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News > World

Fox News Cheered 'God Bless' Turkey Coup Plotters

  • A man stands in front of a Turkish army tank at Ataturk airport in Istanbul, Turkey July 16, 2016.

    A man stands in front of a Turkish army tank at Ataturk airport in Istanbul, Turkey July 16, 2016. | Photo: Reuters

Published 20 July 2016
Opinion

As pro-coup tanks and army vehicles roamed the streets in Turkey, the U.S. channel ran coverage in favor of the undemocratic ouster of the government.

"God bless the people trying to save Turkey” by carrying out the coup.

Those were the words of Fox News columnist and commentator Ralph Peters as helicopters and F-16's were targeting the Turkish parliament, the presidential palace as well as civilians in the streets of Istanbul and Ankara on July 15.

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“We should make no mistake, the people staging this coup are the good guys. It sounds paradoxical, but they are the ones on the side of constitutional democracy,” Peters said, commenting on the Turkey coup as the controversial right-wing channel showed footage of Turkish people confronting tanks and soldiers in the streets.

He went on to say that U.S. President Barack Obama was wrong to support the government in Turkey. “As usual, Obama, Kerry has got it wrong," he said.

However, Peters was probably giving the Obama administration a bit too much credit, as the U.S. government and other Western countries were ambiguous in their support for the government, at least for the first three hours when there was still a possibility the coup would not succeed.

In his initial statement, U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry said he hoped for “stability and peace and continuity” within Turkey without showing any support for either side and especially for the legitimate and elected Turkish parliament or president.

Only when it was already obvious that the coup was failing did President Barack Obama and Kerry issue a statement clearly backing President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and the government.

“If you want to know why Europe and the U.S. are a busted flush in the Middle East, why they have lost all moral authority, indeed any authority at all, and why they are no longer the candle bearers of democratic change, look no further than the three hours of silence as they waited to see which way the wind was blowing in Istanbul and Ankara,” David Hearst, editor of Middle East Eye website and former senior staff writer at The Guardian, said in a recent column.

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Peters was just one example of how Fox News backed the ousting of the democratically-elected government in Turkey by a coup that was already revealing how bloody its aftermath could have been for the Turkish people.

Throughout the day, Fox News hammered the pro-coup narrative as one commentator after another suggested it would be better if Erdogan is ousted because of his authoritarian tendencies and his Islamic-rooted politics.

For example, Texas Republican Representative Michael McCaul attributed the coup to Erdogan’s "Islamism." His Fox News host agreed that Erdogan’s “essential embrace to Islamism” was Turkey’s foremost problem.

Another telling conversation took place between Fox News’ Tucker Carlson and former Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee who said: “This current president, you know, he is the problem,” referring to Erdogan and arguing it would be better if he is ousted.

Using the “Islamist is bad” argument in order to support the coup suggests the commentators have very little knowledge about the power struggles in a major state such as Turkey.

In fact, all opposition parties, whether nationalist, leftist or secular, came out against the coup and many supported Erdogan’s government despite their major opposition to its policies. By far most agree that the secular elite within the Turkish military was not backing the coup and had no hand in it.

A popular theory backed by many in Turkey is that the coup might have been plotted and carried out by former religious and conservative allies of Erdogan, who now want him out of power.

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Irregardless of who was responsible for the coup, however, there is no denying that polls and local media suggest that most Turkish citizens across the political and social spectrum rejected the coup against the elected-government.

Turkey has suffered three bloody coups that saw the military unleash a major crackdown and rule the country with an iron fist. Observers point to the numbers of people taking to the streets on the night of the coup and say it proves the Turkish people are determined to move past their history.

Nonetheless, while many within Turkey and abroad agree that Erdogan and his government have indeed made Turkey a less democratic country with many controversial policies against the Kurdish population and other minorities, the vast majority also agree that removing him from power should be done within the rule of law and at the ballot box.

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