Category: News

Westfield London stabbing: Stabbing Attack at London’s biggest shopping centre

Westfield London stabbing: Man in hospital after shopping centre attack

Two men arrested after attack at London’s biggest shopping centre

According to Independent a man has been stabbed at a London shopping centre packed with thousands of families and children on their school holidays.

Witnesses said the attack happened on the ground floor of Westfield London, with two men seen running away from the scene.

Police were called at 2pm and arrived to find a man in his 20s with stab wounds.

He was taken to hospital in west London by ambulance and his condition is unknown.

“Officers retain an open mind as to the motive but this incident is not terror related,” a spokesperson for the Metropolitan Police said.

Two men have been arrested in connection with the incident.

Westfield London, in White City, is the second-largest shopping centre in the UK and the biggest in London.

It was partly closed as investigations into the incident continued on Friday afternoon.

The attack came amid increased security across the capital after a man went on a knife rampage in Russell Square, killing an American woman and injuring five others.

August 5, 2016
This hooker was used to bribe NYPD cops with group sex

The hooker at the center of the NYPD corruption scandal has revealed to The Post how she engaged in mile-high group sex with two cops and three other men during a wild private-plane trip to Las Vegas.

According to New York Post Gabi Grecko donned a skimpy flight attendant outfit to service now-disgraced NYPD Deputy Inspector James Grant, since-fired Detective Michael Milici and the others while flying over the American heartland in February 2013, she claims.

She was hired by a pair of businessmen to entertain Grant in exchange for official favors, according to a federal corruption case filed against him this week.

Grecko, 27, told The Post she performed oral sex on each man in the cabin — sometimes simultaneously having sex with more than one of them.

“I was doing it while they were in their seats,” Grecko recalled.

“It was me on top the whole time. Front, behind, side. They all seemed really comfortable to take their pants off in front of each other and laugh about it. It’s like they’d done this before.”

Grant’s co-defendant, Brooklyn businessman Jeremy Reichberg, directed the sexcapades, shouting out instructions and providing running commentary, she said.

“He wasn’t really part of the action. He was just like setting it up and watching. He got serviced for part of the time, but he was mostly just egging it on and saying nasty comments, instructing me what to do sexually,” she said.

“He’d call me a dirty slut while smacking my a- -.”

She said she had no idea Grant and Milici, who were in civilian clothing, were cops, although they jokingly swung handcuffs.

“I didn’t think they were real,” she said. “They were just waving them around, like to put them on me. I was like, ‘No way.’ ”

Grecko, who is cooperating with the feds against Grant and Reichberg, said her outfit came from a costume shop near Union Square. Reichberg took Grecko there and helped her pick it out before the trip, she said.

“I was supposed to be a sexy stewardess. I’d ask: ‘Tea or coffee?’ ” she said.

“They all wanted me, I guess, and not the tea or coffee.”

Grecko initially thought the in-flight entertainment would be limited to “sitting on people’s laps and drinking with them.”

“I didn’t think it would be as extreme as it was, but then because I obviously couldn’t get off the plane, I had to do what they were telling me,” she said. “More than one would try to get my attention at once. They were really creepy and very rude and offensive.”

Grant kept shouting, “Ma’am, I need service over here!” she said.

And they were a bit picky.

“One of them told me that I wasn’t giving a good b- – -job,” Grecko added.

Grecko’s tale expands on allegations in the criminal complaint unsealed Monday that Grant and Milici joined the Mile High Club during the “first-class plus” flight.

It also expands on other allegations in the complaint against Grant, Reichberg and NYPD Deputy Chief Michael Harrington, who is not alleged to have been on the flight.

The feds say Reichberg and a cooperating witness — identified by sources as his pal Jona Rechnitz, a Manhattan real estate investor — invited Grant to join them in Sin City from Feb. 2 through Feb. 4, 2013, for Super Bowl XLVII.

Also on the trip was Grant’s friend Milici, referred to in court papers as “Detective-1,” an unidentified male “associate” of Rechnitz’s and Grecko, whom the feds call “Prostitute-1.”

The four identified men are all married with children.

Reichberg and Rechnitz arranged for Grecko “to come on the private jet and spend the weekend with the group in Las Vegas,” the Manhattan federal court complaint says.

Law enforcement agents who interviewed Grecko “confirmed, among other things, that [she] was engaged to accompany the persons on the trip and that Grant and others took advantage of her services during the trip,” the complaint says.

Michael Milici and James GrantPhoto: Gabriella Bass

Rechnitz footed the $59,000 bill for the jet and scored comped rooms for the cops and paid for their meals, the complaint says.

Grant shared his room with Grecko, according to the feds.

Rechnitz wasn’t reimbursed, but the feds say Grant performed “numerous official acts” for him and Reichberg, including “regularly” providing them with police escorts.

Grecko said the group stayed at the MGM Grand Hotel & Casino.

Most of the men shared a huge duplex penthouse suite, equipped with a hot tub on its terrace, while Grant and Grecko shared a smaller penthouse, she said.

The group watched the Super Bowl in a private section of a large party room in the hotel, where they were joined by a bevy of local hookers, Grecko said.

Everyone binged on champagne and catered food, and Grecko said the men bet heavily on the San Francisco 49ers — who lost to the Baltimore Ravens, 34-31.

The group then returned to the large penthouse for a late-night orgy with other hookers, who got naked and hopped into the hot tub, Grecko said.

“When I came in, there were all these nude girls . . . They were walking in and out from the balcony,” Grecko said.

“They didn’t pressure me too much into doing it that time because there were all these girls.”

August 5, 2016
Mental Health Significant Factor at Terrorist knife attack’ in Russell Square where 7/7 bomb was detonated
‘I heard a scream, then I saw the blood’: Woman in her 60s is killed and five people are injured as man, 19, ‘goes on rampage in a terrorist knife attack’ in Russell Square where 7/7 bomb was detonated
- Woman in her 60s has died and five others injured after knifeman, 19, ‘went on the rampage’ in London
- Police called to Russell Square at 10.30pm last night after witnesses say screaming victims tried to flee
- One witness said: ‘There was a madman running around with a knife just lunging at people randomly and stabbing them. He was just going for anyone he could see’
- Suspect Tasered and spent night in hospital before being taken to a South London police station for questioning
- Five other victims were knifed in the back, side and arms. Two are in hospital and three were discharged
- Scotland Yard said incident could be terror related and said knifeman has ‘significant mental health issues’
According to Daily Mail a knifeman has gone on the rampage in central London and murdered a woman in her 60s and injured five more people in a possible terror attack.

Police were called to Russell Square at 10.30pm last night after the suspect, 19, chased and stabbed pedestrians in the back, side and arms who were left ‘screaming and covered in blood’ on the pavement.

He was arrested on suspicion of murder after armed officers Tasered him to the ground and after a night in hospital has been taken into custody at a south London police station.

A woman was pronounced dead at the scene and two women and three men were taken to hospital. Three have since been discharged.

The killer’s knife was abandoned on the pavement next to the body of the unnamed victim, which remained under a forensics tent overnight and was taken away by ambulance this morning.

Hotel staff on Russell Square, an area always packed with tourists, said the attacker was completely silent was ‘just going for anyone he could see’ before he was shot with a Taser and pinned face-down by police.

One worker told the Standard: ‘The police came to the hotel and a guest was telling them what he saw. He said there was a madman running around with a knife just lunging at people randomly and stabbing them’.

Scotland Yard’s top anti-terror officer Mark Rowley gave a press conference outside Scotland Yard at 3.40am and said the 19-year-old appears to have ‘significant mental health issues’ but admitted terrorism could be a motive.

The Met will send scores of armed officers on to the streets of the London this morning – including members of its new elite counter-terror unit – to reassure the public and in case there is a new attack.
- A 19-year-old man has been arrested on suspicion of murder after he stabbed six people in Russell Square at around 10.30pm last night. One witness called him ‘dark-skinned’ or African, another white and ‘chubby’
- A woman, believed to have been in her 60s, was fatally injured and five others were treated in hospital. Three were discharged this morning.
- Spanish family of four – believed to be on holiday in London – cradled the woman as she died on the pavement
- Witnesses say he was chasing screaming victims and slashing ‘anyone he could see’ before he was Tasered by police.
- Counter-terrorism officers are supporting the homicide investigation into the incident, while Met has said early indications suggest man’s mental health ‘was a factor’. Terrorism is a motive being considered.
- Scotland Yard has sent out armed units to patrol the streets as London Mayor Sadiq Khan urged the public to remain ‘calm and vigilant’.
The attacker has struck at the heart of London’s tourist centre, packed with hotels. At 10.30pm, when he stabbed his victims, the area was full of people who had enjoyed a night in the West End.

One witness claimed he may have jumped off a moped before slashing at his victims.

A source said the suspect was seen to go ‘on the rampage’ with the weapon. Another witness said he heard one of the victim’s scream before running over to help them.

Fernando, 40, from Brazil told MailOnline how he cycled into the horrific scene his way home last night and saw the murder victim slumped against the fence of Russell Square’s famous gardens and called the emergency services.

He said: ‘I was cycling home from work and some people stopped me in the street asking for help to call an ambulance. I saw an old lady lying against the wall – she had collapsed. I had to call 999, but it took a bit of time because I didn’t know the postcode, then two or three minutes later a car full of police turned up. That was the moment I realised she had not just collapsed but had been stabbed.’

According to Fernando, a Spanish family of four – a mother, father and their two daughters thought to be in their 20s – were looking after the woman who is believed to have died at the scene.

‘She was being cradled in the lap of a Spanish tourist who was trying to keep her alive. I didn’t hear the old woman speak – she had been stabbed in the back,’ he said.

According to witnesses, the scale of the attack was initially unclear as Fernando said at first he had no idea that other people had been injured.

‘I don’t know if she was alive when I left – I think she had already died – she wasn’t talking. The Spanish girl tried to talk to her and keep her alive. She said to me before I left that she was still breathing.

‘I realised it was a stabbing when they started giving her first aid. Then I realised more people had been stabbed.’

Witnesses said the attacker was chubby, had been wearing black shorts and a white t-shirt and that he left with the knife, which he carried in his right hand.

‘I understood he was white and a bit shabby – but they couldn’t see much of his face,’ he said.

Fernando was told that the attacker had been hiding his face with his forearm as he ran along stabbing people in the back.

‘He did not shout anything,’ he said, adding that people didn’t shout either – terrified that the attack was not over.

A night receptionist at the Repton Hotel, overlooking the scene, said: ‘I saw a woman lying on the floor with police standing over her, checking to see if she was alive.

‘She looked unconscious, they were shaking her but she was lying still. Then the ambulance arrived. A guest came in shortly afterwards saying she saw police chasing a man down the street.’

Police cordoned off the area and additional police patrols are in place in London, and police helicopters hovered over the city well into the early hours.

The incident occurred in the same area as where one of the 7/7 bombs detonated in 2005. A total of 26 people were killed when Germaine Lindsay, 19, detonated a suicide bomb on a Piccadilly line Tube as it moved between King’s Cross station and Russell Square.

On the same day a bus was destroyed on Tavistock Square, which is just up the street.

Last night’s incident came hours after the Met unveiled its brand new elite anti-terror unit.

Scotland Yard confirmed that ‘terrorism is one possibility being explored at this stage’ and also said that early indications suggest that ‘mental health is a significant factor in this case’.

The Met’s Assistant Commissioner for special operations, Mark Rowley, said it had been a ‘tragic incident’.

He said: ‘Early indications suggest that mental health is a significant factor in this case and that is one major line of inquiry.

‘But of course at this stage we should keep an open mind regarding motive and, consequently, terrorism as a motivation remains but one line of inquiry for us to explore,’ he said.

‘Armed officers arrived at the scene within five minutes, they discharged the Taser whilst confronting and arresting the suspect.

‘Six people have been injured, including the one woman who sadly died at the scene, and the others have received various injuries.’

He confirmed murder detectives and the counter-terrorism unit had been brought in to investigate the killing.

Mayor of London Sadiq Khan has called for the public to remain ‘calm and vigilant’ as police investigate whether a knife attack that left one woman dead and five people injured was terror-related.

Mr Khan said his ‘heart goes out to the victims of the incident in Russell Square and their loved ones’ after the death of the woman, who may be a Spanish tourist.

Eyewitness Zuhair Awartani told the BBC he saw the attacker being arrested.

He said: ‘I arrived here at my hotel and I saw the guy getting arrested just on the block. There were two police cars and he was like African – a dark-skinned man’.

Helen Edwards passed by as police arrested the man and said she believed that someone else may also have been attacked in a side road.

There are fears that the knifeman operated with an accomplice as the Met refused to rule out arresting more suspects. One witness said he saw ‘a man flee on a motorbike’. Others suggested a gang may have been involved.

Philippa Baglee, who was in London to celebrate her 60th birthday, was walking past Russell Square when she saw a group of people looking down at the ground.

She said: ‘There was someone lying on the ground and lots of people around and a guy with a black motorcycle helmet balanced on top of his head walking around.

‘He was on the outside of everyone looking on the ground.

‘The moment I saw an ambulance and police car arrive, I thought someone had just been knocked off their bike.’

Asked to describe the man, she said he was short and dressed in what she thought was all black leathers.

She continued: ‘It was all very calm. No-one was panicking. I just went back in.’

Ms Baglee added that she did not find out what had happened until Thursday morning.

‘It’s a bit scary, I have just come for a couple of nights for my 60th.’

An eyewitness, who called himself Michael, told MailOnline that he saw a woman – aged around 25 – with blood pouring from her back. He said another woman of the same age was suffering a wounded arm.

He said he believed the victims were heard speaking in Spanish.

He said: ‘I heard a scream, and then we went to the park and I saw a girl lying on the floor with blood coming from her back. Another girl had blood on her arm.’

The two women were with two men who were shouting ‘tío lo vi todo’ in Spanish, meaning ‘I saw everything’.

The witness added: ‘They all spoke Spanish so I guess they were a group. I only saw the victim and the girl with the arm stabbed from that group.

‘I just saw blood just next to her. She was lying on the floor with a friend hugging her.’

Another witness, Jeremy Cheng, said: ‘A woman with whom I spoke said that police told her that a gang of some sort was involved – and that they fled south or south-west.

‘But that is just speculation.’

Robbie Deegan, 22, said: ‘I saw people running and screaming when we came over here to see what the hustle and bustle was about. We heard a commotion and saw people running away from the square.’

Paul Hutchinson, a taxi driver, said he passed the incident shortly after it occurred.

He said: ‘I drove past Russell Square and the road wasn’t shut but the pavement was all taped off by police, lots of armed police, lots of cars and the body was just lying on the floor. You could see the boots sticking out from under the cloth.

‘Loads of armed police, cars with lights on and the body on the floor.’

Pol O’Geibheannigh, 45, was walking back from the cinema when he saw a massive police presence and a woman lying in a pool of blood.

He said: ‘I just knew right away that this is not right. You just don’t see armed police around this area.

‘This was just wall to wall with armed police. You could see a woman on the floor. There was dark matter around her, which was obviously blood.

‘She was lying in a pool of blood with a red blanket on top of her. I went into the bar and it wasn’t until an hour later that they put the tent up.

‘And then at about 12.30, when we were coming out, there were about five or six people running off towards Bedford Square.

‘That level of police presence I haven’t seen since 7/7 and I was here – I live around the corner.

‘But it was just a matter of someone being in the wrong place at the wrong time.’

A 35-year-old man, who did not wish to be named, said he saw three men fleeing nearby Queen Square shortly after the incident. ‘One man fled on a motorcycle heading down a pedestrianised area,’ he said. ‘He obviously looked in a hurry.’

Meanwhile, a guest at the Imperial Hotel said he saw a man lying on the ground. He told MailOnline: ‘There was all sorts of commotion going on’.

He added that guests at the hotel have been asked to enter through the rear entrance as the front is cordoned off by police.

Local resident Helen Edwards, 31, said the panic reminded her of the 7/7 attacks. She was woken by the bus bomb at Tavistock Square on July 7, 2005.

Talking about last night’s incident, she said: ‘It was a bit surreal. It brings back memories of 7/7. I was woken by the bus bomb that day.

‘I was walking near Russell Square tonight when I saw several armed police officers and armed response units. I walked around the cordon and saw an ambulance and loads of people.’

Other witnesses took to Twitter to share news of the attack. Abdulrahman Muammar wrote: ‘#London Russell Square locked down & surrounded with police officers. Many police cars & ambulances.’

Helen Edwards tweeted: ‘#Police guarding cordon around #russellsquare #bedfordplace #southamptonrow. Saw armed police & paramedics earlier. I saw armed police guarding the cordon around Russell Square plus ambulance at another end of Bedford place.’

Meanwhile, Lauren Brittny said: ‘Sadly my brother and his mates witnessed the stabbing in Russell Square. And the police obviously arrived too late. My brother rang me at the time as he was in shock. But all he said was the man quickly jogged passed him.

‘My brother was at UCL summer camp and they were returning from a theatre trip . His mentors were guarding them so he was unable to do much I wish he filmed the guy. But everyone was stunned by the situation.

‘My brother said the woman was surrounded by her friend he suspected they were on a Hen night.’

Scotland Yard confirmed the incident is being treated as a possible terror offence.

The Met said one suspect was detained after being Tasered at the scene of the incident – opposite the three-star Imperial Hotel and near a quiet park.

A spokesman said: ‘Police were called at 10.33pm to reports of a man seen in possession of a knife injuring people at Russell Square, WC1.

‘Officers attended the scene along with the London Ambulance Service.

‘Up to six people were found injured at the location.

‘A female was treated at the scene but was pronounced dead a short time later.

‘We await an update on the condition of the other persons injured and details of any other injuries.’

Police added that the man was arrested at the scene six minutes after the incident.

The spokesman added: ‘A man was arrested at 10.39pm and a Taser was discharged by one of the arresting officers.

‘Terrorism is one possibility being explored at this stage.’

Additional police units have been deployed to the area to provide reassurance. Extra patrols will also be carried out in the area near the British Museum in Bloomsbury.

Anyone with information should contact police on 101 or call Crimestoppers anonymously on 0800 555 111.
August 4, 2016
DC transit police officer charged with aiding IS group

A Washington, DC transit police officer was arrested on Wednesday on charges he attempted to provide material support to the Islamic State (IS) group, the US Justice Department said, in the first such case involving a member of law enforcement.

Accordıng to reuters In July, Nicholas Young, who lives in Virginia, sent codes for gift cards worth $245 to an FBI informant. The gift cards were intended for mobile-messaging accounts that the IS group uses to recruit its followers. Young believed the informant he was messaging was an acquaintance who was working with the militant group, according to court records.

Young, who had worked for the transit authority since 2003, had been on the radar of federal law enforcement since 2010, according to an affidavit in the complaint filed in US district court in Virginia on Tuesday.

Metro authorities said Young was fired immediately after his arrest on Wednesday.

The 36-year-old US citizen is the first law enforcement officer charged with attempting to provide material support to a designated terrorist organisation, according to the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

The Justice Department has brought IS group-related charges against more than 90 people since 2014.

Young did not pose a threat to Metro train riders or employees during the six years he was under federal surveillance, according to Joshua Stueve, a spokesman for the Eastern Virginia US Attorney’s Office.

“None of the things that he said, none of the things he wanted to do related to anything here. His interest was totally in how he could get overseas and what he could do over there,” Stueve said.

In 2014, he met several times with an undercover FBI agent who was posing as an eager recruit of the IS group, according to the affidavit, and advised the agent about how to evade law enforcement as he left the United States to join the militant group.

Young sent the gift card codes after the informant told him that the group needed help setting up mobile messaging accounts, according to the affidavit, and then promised to cover his tracks: “Gonna eat the SIM card. Have a good day.”

“Metro transit police alerted the FBI about this individual and then worked with our federal partners throughout the investigation,” said Metro general manager Paul Wiedefeld, calling the allegations against Young “profoundly disturbing.”

Young had travelled to Libya in 2011 to support rebels trying to overthrow Muammar Gaddafi, the affidavit said.

That year, he also discussed with informants ways of smuggling guns into the federal courthouse in Alexandria, Virginia, where he will appear on Wednesday, according to the Justice Department.

August 4, 2016
Stratfor: Egypt and Turkey, Aligned but out of Step

Geopolitical Weekly

Turkey’s embrace of Islamism — and Egypt’s rejection of it — has driven a wedge between them. (PETER MACDIARMID/SASCHA STEINBACH/Getty Images)

By Emily Hawthorne

When Egypt opened its 2011-12 election season, the first election to be held since the end of the Arab Spring, the country’s political atmosphere came alive with promise and debate. At the time, I lived in the coastal city of Alexandria, where “let’s give them a try” had become the refrain of my religiously conservative Egyptian friends. They were referring to the Islamist Muslim Brotherhood candidates who were flooding the parliamentary tickets, figures who had never before been able to challenge the military leaders who had ruled Egypt with a tight grip since the 1950s. “But they’re not experienced,” was the common retort of my more secular friends, many of whom went on to cast their vote for technocrat Hamdeen Sabahi in the presidential race that spring. Yet when the Muslim Brotherhood’s Mohammed Morsi was declared the country’s president in June 2012, the noisy celebrations of his jubilant supporters echoed through the streets of my neighborhood.

A decade earlier, in 2002, a similar atmosphere — one of possibility, hope and apprehension — enveloped Turkey as it prepared for general elections, a vote that gave rise to the country’s own Islamist-leaning government and Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who would become prime minister. Turkey’s Islamist forces, embodied by Erdogan and his Justice and Development Party (AKP), had taken years to fight their way to the top of Turkish politics, edging out their more secular and liberal rivals along the way. Now president, Erdogan continues to dominate the country’s political scene, and in spite of a recent failed coup attempt, both he and his party appear to have a long future ahead of them.

Egypt’s experiment in Islamist governance, however, proved to be far more short-lived. Morsi’s Muslim Brotherhood administration fell just as quickly as it rose, and Egypt’s ruling military council is doing everything in its power to ensure that it does not return. Turkey’s embrace of Islamism — and Egypt’s rejection of it — has driven a wedge between the two countries. But the friction between Ankara and Cairo is as much about the similarities they see in themselves as it is about their ideological differences.

Two Paths Merge

Turkey and Egypt are like-minded rivals moving along the same path, albeit out of step with one another. That path has been determined, in large part, by geography. The territory that makes up both modern Egypt and Turkey occupies the land bridges lining the Mediterranean Sea, swaths of terrain that are as key to trade, commerce and migration today as they were 1,000 years ago. Even now, the two states are the primary gateways for the waves of migrants flowing into Europe.

For millennia, Egypt’s people clustered around the Nile River, giving rise to the homogeneity that is still palpable in the country. By contrast, Turkey’s diverse population has always been scattered, flung far and wide across its expanse, a mix of ethnicities that has simultaneously strengthened and weakened the state. Centralization of power has always been a much simpler task for Cairo than for Ankara. Yet even if Turkey’s past rulers — the Ottomans, and before them the Greek Byzantines and Turkish Seljuks — had a hard time controlling Turkish territory in its entirety, they excelled in capturing it. In 1517, Egypt came under the Ottoman Empire’s loose command, and from that point, its course began to align with Turkey’s.

After the Ottoman Empire fell in the wake of World War I, the two states continued to tread similar paths through the 20th century. Egyptian and Turkish leaders served as wellsprings of inspiration for one another during the tumultuous decades of state building that swept across the Middle East. For example, Gamal Abdel Nasser — a leader still revered among Egyptians today — drew some of his ideas from Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, an equally powerful figure in Turkey who carefully constructed his country’s secular and militarized model of governance. Both states embraced a secular, nationalistic approach to policymaking while empowering their armed forces, a strategy that made them vulnerable to periodic coups and uprisings. This reality still holds today, as evidenced by Egypt’s 2013 coup and Turkey’s July 15 coup attempt.

Religious figures in Egypt and Turkey exchanged ideas throughout the 20th century as well. At different times, both countries grappled with the emergence of Islamist groups that threatened to upset the status quo and challenge the ruling power. In the 1920s, the Muslim Brotherhood was founded in Cairo by Hassan al-Banna, whose writings on religion underpinning the state went on to inspire Islamist political movements across the Middle East. Decades later, Necmettin Erbakan laid the groundwork for Turkey’s own brand of Islamist politics. He went on to become the country’s prime minister in the 1990s, only to be forced out of office by the military for attempting to merge religion and state. Ironically, this series of events was not unlike what Morsi would experience decades later as the Egyptian military stepped in to take back the state from its Islamist leader.

As Turkey Rises, Egypt Falls

Since the Arab Spring, Turkey and Egypt have struggled to find their footing in an ever-changing region. Egypt, however, has had a considerably more difficult time. Even though it has the largest population and one of the biggest militaries in the Middle East, political uncertainty, driven in part by the quick termination of the country’s sole foray into Islamist-tinged democracy, has kept Egypt focused inward. Its political scene has stabilized in the past two years, but Cairo’s efforts to appease an exploding populace and prop up a lackluster economy have left it little room to regain its status as a regional heavyweight.

At the same time, empowered by a more diversified economy, Turkey has inserted itself in conflicts and negotiations across the Middle East. Its goal is simple: to mold the turbulent region by espousing its moderate Islamist order. After all, regardless of some popular dissatisfaction with Erdogan’s autocratic style, the Turkish government is democratically elected. And as many Turks were quick to point out in the wake of the country’s recent coup attempt, the overthrow of a democratically elected government — even one that has since taken the opportunity to purge every corner of society — promises only greater uncertainty. In spreading its reach, though, Turkey has stepped on Egypt’s toes on several occasions. For instance, Cairo has long laid claim to brokering peace between Israelis and Palestinians, talks that have been complicated by Ankara’s recent support for Hamas.

The widening gap between the two countries has only been exacerbated by their diverging approaches to governance. Under Erdogan’s rule, Turkey has thrown its weight behind Islamist movements in the region — including Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood — because they often share the ruling AKP’s agenda. While Morsi and his Muslim Brotherhood peers controlled the government in Cairo, ties between Egypt and Turkey improved. (When, in September 2011, Erdogan made his first official visit to Egypt, many Egyptians welcomed him as the embodiment of the capable, Islamist leader they hoped to see in their own country.) But since Morsi’s 2013 ouster, Egypt’s secular military leaders have given Turkey the cold shoulder, in no small part because Ankara has offered Egypt’s exiled Muslim Brotherhood members haven within its borders.

Deep-Seated Tension Lingers

Turkey’s decision to protect the Muslim Brotherhood has strained its ties with Egypt to their breaking point. Now, any significant incident is an opportunity for the states to trade jabs. In the days following Turkey’s attempted coup, Egypt made its annoyance at the operation’s failure clear. Three Egyptian state newspapers ran premature headlines proclaiming Erdogan’s ouster, while Egypt’s Foreign Ministry hemmed and hawed over the U.N. Security Council’s characterization of the Turkish government as “democratically elected” in a resolution condemning the coup. Turkey, which has also used the United Nations as a platform to throw barbs at Egypt, shot back by saying it was “natural for those who came to power through a coup to refrain from taking a stance against the attempted coup.” Cairo responded by offering to consider the asylum request of Fethullah Gulen, the cleric charged with inciting the coup, should he choose to submit one.

The spat is just the latest of the deep, intermittent bouts of tension between Egypt and Turkey that, by all appearances, are bound to continue. Over the past year, Saudi Arabia has been working to mediate talks between the two on the Muslim Brotherhood in an effort to unify the dual cornerstones of its envisioned Sunni alliance. If successful, the normalization of Egypt-Turkey ties would go a long way in strengthening Sunni unity in the region, which has been deeply shaken by conflict and jihadist violence. But though Saudi Arabia has made some headway, it is unlikely that Ankara will agree to feed Riyadh’s regional ambitions at the expense of its own.

Egypt, for its part, is more likely to listen to Saudi Arabia’s pleas. But Riyadh does not have the power to force Cairo to ignore Ankara’s support for the Muslim Brotherhood, which Egypt considers a terrorist group. The situation is complicated further by the fact that Egypt has recently held meetings with the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, a group Turkey counts among its terrorist threats and has targeted with numerous military operations.

This is not to say Egypt and Turkey have few goals in common. Both, for instance, would like to see the defeat of the Islamic State and the development of the eastern Mediterranean region. But even if the two could set aside their differences and cooperate temporarily for the sake of mutual gain, tension between them will continue to simmer beneath the surface, constantly at risk of flaring up once more.

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August 3, 2016
Turkey’s Intra-Islamist Struggle for Power

by Burak Bekdil

Originally published under the title “Coup Lessons.”

Exiled Turkish preacher Fethullah Gülen (left) and President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, once allies, have turned on each other with a vengeance.

Every piece of evidence emerging after the failed putsch on July 15 indicates that President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan was the victim of a failed Gülenist coup d’état. But to get the picture right we must ask ourselves, perhaps ironically, what the victim and the perpetrator have in common. The answer is many years of staunch alliance and the same ideology: political Islam.

Mr. Erdoğan now accuses the Gülenist movement of “having infiltrated into the state system over the past 40 years.” He must accuse himself first. He was the man who paved the way for the Gülenist infiltration during the years he was in power, from 2002 to 2013, when he broke up with the “terrorist.” In his own words: “Whatever you asked for, we gave it to you.” In short, Mr. Erdoğan was a devoted Gülen ally during 37.5 years of the “terrorist’s” 40-year quest to capture the Turkish state.

What brought them together? What, essentially, do Messrs. Erdoğan and Gülen have in common, ideologically speaking? The desire to Islamize. Did they break up because of deep ideological divergences? No. Over methodology in reaching a common goal? Perhaps. Because of greed for political power? Probably. But not because one of them decided to abandon political Islam.

The failed Gülenist putsch offers lessons that Turkish Islamists will probably never learn: Islam the religion or Islamism the political ideology will never forge a wonder alliance or achieve your end goals just because Islamism the political ideology brings together a small or big bunch of like-minded conservative Muslims sharing an ideology that aims to “conquer” Muslim lands first (by imposing Islamism on secular Muslims) and then “conquer” infidel lands (by imposing Islamism on non-Muslim nations).

Turkey experienced a coup attempt by Islamists disguised as officers against Islamists who are not disguised.

“Conservatism as a glue” and “he is a good fellow who prays five times a day, has his wedding ring on his right hand, has a particular type of moustache” are foolish indicators upon which to forge enduring political alliances. Being conservative Muslims isn’t enough to make a strong bond. If President Erdoğan’s narrative of the July 15 coup attempt is right, what we see here is basically a coup attempt by Islamists disguised as officers against Islamists who are not disguised. In short, an Islamist coup against an Islamist government.

Will the Turkish Islamists in power ever understand that piety or non-piety is not a good basis to establish friends from foes? No. For several years they feared a putsch from their ideological nemesis, the secularists. In a bitter irony, the secular officers helped them suppress the Islamist coup attempt within the army ranks.

The Islamists in power must now purge tens of thousands of Islamist government officials, including senior judges, military and police officers, academics, and their former allies. They must close down thousands of Islamist schools, NGOs, and foundations and engage in a witch-hunt in a country ruled under a state of emergency; Islamists running after Islamists. Funny, more women with the Islamic headscarf are now being arrested than under the oppressive secularist regime of the late 1990s.

Sadly, the Erdoğanist-Gülenist (political) amorous affair produced millions of pages of (political) love letters (just Google it and see material as recent as even 2013) but ended up in the courtroom after domestic violence. Now there will be new Islamist-to-Islamist alliances, with new sects competing to emerge, just because the pious can only trust the pious. And then the headlines on another dreadful day will be bad déjà vu.

A minor note to my former “sparring partner,” column neighbor Mustafa Akyol, who wrote that “the government is trying to wipe out a cult that has secretly infiltrated the state, in order to impose its own agenda by using every dirty method against its enemies.” That is wrong. The government is trying to wipe out a cult that has not-so-secretly infiltrated the state as its best ally in order to advance a common ideological goal, and by using every dirty method against their then-common enemies.

Burak Bekdil is an Ankara-based columnist for the Turkish newspaper Hürriyet Daily News and a fellow at the Middle East Forum.

July 31, 2016