Do Jews Have a Future in Turkey?

Growing anti-Semitism, an Islamist government, hostility toward Israel, and assimilation threaten the survival of the Jewish community of Turkey, which is now thought to number 15,000 souls. In a synagogue in Istanbul, there is a helmet under every seat in case of another attack like the 2003 truck bombings that left 27 dead. Avi Lewis writes:

With an illustrious 700-year history behind them, Turkey’s Jews now seem wedged between a rock and a hard place. While outbursts of anti-Semitic rhetoric and growing hostility toward Israel under President Recep Tayyip Erdogan make the community increasingly uneasy, some Jewish leaders say they are just as concerned over assimilation, intermarriage, and emigration. But they remain adamant that Jewish life will persist here, regardless of the growing intolerance and Islamization of Turkish society.

A spokesman for the Jewish community’s official [organization] says Turkey’s Jews are dismayed by the uptick in anti-Semitic speech and media articles but still try, in their limited capacity, to bring these issues to the attention of the public and government to solve them via the legal system. . . .

While some members are indeed in the process of leaving because of the anti-Semitic environment, others are staying put, and a small number are even returning. The general consensus is that of a highly ambivalent community taking a wait-and-see approach to political developments.

Read more at Times of Israel

More about: Anti-Semitism, Jewish World, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, Turkey, Turkish Jewry

 

What a Strategic Victory in Gaza Can and Can’t Achieve

On Tuesday, the Israeli defense minister Yoav Gallant met in Washington with Secretary of State Antony Blinken and Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin. Gallant says that he told the former that only “a decisive victory will bring this war to an end.” Shay Shabtai tries to outline what exactly this would entail, arguing that the IDF can and must attain a “strategic” victory, as opposed to merely a tactical or operational one. Yet even after a such a victory Israelis can’t expect to start beating their rifles into plowshares:

Strategic victory is the removal of the enemy’s ability to pose a military threat in the operational arena for many years to come. . . . This means the Israeli military will continue to fight guerrilla and terrorist operatives in the Strip alongside extensive activity by a local civilian government with an effective police force and international and regional economic and civil backing. This should lead in the coming years to the stabilization of the Gaza Strip without Hamas control over it.

In such a scenario, it will be possible to ensure relative quiet for a decade or more. However, it will not be possible to ensure quiet beyond that, since the absence of a fundamental change in the situation on the ground is likely to lead to a long-term erosion of security quiet and the re-creation of challenges to Israel. This is what happened in the West Bank after a decade of relative quiet, and in relatively stable Iraq after the withdrawal of the United States at the end of 2011.

Read more at BESA Center

More about: Gaza War 2023, Hamas, IDF