Cleric Fethullah Gulen, accused of 2016 coup against Turkey's Erdogan, passes away in US
Saylorsburg, Oct 21: Fethullah Gulen, a reclusive US-based Islamic cleric who inspired a global social movement while facing accusations he masterminded a failed 2016 coup in his native Turkiye, has passed away.
Abdullah Bozkurt, the former editor of the Gulen-linked Today's Zaman newspaper, who is now in exile in Sweden, said on Monday that he spoke to Gulen's nephew, Kemal Gulen, who confirmed the death. Fethullah Gülen was in his eighties and had long been in ill health.
The state-run Anadolu Agency quoted Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan as saying the death has been confirmed by Turkish intelligence sources.
Gulen spent the last decades of his life in self-exile, living on a gated compound in Pennsylvania's Pocono Mountains from where he continued to wield influence among his millions of followers in Turkiye and throughout the world.
He espoused a philosophy that blended Sufism — a mystical form of Islam — with staunch advocacy of democracy, education, science and interfaith dialogue.
Gülen began as an ally of Turkish leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan, but became a foe. He called Erdogan an authoritarian bent on accumulating power and crushing dissent. Erdogan cast Gülen as a terrorist, accusing him of orchestrating the attempted military coup on the night of July 15, 2016, when factions within the military used tanks, warplanes and helicopters to try to overthrow Erdogan's government.
Heeding a call from the president, thousands took to the streets to oppose the takeover attempt. The coup-plotters fired at crowds and bombed parliament and other government buildings. A total of 251 people were killed and around 2,200 others were wounded. Around 35 alleged coup plotters were also killed.
Gülen adamantly denied involvement, and his supporters dismissed the charges as ridiculous and politically motivated. Turkiye put Gulen on its most-wanted list and demanded his extradition, but the United States showed little inclination to send him back, saying it needed more evidence. Gulen was never charged with a crime in the US, and he consistently denounced terrorism as well as the coup plotters.
In Turkiye, Gulen's movement — sometimes known as Hizmet, Turkish for “service” — was subjected to a broad crackdown. The government arrested tens of thousands of people for their alleged link to the coup plot, sacked more than 130,000 suspected supporters from civil service jobs and more than 23,000 from the military, and shuttered hundreds of businesses, schools and media organisations tied to Gulen.
Gulen called the crackdown a witch hunt and denounced Turkiye's leaders as “tyrants”.
“The last year has taken a toll on me as hundreds of thousands of innocent Turkish citizens are being punished simply because the government decides they are somehow connected' to me or the Hizmet movement and treats that alleged connection as a crime,” he said on the one-year anniversary of the failed coup.
Turkish Foreign Minister Fidan said on Monday that Gulen's death “will not make us complacent. Our nation and state will continue to fight against this organisation, as they do against all terrorist organisations”.
Fethullah Gulen was born in Erzurum, in eastern Turkiye. His official birth date was April 27, 1941, but that has long been in dispute. Y. Alp Aslandogan, who leads a New York-based group that promotes Gulen's ideas and work, said Gülen was actually born sometime in 1938.
Trained as an imam, or prayer leader, Gulen gained notice in Turkiye some 50 years ago. He preached tolerance and dialogue between faiths, and he believed religion and science could go hand in hand. His belief in merging Islam with Western values and Turkish nationalism struck a chord with Turks, earning him millions of followers.
Gülen's acolytes built a loosely affiliated global network of charitable foundations, professional associations, businesses and schools in more than 100 countries, including 150 taxpayer-funded charter schools throughout the United States.
In Turkiye, supporters ran universities, hospitals, charities, a bank and a large media empire with newspapers and radio and TV stations.
But Gulen was viewed with suspicion by some in his homeland, a deeply polarised country split between those loyal to its fiercely secular traditions and supporters of the Islamic-based party associated with Erdogan that came to power in 2002.
Gulen had long refrained from openly supporting any political party, but his movement forged a de facto alliance with Erdogan against the country's old guard of staunch, military-backed secularists, and Gulen's media empire threw its weight behind Erdogan's Islamic-oriented government.
Gulenists helped the governing party win multiple elections. But the Erdogan-Gulen alliance began to crumble after the movement criticized government policy and exposed alleged corruption among Erdogan's inner circle. Erdogan, who denied the allegations, grew weary of the growing influence of Gulen's movement.
The Turkish leader accused Gulen's followers of infiltrating the country's police and judiciary and setting up a parallel state, and began agitating for Gulen's extradition to Turkiye even before the failed 2016 coup.
The cleric had lived in the United States since 1999, when he came to seek medical treatment.
In 2000, with Gulen still in the US, Turkish authorities charged him with leading an Islamist plot to overthrow the country's secular form of government and establish a religious state.
Some of the accusations against him were based on a tape recording on which Gulen was alleged to have told supporters of an Islamic state to bide their time: “If they come out too early, the world will quash their heads.” Gulen said his comments were taken out of context.
The cleric was tried in absentia and acquitted, but he never returned to his homeland. He won a lengthy legal battle against the administration of then-President George W. Bush to obtain permanent residency in the US.
Rarely seen in public, Gulen lived quietly on the grounds of an Islamic retreat centre in the Poconos. He occupied a small apartment on the sprawling compound and left mostly only to see doctors for ailments that included heart disease and diabetes, spending much of his time in prayer and meditation and receiving visitors from around the world.
Gulen never married and did not have children. It is not known who, if anyone, will lead the movement.
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Kerala Story 2 propaganda film aimed at polarisation: John Brittas
New Delhi (PTI): The Kerala Story 2 is a "propaganda" movie aimed at creating polarisation ahead of the upcoming Assembly elections in the state, CPI(M) Rajya Sabha MP John Brittas said, questioning if local BJP leaders would dare to demand a "beef ban".
The film, which has sparked a controversy with its promo showing a woman being forced to eat beef, has been challenged in court.
Brittas, a Rajya Sabha MP from the Left party, alleged that the upcoming film was part of a political attempt to polarise voters and malign Kerala ahead of elections, however, stating that he did not favour its ban.
"It's a propaganda movie. It should be put in the septic tank rather than viewed in the theatre," Brittas said.
"It is very obvious that the BJP wants to use such malicious propaganda to tarnish Kerala, to have a foothold in Kerala, to create communal polarisation here, and send a wrong picture about the state, which is the most peaceful and known for its communal amity and harmony," he told PTI.
The movie has also triggered widespread reactions on social media, with several posts talking about communal harmony in the state. Brittas said the makers of the movie did not have an understanding of the society in Kerala.
"The counter-narrative that's been drawn on social media is mind-boggling. If the producer or the director had an iota of shame, they would have abandoned this project... I feel that this is a diabolical game that's being played out by the BJP, just for electoral polarisation," he said.
Brittas also challenged the BJP leaders in Kerala to speak about a "beef ban".
"I am challenging, can a BJP leader profoundly make a statement in Kerala that beef should be banned? Can anybody say that beef should be banned in Kerala, even a BJP leader?" he said.
"Is it not a fact that most of these BJP leaders consume beef? This is part of your choice, whether you want to have beef, pork, mutton or chicken," he said.
Referring to judicial scrutiny in another film, Ghooskhor Pandat, Brittas cited observations made by the Supreme Court on titles and social sensitivity, and asked how authorities should respond when, in his view, "an entire state is maligned".
"When they put a title in an innocuous way, this was the response of the Supreme Court. Then how should the Supreme Court react after seeing Kerala Story 1 and 2?" Brittas asked.
He, however, said that they don't want a ban on the movie.
"Even when the earlier Kerala Story came, we did not ban it. It was screened and left (the theatres). Nobody went to see the movie," he said, adding, "Let people realise what this diabolical game being played by the BJP is."
The CPI(M) leader also cast doubt on claims about the commercial success of the earlier movie, suggesting that organised support and bulk ticket purchases could have contributed to its box office performance. He also took a swipe at Prime Minister Narendra Modi, recalling that the BJP had publicly praised the first film during its release.
"Can a movie for which the prime minister is the brand ambassador be seen as a flop? The BJP cadre have to buy the ticket, even if they don't watch it," Brittas said.
"The richest party would have given the money they got from electoral bonds, a portion of it," he said, targeting the BJP.
He also questioned the speed with which the movie reportedly secured certification, alleging inconsistencies in the way the Central Board of Film Certification treats films.
Brittas said in Kerala's plural social fabric, where multiple religions and cultures coexist, attempts made at communal division are unlikely to succeed.
He maintained that the state's voters were politically aware and would not be influenced by what he described as propaganda.
"They can try hard to malign Kerala, but the state will give a fitting reply," he said.
The Kerala Story, directed by Sudipto Sen and released in 2023, had claimed to depict the alleged radicalisation and trafficking of women from Kerala into extremist networks, a narrative strongly disputed by the Left Democratic Front government and opposition parties in the state, as well as several civil society groups.
The sequel, The Kerala Story 2, has again triggered debate even before the release, with promotional material and political reactions reviving arguments over representation, artistic freedom and the use of cinema in electoral narratives.
