Turkey through the eyes of an Arab

Those who rolled up their sleeves to build a new state and nation after the collapse of the Ottoman Empire followed a systematic method based more on practice than theory, in the shadow of the chilling memories of the genocide committed against Turks in the Balkans and Muslims in the Caucasus.

By roughly analyzing the reasons for the collapse of the great empire, they constructed a structure for the new national state that would not lead to the previous malfunctions.

A single religion was one of these, and it happened.

By the permission of God, biiznillah, no one remained but Muslims.

Especially after the events of September 6-7 and the gloomy atmosphere of the Cold War, when the last remaining ones were also intimidated, we were left to ourselves.

Would it have been better if they had stayed?

It would have been very good, but unfortunately, the Special Warfare Department did not allow it.

Especially the British Special Warfare Department.

Those who remain in Istanbul, numbering no more than a handful, are not very visible either.

In the Balkans, too, it is hard to see Muslims, except for those in a few poor villages.

Anyway, once the issue of a single religion was resolved, it was time for the issue of a single sect, but despite considerable effort, it did not happen.

Alevi Turkmens resisted and were relatively successful.

The migration to cities, which began especially after the 1960s, made Alevis visible, and when it was understood that the rumors fabricated about them had nothing to do with reality and that Alevis also had two eyes and two ears, the Sunnis also loosened their fists.

Even if it is not very possible to explain these things to Sunni small-town Turks who do not know the difference between Arab Alevis and Turkmen Alevis, the problem was solved as familiarity increased through migration.

When the Shafi'is saw the difficulties the Alevis were going through, they did not get involved in the matter at all.

They escaped without getting hit by the gendarmerie's baton.

What remained was the issue of a single nation.

That did not fail either.

Perhaps it was even more successful than targeted.

It may be a singular example, but the teacher who gives private lessons to the children in our complex is a mathematician who, despite being born in a hamlet a thousand kilometers east of Ankara, became a teacher instead of a bandit or a shepherd thanks to the light of the republic.

The troublesome terrorist organization could not succeed despite international support and could not generate hatred, so we have been continuing with this teacher for two years.

Although it killed the teachers and doctors sent to the mountain village, the region was left neither without teachers nor without doctors.

There is no one left who does not know Turkish.

Electricity, roads, water.

There is almost no point they have not reached.

Even a university was established, even if it had no students, for heaven's sake.

A fair number of foreign students came to these empty universities.

The classrooms were filled to the brim with Arab and African students.

They loved Turkey very much.

They are traveling from city to city.

They also share their experiences in class.

They are looking for the recipe for how we became a single nation despite every city resembling a different country or nation, and despite the 7 regions, 7 different folk dances, different musical rhythms, drums, zurnas, kemençes, bozlak, and long-form folk songs.

In the meantime, let us not deny TOKİ its due; its contribution with concrete blocks built with a single-type tunnel formwork architectural system in every region, every city, every climate, every culture, every mountain, every slope, and every plain is undeniable.

They began to look with suspicion at the mentors who caused them to fall apart by thinking they would survive by fragmenting positions into micro-structures and dividing them on a sectarian basis, using the democratic wisdom they received from imperial powers and their local collaborators who are literate and speak the language.

Then, these rumors sprouted among us too.

Thank God, no one from here jumped headlong into this nonsense.

It is clear that the absence of liberal leftists and Second Republicans, and the crushing of FETÖ members, ensured that Turkey's project of ethnic and sectarian fragmentation was extinguished before it could grow.

In the Republic of Turkey, where espionage or counter-espionage does not work, those who try to play reverse psychology will also be left empty-handed.