A Turkish official says there is no new agreement with the United States on using an air base in southern Turkey for operations against the Islamic State group.

Turkey and the United States are still talking about the Incirlik air base as well as Turkish demands for the creation of a no-fly zone and a safe haven for refugees, the government official told the Associated Press on Monday. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak on the issue publicly.

Full Article:

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/world/turkey-has-not-agreed-to-let-us-use-base-for-operations-against-islamic-state-official-says/article21079256/

I don´t understand Turkey´s position. Why do they have this position?

what positions would you prefer?

Turkey provides support to ISIS. Because Turkey 75% Sunni Muslim country. And ISIS killing Kurds.Turkey is always a supporter of the Islamic State.

Erdogan´s son Bilal Erdogan and ISIS

I don`t see any Turks in that picture. Just a Greek and some Arabs. 

I understood ISIL already has a Turkish-Border town in Syria, Suruc. Does Turkey not see this as a threat or is their position to not strike until striked at?

I hope that AzerbayCan61 is not correct, I hope Turkey´s inaction has nothing to do with the Kurds.

Interesting:

Time to kick Turkey out of NATO

It would be great. And while we are at it we could also close the military bases of christian invaders in Turkey.

Yes, you have to wonder about Turkey´s commitment to NATO.

But if they did get involved with this conflict, could make things worse and allow the conflict to spill inside Turkey.

I can see Turkey´s dilema. After a brief flirtation with the west they are beginning to reappraise their position.

Let´s take a look at what´s going on in Iraq and Syria.

Kurds: They rose to power and have become the de facto administrators of the vast regions of these two countries. They have armies trained by the West and they use American weapons. On paper America is an ally of Turkey via NATO. Yet, they backed the formation of Kurdistan which has long been a major threat for Turkey. Turkey has been fighting with the Kurdish seperatists for ages and all her allies know the country´s concerns and policies.

ISIS: We are talking about a major military power with unprecedented fire power and organization. This organization runs on tremendous amounts of money coming from all sorts of illegal channels and trades. The question is who created ISIS? Whose pawn are they? 

Turkey: Turkey has a long border with both countries and it directly suffers the consequences of the war. Turkey has so far accepted the largest number of refugees. She even let them travel around the country or find jobs where some Western governments were reluctantly offering to accept 800 or so of them.

America: America belongs here because they consider themselves as the world police. They have a right to invade, divide, partition sovereign nations just because they can do that. Let us not talk about moral values here. It is just a power game that takes place just because America wants a large chunk from the wealths of smaller nations.

One day, this will change there will be a new super power. Maybe China or God knows who. When that happens American people will remember the old days just like many Turks remember the Ottoman Empire. In this world, there is no lasting alliance or friendship.

I don´t blame you at all for questioning the US´ motives. But with Turkey doing nothing about ISIL, is the rest of the world just supposed to sit back and let ISIL flourish or just wait and see how they make out?

Why don´t you christians mind your own business, ever? You could start with getting out of the muslim countries you invaded and paying compensation for the muslims you killed.

It is a bit weird to call the West as Christians. Christ himself was a peaceful man. He has no relation with the current day Christians who have nothing to do with the original teachings of that great dude. For example, he strictly forbade usury but todays´ West runs on usury and by the consent of the church. 

Islam´s prophet on the other hand was a warrior prophet. He acted as an army general, statesman etc. We have to remember this point. We can claim crusades were against the spirit of Christianity but can we say that Jihad actually contradicts with it?

I would like to say, the religion context here is dubious. Christ did not want his followers to organize crusades. Christians can´t attribute their warlike nature to the teachings of their religion. However, Muslims can.

We should say this is a cultural thing... and nothing more.

What are they if not christians? Can you define what the "west" is then? It´s an ambiguous term that christians have made up to hide their agenda to christianize the whole world. That of course doesn´t mean they are trying to make everybody to convert into christianity. instead they simply force people to wear what christians wear, act like christians act, think the way christians think. And they call it westernization instead of that infamous word crusade. What´s this if not christofascism?

There are almost 3 million muslims living in Britain and more are choosing to come here every year so we cannot be what you say. Islam is the second religion in the UK and more mosques are being built to cope with the rising muslim population. So what you are saying is simply not true.

And thousands of christian immigrants from England come to Turkey to live here. So what does this have to do with what I said?

Orthodox-Catholic Christians in the Middle Ages there were wars. Mutually excommunicated. Today Orthodox-Catholic war does not exist. But Muslims in the 21st century Sunni-Shiite war continues. Alevis are respectful of all religions and peoples. But they are ´not-Islamic  sects´ acceptable. 

Today Erdogan and his government ´Arab Islam´ is the understanding. We Azeris, for  moderate Islam thank the Aliyev government.

You should thank West for tokenizing moderate Islam.

im should thank ´Mevlana´ for moderate Islam. But you, can thank Saudi Arabia.

That was over my head. Anlamadim.

That was over my head. Anlamadim.

He is trying to say Obama is playing the Mevlevi card. Can you believe that? 

ORTA DOĞU ÜZERİNE BİR YORUM

Orta Doğu’daki şekillenmenin temel alt yapısı, tarih ve hukuk açısından, Türkiye ve bölge yöneticileri arasında 1923 tarihinde imzalanan Süleymaniye Kongresi’nde alınan yasal kararlara ve Lozan Anlaşması felsefesine dayanır.

Süleymaniye Kongresi kararlarında; Irak ve Suriye’nin kuzey bölgeleri Türkiye’nin Misakı Milli sınırları arasında gösterilmiş; bu bölgelerde yaşayan Türkmen ve Kürt halkları yönetimlerine muhtariyet verilmesi öngörülmüştür.

Bu tarihsel alt yapıı ve hukuki gerçeklik dikkate alınarak, Orta Doğu’nun uluslararası hukuka göre yeniden şekillendirilmesi ve bu bölgedeki trajik olayların önlenmesi; (Osmanlı İmparatorluğu’nun  bu bölgeyi 400 yıl barış içinde yönetmiş olmasından yola çıkarak), ancak bölgesel önemli bir aktör olan  Türkiye’nin ulusal liderliği altında ve  bu bölge halklarının istekleri yönünde gerçekleşebilir.

NOT=Bu yorumu, bir arkadaş İngilizceye çevirebilirse, çok yararlı olur.

You should be grateful that your country was not invaded by the sunni Kurds. The population in Turkey was mostly Shiite too before the Kurds that Yavuz Sultan Selim brought from the desert of Iran genocided thousands of Alevi Turks.

Yes Yavuz Sultan Selim in 1514 allied with Sunni Kurds. Because Alevis gave support to the Safavid state. Kurdish leader Idris-i Bitlisi, says that 40,000 Alevis died. Azerbaijani Shah Ismail, Kurds were deported to Xorasan.

Shah Ismail, Turkish language official language of the Safavid state was made​​. Shah Ismail, the Turkish language was the letter writer. Yavuz Sultan Selim, Persian letter writer.

Today, the most widely spoken language is Turkish  language for daily life in Iran.

I think it is real Turk Shah Ismail. Yavuz Sultan Selim and the Ottoman Empire only is a ´Arab´ admirer.  Today Erdogan is a ´Arab´ admirer. Ilham Aliyev is just acting like Shah Ismail.

Yes Yavuz Sultan Selim in 1514 allied with Sunni Kurds. Because Alevis gave support to the Safavid state. Kurdish leader Idris-i Bitlisi, says that 40,000 Alevis died. Azerbaijani Shah Ismail, Kurds were deported to Xorasan.

Shah Ismail, Turkish language official language of the Safavid state was made​​. Shah Ismail, the Turkish language was the letter writer. Yavuz Sultan Selim, Persian letter writer.

Today, the most widely spoken language is Turkish  language for daily life in Iran.

I think it is real Turk Shah Ismail. Yavuz Sultan Selim and the Ottoman Empire only is a ´Arab´ admirer.  Today Erdogan is a ´Arab´ admirer. Ilham Aliyev is just acting like Shah Ismail.

I agree with that. There is in fact a great deal of resemblence between Yavuz and Tayyip,

-They are/were both racially more Greek than Turk. Tayyip is a Pontus greek from the black sea. and there were no Turkish women in the Ottoman harem. Thw women in harem were mostly Greek, Russian and Serbian. So only the few founders of the Ottoman state like Ertugrul, Osman and Orhan had Turkish blood.

-They both hate/hated Turks, especially the Alevi ones.

-They both love/loved Kurds, and cooperate with them. 

Kurds, Turks, Azeris whatever, it is not wrong to belong one of them. It is wrong to say a certain race is evil and that people we hate are doing the things that make us angry because they are Kurds, Turks etc. That´s why many of the posts here smell of chauvinism and racism.

History recorded Yavuz as a violent person who murdered his own father chased his vizirs with a sword in his hand. He must certainly have had an anger management problem but unfortunately there were no shrinks in his day; for that he would have to wait until the 19th century. 

As it turns out Sheik Ismail was a direct opposite of Yavuz Selim. He was a man of letters, a poet, a proto-humanist who is still a role model for post modern humanists. However, a typical mistake would be disregarding the time frame and considering all the leaders as if they are contemporaries.

Yavuz was not a racist. He thought he was the sword of God and he also though he was the Khaliph and that he was acting according to God´s will. In other words, by today´s standards he was an über megaloman. He killed his own kinsmen, citizens and friends and planted the seeds of ethnic hatred in this country.

Erdogan certainly likes him and will give his name to the third bridge over Bosphorus because he has a similar character. Nevertheless, Erdogan does not lead an empire with mighty armies. He is playing in a setting where a leader must be aware of his limitations.  

Here I tried to translate a few lines from Sheik Ismail

Truth is a deep mystery

You can not crack it open

There is faith in blasphemy

Yet it is beyond all reason

I am Hata-i the Sheik

of the land of misty mountains

Here are the Bible and the Quran

and there is not a single difference

Sheik Ismail.

and this one is from Yavuz Selim

By what magic did she turn my eyes all red

she filled up my heart with her love

lions do tremble by the fear of my terror

yet her eyes turned me into a slave of her love 

Yavuz Selim

(These are just quick translations)

As vineyard says : "Kurds, Turks, Azeris whatever, it is not wrong to belong one of them. It is wrong to say a certain race is evil and that people we hate are doing the things that make us angry because they are Kurds, Turks etc. That´s why many of the posts here smell of chauvinism and racism."

Dont be chauvinist or racist. The race or nations has nothing to do with it.. 

In my opinion : Governments and Countries always only worry about their own profits. They are doing everything by their evil plans, plans which man in the street don´t even have a clue about. While being allies and friends on paper,media they are secretly using people. Setting them against and earning profit from it. 

In this scenario people have some scary theories about U.S.A government´s plans: To gain more power at middle east to get usage of the wealthy soils ,they created,supported ISIS. So they would had a reason to do so..

Who knows what kind of disguisting plans does Turkey Government or even any other country has to this situation.. 

One thing is sure that you can´t have a prejudgment about all the persons just because some example.

You´re wrong. Orhan Gazi in the 4-wife of Greek origin. Uzun Hasan´s wife Theodora Despina Hatun Pontic Greek origin. Uzun Hasan, Shah Ismail´s is the uncle.  Pargali İbrahim Pasha, Mimar Sinan, Piri Reis, all of Greek origin. But they all felt himself a Turk. Erdogan may be of Greek origin, But he needs to act like a Turk. 

Bulent Ecevit of Kurdish origin. But he saved the northern part of Cyprus. The important thing is to feel himself a Turk.

Orhan gazi´s wife was greek but his mother was turkish. It´s just a rumor that one of the grandfathers of Ecevit was Kurdish. and Tayyip doesn´t consider himself to be a Turk but a muslim. He has never even said that he is a Turk. He perefers to call himself "Turkiyeli" instead of Turkish which is rather funny. Can you imagine how it would be if a French president can´t say that he is French?  It´s such a shame that this crook rules Turkey.