Do the governments in our so-called democratic states care for what they claim to – their “cherished values” of pluralism and democracy? Their approach towards the regime led by Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Turkey offers yet another evidence that they hardly care for such values.

Observers say Turkey is no longer what its legendary architect and first President Kemal Atatürk had promised once—humanism, republicanism, statism, secularism,and Western liberal-scientific education. There was a time when Turkey had a special relationship with Israel, the only democracy in the Middle East.

Turkey was neutral during the Arab-Israeli war of 1948. It was the first Muslim state to establish diplomatic ties with Israel in 1949. In 1951, Turkey joined the Western powers to protest against Egypt’s decision to deny Israeli ships passage through the Suez Canal. In 1954, then Turkish Premier Adnan Menderes called on Arab states to........

© Blitz