Is antisemitism rising in Turkey?

Yesterday's Radikal daily ran the results of a European Union-sponsored public survey on xenophobia and racism in its headlines. “Racism within us” read the headline. The results deserved a critical headline indeed, but a close look at the results publicized by the Frekans research company reveals that what is “within us” is ignorance and not racism per se.

As the results of this important nationwide survey appeared only in the Radikal and Milliyet dailies, it is better to present the results as they are represented in these two newspapers. The survey reveals that 42 percent of Turkish people do not want to have a Turkish-Jewish neighbor; over 50 percent of people do not want to see non-Muslims having jobs in public offices, especially if these posts relate to security issues; almost 50 percent of Turkish people believe that the Greek, Armenian and Jewish citizens of Turkey do not feel a belonging to Turkey; and according to an average Turk, an average Jew is unreliable but hardworking and does not value human beings.

These are all the alarm bells of racism in its embryonic stage.

Ignorance is the first step toward racism, but it is not racism. Milliyet columnist Derya Sazak is amazed to see that Turks do not want to have Jewish or Christian neighbors despite the fact that they know very little about Judaism and Christianity. This amazement is amusing. Well, in fact, it is sorrowful. Common wisdom says that human beings are enemies of what they do not know. I am 100 percent sure that a larger portion of Turkish society would say no to a neighbor from an alien species.

The most disturbing result of the Frekans survey is not about our xenophobia, it is about our ignorance of “others within us.” The survey reveals the importance of interfaith and intercultural dialogue activities. It reveals the importance of civil society organizations like the Writers and Journalists Foundation and its Intercultural Dialogue Platform, which has been organizing encounters with the “others within us.”

Shame on the journalists who kept silent on the face of the rootless criticism the volunteers of dialogue had to cope with.

Despite its disturbing findings, the survey is not free of questions itself. The representation of the results in the two newspapers I mentioned lacks any comparison with previous surveys. Only months ago, Professor Yılmaz Esmer publicized the results of his survey, carried out on a larger sample group, about “Radicalism and Extremism,” where Esmer asked the participants about their opinion on the religious or sexual preferences of their neighbors. Sixty-four percent of the Turkish public replied that they wouldn't want to have a Jewish neighbor. If that exclusivist response dropped to 42 percent in only a few months, we can securely conclude that Turkish people's sentiments about Jews are largely dependant on the policies of Israel. Esmer's study was conducted in a period when Israel's Gaza operations created a surge in anti-Zionism all over the world, and not only in Turkey. Professor Esmer's study had comparative notes in it, and we learned from Esmer that in a similar study conducted in 1990, only 45 percent of Turkish people disliked the idea of a Jewish neighbor.

Esmer's findings revealed an increase in anti-Semitism. Frekans' research is actually bringing good tidings. We return to our normal levels of “alien paranoia” when Israel adopts a low-profile military operations policy in the occupied Palestinian lands.

It would be unjust if we reduced the findings of the Frekans survey to the “perception of Jews and Israel in the Turkish public.” The survey says that when asked to define themselves only with one of the identities given, 51 percent chose to say “citizen of the Turkish Republic,” 19 percent Muslim, 19 percent Turkish, 2 percent Kurdish and 2 percent Alevi.

This is something that needs to be discussed more thoroughly.

One last point for the Jewish community! The study was publicized by the Jewish community the day before yesterday. It found a large place in Radikal because Radikal's editor-in-chief, İsmet Berkan, was invited to comment on the findings. Milliyet's Derya Sazak was also among the invitees. To the best of my knowledge, Today's Zaman was not invited or informed. This is doing exactly the opposite of what the survey suggests. If you ignore the largest circulating Turkish daily and the larger of the two English dailies, don't look for any explanation for the ignorance of the general public other than your ignorance of the general tendencies of the public.