Turkish Teflon

It’s a well-known fact that our governments, the media, and the United Nations observe a double standard in their treatment of Israel over the Palestinian issue. It’s just business as usual; we’re used to it.

However, the following essay, posted yesterday at Vlad Tepes, points out the blatant absurdity of it all by comparing the treatment of Israel to the carte blanche handed to Turkey over the PKK:

Turkish Teflon
An article written by ‘J-Practical’ for Vladtepes blog

According to Reuters, Turkey’s armed forces said on Monday that some 145-160 Kurdish guerrillas were killed in Turkish air and artillery strikes in northern Iraq this month.

So why is Turkey bombing Kurds in Northern Iraq? After all, like the Turks, most Kurds are Sunni Muslims, fellow members of the Religion of Peace, and they’re neighbours of Turkey, living in a semi-autonomous region under limited self rule — so you’d think Turkey would make an effort to live in peace with them.

Actually, the peace is being broken by the Kurdish PKK (Kurdistan Workers Party), a terrorist organization recognized by Turkey, the United States and the European Union. Recently PKK assaults in Turkey have killed more than 40 Turkish security force personnel.

Turkey is simply defending itself from terrorists, which is why the Turkish air force sent warplanes to bomb Kurdish towns which the Turkish intelligence say contain PKK bases and arms depots. As it happens regularly in such bombings, seven civilians were killed a week ago, though the Turkish General Staff said more than 100 PKK militants were also wounded.

Now, let’s see if this makes sense to you, because I’m scratching my head:

1.		Kurdistan — semi-autonomous region containing PKK terrorists. Gaza — semi-autonomous region, wholly controlled by Hamas terrorists. The actions of the PKK are internationally denounced, the actions of Hamas are internationally ignored or celebrated.
2.		PKK kills Turkish security force personnel, which justifies two months’ worth of Turkish military campaigns that bomb PKK bases in Kurdish towns (occasionally killing innocent civilians), in order to defend Turkish citizens from terrorism.
3.		Hamas targets and kills Israeli civilians, but that doesn’t justify any Israeli response intended to defend Israeli citizens from terrorism.
4.		When Israel bombs Hamas bases, or enters Palestinian towns, a media feeding frenzy draws in crowds of journalists, who film and report the action. Turkey bombs Kurdistan, and the media pretend it’s a non-event.
5.		If Israel inadvertently kills a Palestinian civilian, the media are all over it: We see pictures, interviews with relatives, the outraged headlines (especially from CBC) proclaim the deaths first, report the facts later. Turkey, on the other hand, apparently enjoys a special relationship with the media. CBC, for example, hasn’t bothered reporting any of this since June 18th. At that time, they told us that “The conflict has killed as many as 40,000 people”, but it wasn’t worth any in-depth reports, nor significant enough to merit a journalistic follow-up.
6.		The UN has done next to nothing about it. There have been no impassioned speeches in the UN General Assembly, and the UN Human Rights Council are much too busy to address the Kurds — after all, the plight of the Kurds, like the horrors in Darfur, Congo, or Nigeria, doesn’t deserve the same grave words and permanent agenda item as the plight of the Palestinians.

Can somebody explain the logic that dictates that perceived Israeli injustices can be obsessively scratched at with the energy of an Obsessive Compulsive Disorder, while these concurrent Turkish injustices (happening in the same general region of the world), are ignored, unreported, and apparently excused?

Can someone explain how the Turkish government can kill 40,000 Kurds, without even a single UN Special Commission looking into it? And then turn around and call Israel “brutal” because nine Turkish extremists died aboard the Mavi Marmara, while attacking Israeli soldiers?

But mostly, I’d like to understand how they get away with it, and why the CBC and other ‘responsible media’ have chosen to be complicit in the Turkish Teflon.

Who are the real turkeys here? It sure isn’t the Turks.