombing on 20 December 2021. [32]

Assassination of Hrant Dink, 2007

Allegations have been made about the role of the Gülen movement in the assassination of journalist Hrant Dink in Istanbul. Hakan Bakırcıoglu, one of Hrant Dink's lawyers, said in an interview with Deutsche Welle that the under-aged perpetrator, Ogün Samast, had help from third parties, including people connected to the Istanbul and Trabzon police forces. [33]

Four prosecutors in the trial were dismissed from their posts due to their ties with the movement and for failing to make progress with the case. Furthermore, police commissioners Ramazan Akyürek and Ali Fuat Yılmazer were accused of not sharing their foreknowledge of the attack with the prosecutors, the gendarmerie, or the intelligence services despite being briefed of a planned assassination several times. [34]

Ergenekon trials, 2008-2016

Questions have arisen about the Gülen movement's possible involvement in the Ergenekon investigation, [35] which critics characterized as "a pretext" by the government "to neutralize dissidents" in Turkey. [36]

According to investigative journalist Nedim Şener, the Gülen movement used the assassination of Hrant Dink, the assassination of priest Andrea Santoro, the Zirve Publishing House murders as well as other events, to create the illusion of a clandestine Kemalist ultra-nationalist organization responsible for these events. With the start of the Ergenekon trials, this alleged organization was called "Ergenekon terrorist organization". The Gülen affiliated media, in particular Taraf, Zaman, and Samanyolu Haber TV, were instrumental in shaping the public opinion during this time. In these court cases, military officials, parliamentarians and journalists were accused of plotting a violent coup to oust the government. It was later revealed that these cases were based on fabricated evidence, most of which was produced by the Gülenists in the police. [37] Later Nedim Şener was arrested for being a member of the Ergenekon organization and was held in pre-trial detention in 2011. [38]

The Gülen movement has also been implicated in what the opposition Republican People's Party (CHP) has said were illegal court decisions against members of the Turkish military, including many during the Ergenekon investigation. These claims were also supported by President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan after 2013. [39]

Sex and corruption tapes, 2010

Members of the Gülen movement inside the intelligence agency have been accused of reshaping Turkish politics to a more "workable form" by leaking secretly filmed sex tapes and corruption tapes of members of the government, with the resignation of main opposition leader Deniz Baykal in 2010 as the most notable example. However to date, these allegations remain unsubstantiated, and no court case has been brought.

The Imam's Army, 2011

In March 2011, seven Turkish journalists were arrested, including Ahmet Şık, who had been writing a book, "Imamin Ordusu" ( The Imam's Army ), [40] which states that the Gülen movement has infiltrated the country's security forces. As Şık was taken into police custody, he shouted, "Whoever touches it [the movement] gets burned!". [41] Upon his arrest, drafts of the book were confiscated and its possession was banned. Şık has also been charged with being part of the Ergenekon plot despite investigating the plot before his arrest. [42]

In a reply, Abdullah Bozkurt, from the Gülen aligned newspaper Today's Zaman , said Ahmet Şık was not an investigative journalist conducting "independent research", but was hatching "a plot designed and put into action by the terrorist network itself". [43]

Corruption scandal, 2013

On 17 December 2013, an investigation into corrupt practices by several bureaucrats, ministers, mayors, and family members of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) of Turkey was uncovered, resulting in widespread protests and calls for the resignation of the government led by Prime Minister Erdoğan. [19] [20] Due to the high level of political influence of the Gülen movement in Turkey, it was rumored that the investigation was facilitated by the movement's influence in the Turkish police force and the judiciary. [21] The investigation was said to be a result of a break in the previously friendly relations between the Islamist-rooted government and the movement. [22]

President Erdoğan and the AKP (the ruling party of Turkey) have targeted the movement since December 2013. Immediately after the investigation became public, the government subjugated the judiciary, media and civil society which were critical of the government's authoritarian trend in recent years. [44] [45] [46] Erdoğan labelled the investigations as a "civilian coup" against his government. Since then, Erdoğan has shuffled, dismissed or jailed hundreds of police officers, judges, prosecutors and journalists in the name of fighting against a "Parallel State" within the Turkish state.

Media arrests, 2014

On 14 December 2014, Turkish police arrested more than two dozen senior journalists and media executives connected with the Gülen movement on various charges.

The US State Department cautioned Turkey to not violate its "own democratic foundations" while drawing attention to the raids against media outlets "openly critical of the current Turkish government". [47] [48] EU Foreign Affairs chief Federica Mogherini and EU Enlargement Commissioner Johannes Hahn said that the arrests went "against European values" and "are incompatible with the freedom of media, which is a core principle of democracy". [49]

The Turkish government took over the Gülen affiliated Zaman Daily, on 4 March 2016. Turkish police entered the headquarters by force and fired tear gas at protesting journalists and civilians. Hundreds of protestors were injured. [50] [51] In their effort to eradicate the movement from within the country the Turkish National Security Council has identified the movement as the "Gülenist Terror Organisation" ("Fethullahçı Terör Örgütü", FETÖ). [52] The government has also been targeting individuals and businessmen who have supported the movement's organizations and activities.

Eavesdropping on state offices, 2015

On 20 January 2015, Turkish police launched raids in Ankara and three other cities, detaining some 20 people suspected of illegally eavesdropping on President Erdoğan and other senior officials. The suspects are linked to Turkey's telecommunications authority and to its scientific and technological research center TUBITAK. Local media said the move was aimed at the "parallel structure" — the term Erdoğan uses to refer to Gülen's supporters in the judiciary, police and other institutions. [53]

Collaboration with PKK

Since 2013, the Gülen movement has been accused by the Turkish government of collaborating with the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK). [54] In 2014 the movement reportedly conducted several meetings with the PKK in parts of northern Iraq under PKK control. In 2015, the Turkish government said the movement had leaked the identity of 329 Turkish Gendermarie informants to the PKK who were then executed by the PKK. [55]

On 15 April 2016, during the Kurdish–Turkish conflict according to the testimony of his companions Gülen movement member Brigadier General Ali Osman Gürcan deliberately sent 17 soldiers to a house that was packed with IEDs. This led to the death of one police officer and the wounding of eight soldiers. The house had been marked on a map with the code 'P368' for IED's, which Gürcan erased from the map. This lead to a brawl and his companions called him a "traitor". Gürcan later participated in the coup d'état attempt under the Peace at Home Council. He was arrested after the coup's failure and sentenced to life imprisonment.[ citation needed ]

15 July 2016 coup attempt

In reaction to the 15 July 2016 coup attempt which was led by a military faction operating outside the chain of command, the Turkish government quickly stated the coup's leader to be Gülen. In following days and weeks, a massive crackdown affected all entities affiliated with the Gülen movements, from individuals to businesses, newspapers and schools. [56]

Purges from state offices

Since the 2016 coup attempt, authorities arrested or imprisoned more than 90,000 Turkish citizens and closed more than 1,500 nongovernmental organizations, primarily for alleged ties to the Gülen movement. [57] In 2018, approximately 25,000 Turkish asylum requests were filed by alleged Gülenists in the European Union (a rise of 50% from 2017), with Germany's share 10,000 and Greece's about 5,000. [58] In the U.S., according to news reports, a number of Gülenists who have successfully receiving political asylum status resettled in New Jersey. [59]

In 2019, it was reported that Interpol had denied Turkey's appeals of the rejection of Turkey's red notice requests regarding 464 fugitives. The decision cited Interpol's definition of the 2016 coup d'état attempt as a failed military putsch rather than an act of terrorism. [60]

Extradition of Gulen

Despite Turkey's official request, the United States has not extradited Gülen. [61] [62]

Extradition of the leadership

As of 2020, Turkey had successfully pressured a number of countries, especially those in Africa and the former Soviet Union, to extradite over 80 alleged Gülenists to Turkey. [63] [64]

Some Gulenists abroad have been kidnapped, allegedly by the MİT (Turkish Intelligence Service), and brought to Turkey. Multiple Turkish officials have confirmed that Turkey has been involved in more than 100 international abductions. [65] [66] 68 of these abductions are publicly known. The number of abductions and the countries are: Azerbaijan (8), [67] [68] Bahrain (1), Bulgaria (1), Gabon (3), [69] Indonesia (1), Kazakhstan (2), Kenya (1), [70] Kosovo (6), [71] Kyrgyzstan (1), [72] Lebanon (1), Malaysia (11), Moldova (7), [73] Myanmar (1), Pakistan (4), Saudi Arabia (16), Sudan (1), Ukraine (3). [74]

Among Turkish citizens within Turkey that have been convicted for membership in the Gülen movement are Turkey's honorary president of Amnesty International, Taner Kilic, and Amnesty's Turkish branch, Idil Eser, who were convicted in July 2020. [75] The editor of Cumhuriyet Can Dündar was sentenced in absentia in December 2020 to 8 years and 9 months for aiding FETÖ (while not being a member) in the MİT trucks scandal. [76]

In June 2021, the Turkish-Kyrgyz educator and head of the Sapat educational network in Kyrgyzstan, Orhan Inandi, went missing from Bishkek, leading to mass protests. Inandi, who holds dual Turkish-Kyrgyz citizenship, had been living in Kyrgyzstan since 1995. [77] One month later, Turkish President Erdoğan said on July 5 that Turkish intelligence agents had abducted Inandi and accused him of being “a top Central Asian leader” of the Gülen movement. [78] Kyrgyz officials have denied claims they colluded with Turkish intelligence in the abduction. [77]

Designation as a terrorist group

Gülen movement is a designated terrorist group according to the following countries and international organizations:

Northern Cyprus, recognised only by Turkey and considered by the international community to be part of the Republic of Cyprus, also designated the Gülen movement as a terrorist organization in July 2016.

In 2017, according to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office and the British Parliament's Foreign Affairs Select Committee there was no "evidence to justify the designation of the Gülenists as a terrorist organisation by the UK". [80] The same year, Gilles de Kerchove, the EU Counter-terrorism Coordinator, said that the European Union didn't see the Gülen movement as a terrorist organisation and that the EU would need "substantive" evidence to change its stance. [81] In 2018, in a conference with Turkish President Erdoğan, German Chancellor Angela Merkel said that Germany needed more evidence to classify the Gülen movement as a terrorist organization. [82]

Assassination of Andrei Karlov

Following the assassination of Andrey Karlov, the Turkish government was reportedly investigating the assassin's links to the "Gülenist Terrorist Organisation" (FETÖ). In a speech, Turkish President Erdoğan said that the perpetrator was a member of FETÖ. [83] [84]

In contrast, Russian officials have accused the shooter of aiming to damage Russia–Turkey relations [85] [86] which had been normalizing since the 2016 Turkish coup d'état attempt. [87] [88] [89] [90] Gülen described the killing as a “heinous act of terror” that pointed to a deterioration of security in Turkey. [91]

One of the suspects in the December 2016 murder of Russian Ambassador to Turkey Andrei Karlov on Friday denied links to the faith-based Gülen movement and said he was connected to Menzil Community sect in Turkey. One of 28 suspects in the case, police officer Hasan Tunç, who was friends with the assassin, said he is connected to the Menzil Community sect. [92]

Faith, practice, and experience

The movement has been characterized as a "moderate blend of Islam". [93] [94] Sources state that the Gülen movement is vying to be recognized as the world's leading Muslim network, one that is more reasonable than many of its rivals. [95] The movement builds on the activities of Gülen, who has won praise from non-Muslims for his advocacy of science, interfaith dialogue, and multi-party democracy. It has earned praise as "the world's most global movement". [96] Fethullah Gülen's and the Gülen movement's views and practices have been discussed in several international conferences. [97] [98]

Interfaith dialogue

Gulen and Pope John Paul II Fethullah Gulen visiting Ioannes Paulus II.jpg
Gülen and Pope John Paul II

The movement's avowal of interfaith dialogue grew out of Gülen's personal engagement in interfaith dialogue which was largely inspired by, Said Nursi. Gülen has met with leaders of other religions, including Pope John Paul II, the Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I, and Israeli Sephardic Head Rabbi Eliyahu Bakshi-Doron. [99] Gülen advocates for cooperation between followers of different religions as well as those practicing different forms of Islam (such as Sunnism or Alevism).

Gülen movement participants have founded a number of institutions across the World that promote interfaith and intercultural dialogue activities. Among these are the Journalists and Writers Foundation in Istanbul, the Rumi Forum in Washington and the Indialogue Foundation in New Delhi.

Devotional practices

David Tittensor wrote, "[Detractors] have labeled Gülen community members as secretive missionaries, while those in the Movement and sympathetic observers class it as a civil society organization". [100]

Critics have complained that members of the Gülen movement are overly compliant with the directions from its leaders, [101] and Gülen's "movement is generally perceived by its critics as a religio-political cult". [102] The Guardian editorial board described the movement in 2013 as having "some of the characteristics of a cult or of an Islamic Opus Dei". [103]

Scholars such as Simon Robinson disagree with the characterization, writing that although "[t]here is no doubt that Gülen remains a charismatic leader and that members of the movement hold him in the highest respect", the movement "differs markedly from a cult in several ways", with Gülen stressing "the primacy of the scriptures" and "the imperative of service" and consistently avoiding "attempts to institutionalize power, to perceive him as the source of all truth, or to view him as taking responsibility for the movement". [104] Zeki Saritoprak says that the view of Gülen as "a cult leader or a man with ambitions" is mistaken, and contends that Gülen should be viewed in the context of a long line of Sufi masters who have long been a center of attention "for their admirers and followers, both historically and currently". [105]

Relations to the state

The Gülen movement works within the given structures of modern secular states; it encourages affiliated members to maximize the opportunities those countries afford rather than engaging in subversive activities. [106] In the words of the leader himself and the title of a cornerstone of his philosophy, Gülen promotes "an Ottoman Empire of the Mind". [107]

Beginning in 2008, the Dutch government investigated the movement's activities in the Netherlands in response to questions from Parliament. The first two investigations, performed by the AIVD, concluded that the movement did not form a breeding ground for radicalism and found no indications that the movement worked against integration or that it was involved in terrorism or religious radicalization. A further academic study sketched a portrait of a socially conservative, inwardly directed movement with an opaque organizational structure, but said that its members tend to be highly successful in society and thus form no threat to integration. [108]

Relations to politics

Neither Gülen nor his followers have formed a national political party, but they have had political involvement or parliamentary representation. In 2008, Gülen was described as "the modern face of the Sufi Ottoman tradition", reassuring his followers, including many members of "Turkey's aspirational middle class", that "they can combine the statist-nationalist beliefs of Atatürk’s republic with a traditional but flexible Islamic faith" and "Ottoman traditions [have] been caricatured as theocratic by Atatürk and his 'Kemalist' heirs". [109] In the early 2000s, the Gülen movement was seen as keeping a distance from established Islamic political parties. [110]

According to academic researcher Svante E. Cornell, director of the Central Asia-Caucasus Institute & Silk Road Studies Program, "With only slight exaggeration, the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) as well as the government it has led could be termed a coalition of religious orders." [111]

"[...T]he Gülen movement stayed away from electoral politics, focusing instead on increasing its presence in the state bureaucracy. The Hizmet movement’s stated success in this regard would initially make it Erdoğan’s main partner, but also his eventual nemesis." [112]

Freedom of speech

Der Spiegel criticized the movement regarding its activities towards freedom of the press. Despite Gülen emphasizing how much he cares of the freedom of the press in interviews, the movement launched a campaign towards the newspaper in 2012, after an article was written regarding the "cult", in which approximately 2000 readers wrote letters of complaint to the press council. These letters were all alike each other, and thus were all rejected. Der Spiegel said the movement distorted events, threatened those who spoke against it, and accused Der Spiegel of having ties to the Turkish mafia. While Gareth Jenkins of The Sunday Times said, despite portraying itself as a peaceful educational movement, the Gülen organization never hesitates to use anti-democratic and anti-liberal methods.[ citation needed ]

Membership

"It is impossible to calculate the size of the Gülen movement" since the movement is not a centralized or formal organization with membership rosters, but rather a set of numerous, loosely organized networks of people inspired by Gülen. [113] Estimates of the size of the movement vary, with one Tempo in 1997 stating that between 200,000 supporters and 4 million people are influenced by Gülen's ideas, [114] and another source stating that Gülen has "hundreds of thousands of supporters". [115] The membership of the movement consists primarily of students, teachers, businessmen, academics, journalists and other professionals. [8]

Organization

The movement states that it is based on moral values and advocacy of universal access to education, civil society, tolerance and peace. The emphasis among participants is to perform "service" (which is the meaning of the Turkish word "hizmet") as arising from individuals' personal commitments to righteous imperatives. Along with hizmet, the movement, which has no official name, is termed the Gülen movement or cemaat (the latter also used to describe participants in Sufi orders, meaning "congregation," "community," or "assembly.")

The movement's structure has been described as a flexible organizational network. [116]

Lay clergy (Imam-Mullah-Shaykh)

The movement skirted Kemalist Turkey's prohibitions against assembling in non-state sponsored religious meetings. (As a young man, future President Erdoğan belonged to the Naqshbandi tariqa which was then technically banned in Turkey. [117] )

Akin to Turkey's Sufi tariqas are lay religious orders which have been banned in Turkey since 1925. [118] Movement schools and businesses organize locally and link themselves into informal networks. [119] Each local Gülen movement school and community has a person designated its "informal" prayer leader (Imam). In Turkey Imam is state-sponsored. In the Gülen movement, this individual is a layman who serves for a stint within this volunteer position, lay clergy. His identity is kept confidential, generally only purposely made known to those with close connections to those participating in decision-making and coordinating councils within the local group. Above a grouping of such "secret" (not-publicly-acknowledged) imams is another such volunteer leader. This relationship tree continues on up the ladder to the nation-level imam and to individuals who consult with Gülen himself. [120] These individuals closest to Gülen, having degrees from theology schools, are offhandedly referred to within the movement as mullahs . [121] Gülen's position, as described in the foregoing, is analogous to that of a shaykh (master) of a Sufi tariqa. Unlike with traditional tariqas, no-one makes pledges of any sort, upon joining the Gülen movement; one becomes a movement participant simply by working with others to promote and effect the movement's objectives of education and service. [122]

In 2017, German magazine Der Spiegel called the movement a "secretive and dangerous cult" while calling Gülen a suspicious individual. Saying, "the movement calls itself a tolerant service movement, while those who have left the movement call it a secretive Islamist organization with Fethullah Gülen as its leader". The article said pupils attending the "cults" schools in Germany were under immense pressure from their abi's (tutors) who were telling them which books to read, which movies to watch, which friends to meet and whether to see their families or not. While the abi's were keeping a protocol of all those staying in the cult's dormitories.

The Süddeutsche Zeitung quoted a German lawyer that called the organization "more powerful than the Illuminati" and "not transparent as opposed to the claims", and reported that the organization tried to reorganize in the Swabia region of Germany. [123]

Associated organizations

Gülen and the Gülen movement are technology-friendly, work within current market and commerce structures, and are savvy users of modern communications and public relations. [109]

Its members have founded schools, universities, an employers' association, charities, real estate trusts, student organizations, radio and television stations, and newspapers. [115]

Hizmet-affiliated foundations and businesses were estimated to be worth 20-50 billion dollars in 2015. [124]

Schools

Schools associated with the Gülen movement can be found in countries with large populations of people of Turkish descent as well as in predominantly non-Turkish Muslim countries where they provide families with an alternative to madrasa education. There were many Gülen schools in Turkey that an estimated 1.2 million Turks passed through (Including many of Erdoğan's relatives). [125] However after the attempted coup in 2016, all of the schools were shut down and banned by law.

In 2009, it was estimated that Gülen linked schools around the world enrolled more than 2 million students. [36] Estimates of the number of schools and educational institutions but it appears there were about 300 Gülen Movement schools in Turkey and over 1,000 schools worldwide at that time. [126] [127] Later reporting by the Wall Street Journal estimated around 150 schools just in the United States, "ranging from networks in Texas, Illinois and Florida to stand-alone academies in Maryland". [128] Although there is no formal networking of all the schools, collectively they form one of the largest collections of charter schools in America." [129]

Most Gülen movement associated schools are private schools or charter schools. The curricula of the schools vary from country to country but they generally follow a secular mixture of Turkish and local curricula with an emphasis on science and math. A 2008 article in the New York Times said that in Pakistan "they encourage Islam in their dormitories, where teachers set examples in lifestyle and prayer", and described the Turkish schools as offering a gentler approach to Islam that could help reduce the influence of extremism. [93] However in America, "there is no indication the American charter network has a religious agenda in the classroom", according to The Philadelphia Inquirer. [130]

Two American professors at the Lutheran Theological Seminary at Philadelphia and Temple University wrote that "these schools have consistently promoted good learning and citizenship, and the Hizmet movement is to date an evidently admirable civil society organization to build bridges between religious communities and to provide direct service on behalf of the common good". [131] Professor Joshua Hendrick of Loyola University Maryland, who studies the movement, said that Gülen himself "does not have a direct hand in operating" the charter schools and it was reported that Gülen has never visited the schools. [128] [132] Alp Aslandoğan, director of the Alliance for Shared Values said that the schools are independent yet indirectly tied to the Gülen movement on the "intellectual or inspirational level." [133]

In Europe there has been some pushback to the establishment of schools associated with the movement. In Georgia, the Georgian Labour Party protested schools opening on the basis that they "aim to spread Turkish culture and fundamentalist religious ideas". [134] In the Netherlands, there were concerns that the schools would promote "anti-integrative behavior" however an investigation in 2010 by the AIVD intelligence organization found that the schools did not represent a threat. [135] [136]

In America there have been allegations and investigations into money-laundering and kickbacks at charter schools connected to the Gülen movement which receive federal financial support. [137] [138] Schools in Texas were accused of sending school funds to Gülen associated organizations by prioritizing construction contracts with Turkish expatriate-owned construction companies over more economical bids, according to reporting by The New York Times in 2011. [139] Folwell Dunbar, an official at the Louisiana Department of Education, accused Inci Akpinar, vice president of one such construction company, of offering him a $25,000 bribe to keep quiet about troubling conditions at the Abramson Science and Technology School in New Orleans which was operated by the Pelican Foundation. [140]

Media organizations

Movement members have set up a number of media organizations to promote its core values such as love, tolerance, hope, dialogue, activism, mutual acceptance and respect. These media organs include TV stations (Samanyolu TV, Samanyolu Haber TV, Mehtap TV), (Ebru TV) (English), the newspapers Zaman , Today's Zaman (English), magazines and journals in Turkish like Aksiyon , Sızıntı , [141] Yeni Ümit, Çağlayan, [142] The Fountain Magazine (English), [143] Hira (Arabic), The International Cihan News Agency and the radio station Burç FM  [ tr ].

Charitable foundations

The movement runs charity and humanitarian aid organizations internationally. Among them is the Istanbul-based Kimse Yok Mu Association (KYM). KYM organizes charity campaigns to help those in need in different parts of the world. Like any other activities of the Gülen-movement, KYM runs local projects responding to specific needs. KYM holds UN Ecosoc Special status.

Another charity organization Embrace Relief was established in New Jersey and is active in America, Asia and Africa. [144]

Professional associations

While being both praised and criticized for being market friendly, the Gülen movement has established various professional associations and business networks. Among them Istanbul based TUSKON is the major non-profit business confederation which aims to promote economic solutions as well as social and political ones. Another one called TUCSIAD is based in China, in addition to DTIK's Asia-Pacific Group which supports the Gülen movement outside of Turkey in China, hoping to influence Turkish politics from the outside.[ citation needed ]

Timeline

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Zaman, sometimes stylized as ZAMAN, was a daily newspaper in Turkey. Zaman was a major, high-circulation daily before government seizure on 4 March 2016. It was founded in 1986 and was the first Turkish daily to go online in 1995. It contained national (Turkish), international, business, and other news. It also had many regular columnists covering current affairs, interviews, and a culture section. The newspaper is known for its closeness to Fethullah Gülen, the leader of the Gülen movement. The newspaper originally supported the Justice and Development Party (AKP), but became increasingly critical of that party and its leader, Turkish president and former prime minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, particularly after the AKP closed the 2013 December investigation into corruption. On 4 March 2016, in what activists and international media groups criticized as another blow to press freedom in Turkey, control of the newspaper was seized by the government. The takeover was motivated by the newspaper's ties to the Hizmet movement of Turkish cleric Fethullah Gülen, which the government accuses of attempting to establish a parallel state in Turkey.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Fethullah Gülen</span> Turkish scholar, theologian and dissident (1941–2024)

Muhammed Fethullah Gülen was a Turkish Muslim scholar, preacher, and leader of the Gülen movement who as of 2016 had millions of followers. Gülen was an influential neo-Ottomanist, Anatolian panethnicist, Islamic poet, writer, social critic, and activist–dissident developing a Nursian theological perspective that embraces democratic modernity. Gülen was a local state imam from 1959 to 1981 and he was a citizen of Turkey until his denaturalization by the Turkish government in 2017. Over the years, Gülen became a centrist political figure in Turkey prior to his being there as a fugitive. From 1999 until his death in 2024, Gülen lived in self-exile in the United States near Saylorsburg, Pennsylvania.

Ergenekon was the name given to an alleged clandestine, secular ultra-nationalist organization in Turkey with possible ties to members of the country's military and security forces. The would-be group, named after Ergenekon, a mythical place located in the inaccessible valleys of the Altay Mountains, was accused of terrorism in Turkey.

Mehmet Baransu is a Kurdish journalist and author from Turkey. He is a correspondent for Taraf, and previously worked for Aksiyon (1997–2000). He is the winner of a 2009 Sedat Simavi Journalism Award. Known for investigating the Turkish military, he reported on the "Cage Action Plan" which became part of the Ergenekon trials, and published documents in January 2010 revealing "Balyoz" ("Sledgehammer"), a plan for a coup that was supposedly hatched by Turkish military officers in 2003. In January 2010, in connection with Sledgehammer, Baransu delivered a suitcase to the Istanbul Chief Public Prosecutor's Office a suitcase containing evidence of the coup plot such as CDs, tapes, printed documents, and handwritten notes. The Sledgehammer plot involved plans to bomb two mosques in Istanbul, attack a military museum and blame it on religious extremists, and attack a Turkish plane and blame it on Greece. Three hundred and thirty-one of the 365 suspects were sentenced to prison on 21 September 2012, while the remaining 34 were acquitted. Three retired generals were sentenced to life in prison on charges of "attempting to overthrow the government by force," but their terms were later reduced to 20 years. Turkey's Constitutional Court ruled in June 2014 that the rights of most of the convicted suspects had been violated, and ordered the immediate release of 236 of them. The rest were released later. A new trial began on 3 November 2014. Reports released in December 2014 and February 2015 claimed that some of the evidence in the case was fabricated.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">İlhan Cihaner</span> Turkish politician

İlhan Cihaner, is a Turkish leftist politician and a former prosecutor. He's a parliamentary deputy for the Republican People's Party (CHP) since 2011. He was the Chief Public Prosecutor of Erzincan from 2007; he resigned in 2011 in order to stand for election. He is a suspect in the Ergenekon trials. He is a columnist for the soL newspaper.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ergün Poyraz</span> Turkish author

Ergün Poyraz is a prolific Turkish author known for his controversial books about the ruling Justice and Development Party, the Islamic preacher Fethullah Gülen, and people associated with them. He is best known for his 2007 book The Children of Moses, which accused Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and his wife of being secret Jews and of cooperating with Israeli intelligence to undermine Turkish secularism. He was arrested in 2007 and was a defendant in the Ergenekon trials; on 5 August 2013, he was sentenced to 29 years in prison.

The 2013 corruption scandal in Turkey or 17–25 December Corruption and Bribery Operation was a criminal investigation that involved several key people in the Turkish government. All of the 52 people detained on 17 December were connected in various ways with the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP). Prosecutors accused 14 people – including Suleyman Aslan, the director of state-owned Halkbank, Iranian businessman Reza Zarrab, and several family members of cabinet ministers – of bribery, corruption, fraud, money laundering and gold smuggling.

The Gülen movement schools are a network of private or semi-private schools founded by Turkish-Americans. Alp Aslandoğan, executive director of the non-profit organisation Alliance for Shared Values has said that the schools are independent yet indirectly tied to the Islamic Gülen movement on the "intellectual or inspirational level." In 2009, it was estimated that members of the Gülen movement ran schools that serve more than 2 million students, many with full scholarships. Estimates of the number of schools and educational institutions varied widely, with about 300 schools in Turkey and over 1,000 schools worldwide.

The Daily Sabah is a Turkish pro-government daily newspaper, published in Turkey. Available in English and owned by Turkuvaz Media Group, Daily Sabah published its first issue on 24 February 2014. The editor-in-chief is Ibrahim Altay.

The political conflict between the AKP-ruled Turkish government and the Gülen movement of Fethullah Gülen began in 2013.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">2016 Turkish coup attempt</span> Failed military coup in Turkey

On 15 July 2016, a faction within the Turkish Armed Forces, organized as the Peace at Home Council, attempted a coup d'état against state institutions, including the government and president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. They attempted to seize control of several places in Ankara, Istanbul, Marmaris and elsewhere, such as the Asian side entrance of the Bosphorus Bridge, but failed to do so after forces and civilians loyal to the state defeated them. The Council cited an erosion of secularism, elimination of democratic rule, disregard for human rights, and Turkey's loss of credibility in the international arena as reasons for the coup. The government said it had evidence the coup leaders were linked to the Gülen movement, which is designated as a terrorist organization by the Republic of Turkey and led by Fethullah Gülen, a Turkish businessman and a well-known Islamic scholar who lived in exile in Pennsylvania. The Turkish government alleged that Gülen was behind the coup and that the United States was harboring him. Events surrounding the coup attempt and the purges in its aftermath reflect a complex power struggle between Islamist elites in Turkey.

The Alliance for Shared Values (AfSV) is a New York-based 501(c)(3) nonprofit umbrella organization and a major part of the Gülen movement, or Hizmet.

Since 2016, the government of Turkey has conducted a series of purges, enabled by a state of emergency in reaction to the failed coup attempt on 15 July that year. The purges began with the arrest of Turkish Armed Forces personnel reportedly linked to the coup attempt but arrests were expanded to include other elements of the Turkish military, as well as civil servants and private citizens. These later actions reflected a power struggle between secularist and Islamist political elites in Turkey, affected people who were not active in nor aware of the coup, but who the government claimed were connected with the Gülen movement, an opposition group which the government blamed for the coup. Possession of books authored by Gülen was considered valid evidence of such a connection and cause for arrest.

Turkey's media purge after the failed coup d'état on July 15, 2016 resulted in the shutdown of at least 131 media outlets and the arrest of 117 journalists – at least 35 of whom have been indicted for "membership in a terror group".

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Andrew Brunson</span> American pastor

Andrew Craig Brunson is an American pastor. Before becoming a lecturer in the Evangelical Presbyterian Church, he was the evangelical pastor of a Protestant church with a congregation of 24 people in İzmir, Turkey.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">2017 March for Justice</span>

The March for Justice was a 450 km (280-mile) march from Ankara to Istanbul to protest against arrests that were made as part of the government crackdown following the July 2016 coup d'état attempt. After the coup attempt, the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) government declared a state of emergency. Since then at least 50,000 people have been arrested and another 140,000 people have been removed from their positions. The protest was led by opposition leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, in response to a lengthy prison sentence that Enis Berberoğlu received for allegedly giving the press a video that shows Turkish intelligence smuggling weapons into Syria. The march concluded in Istanbul on 9 July with a rally attended by hundreds of thousands of people, during which Kılıçdaroğlu spoke at length about the effect that the government purge has had on the judiciary and rule of law in Turkey.

The Stockholm Center for Freedom (SCF) is an advocacy organization founded in 2017 by Turkish journalists allegedly linked to the Gülen movement. SCF is managed by Abdullah Bozkurt and is headquartered in Stockholm, Sweden. The group moved to Sweden after the government crackdown on press freedom in Turkey after the deadly 2016 failed coup d'état attempt, which the government blamed on Gülenists. The group is mainly focused on issues related to human rights and press freedom in Turkey, although it occasionally reports on other countries as well. It has issued a number of reports in English and Turkish on the human rights situation in Turkey.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Abdullah Bozkurt</span> Turkish journalist

Abdullah Bozkurt is a Turkish journalist. He was the bureau chief for the Gülen-aligned newspaper Today's Zaman.

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Ahval</span> Online news portal focused on Turkey

Ahval is an Emirati-funded online news website that solely reports on Turkey. The site was launched in 2017. Turkish journalist Yavuz Baydar is the current editor-in-chief. The name Ahval means "events" and is a Turkish Arabism derivation from "ahwal".

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