Resurrecting the Ottoman Empire?

[I AM NOT THAT GUY 5,715]

Turkey looks east and makes waves

Reporting from Istanbul, Turkey — Turkey has long been a map of possibility — its eastern fringes touching Iraq and its western borders brushing Europe, a place where the music of Beethoven played amid the call to prayer.

This predominantly Muslim nation is a member of NATO and a candidate, although an unwelcome one, to join the European Union. But Turkey is peering east, dispatching financial brokers, pistachio merchants and diplomats across a restless region that is both looking for and suspicious of any gleam of fresh leadership.

By default and through its own designs, Turkey has gained stature in a Middle East where old Arab powers are fading and gulf states are preoccupied with the global financial crisis and the prospect of a nuclear-armed Iran. Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has strengthened relations with former enemy Syria, improved ties with Iran and, to the agitation of Egypt, arisen as a provocative Muslim voice for Palestinians in the Gaza Strip.

"The country's conservative government has an ideological fit with the Middle East and the larger Muslim world," said Asli Aydintasbas, a columnist with the newspaper Milliyet. "And, practically speaking, there's no place for Turkey in Europe, at least in the short term."

The crisis over the recent deadly Israeli raid on a humanitarian flotilla bound for Gaza upset the strategic relationship between Israel and Turkey, which has been the Jewish state's closest Muslim ally. The two cooperate on defense and amassed $2.5 billion in bilateral trade last year. But Turkey's fierce reaction to the killing of nine Turkish activists by Israeli commandos highlighted the nation's growing disenchantment with the Jewish state.

The U.S. worries that the eastward tilt of Turkey's Islamic-oriented government runs counter to Washington's ambitions. Ankara has increasingly insinuated itself into Palestinian affairs and has appeared to embrace Hamas, which controls Gaza and is considered a terrorist group by the U.S. and Israel. But this tack has turned Erdogan, who once sold sesame buns in Istanbul's poor neighborhoods, into a hero in the Muslim world.

http://articles.latimes.com/2010/jun/20/world/la-fg-turkey-east-20100620

[Saddle Bronc 124]

And its neighbour Iran has always used as its policy-basis (whether during Shahs' time, or current mullahs) that it is the natural heir to (ancient) Persian Empire--which included the bulk of Turkey at-height. All-in-all, it balances out!

[I AM NOT THAT GUY 5,715]

The Turks and the Persians have been becoming buddy-buddy lately. You might think they have more in common, than they do in conflict. With no one listening to their common problems with the Kurds, and tensions growing with the West, both will find wisdom in the phrase, "The enemy of my enemy is my friend."