One of the greatest challenges in today's Middle East and thus also in global politics is undoubtedly the transnational terrorist group the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS). Born in Iraq, spreading to Syria and dominating an important part of the region today, ISIS has a serious effect on the regional balance and geostrategic processes. ISIS's leaders and political, social, monetary and ideological sources are constantly debated. ISIS does not draw attention only as a military power fighting in the region, it is also interesting due to its new organizational structure. ISIS is the greatest indicator that as globalization continues risks are also globalized. ISIS is in the position of a transnational organization due to the foreign fighters it has taken in from different regions of the world. In many Western countries, ISIS is drawing attention due to the high number of foreign fighters it has been able to add to its fold. The question of what will happen when these foreign fighters come home is of high importance. Although its roots stretch back to the beginning of the 2000s, the organization garnered attention in the second year of the Syrian crisis.
Local Sunni tribes' acceptance of ISIS played an important part in the group's rise. The appearance of this situation has much to do with the repressive politics of former Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's regime in Iraq and President Bashar Assad's regime in Syria against Sunnis.
ISIS's rise also became a topic that was closely watched in Turkey from its very beginning. This is because avoiding the deterioration of the territorial integrity of Iraq and Syria was one of Turkey's most important sensitivities. Secondly, Ankara allowed the local factors fighting against the destructive politics of the Assad regime in Syria to take refuge in Turkey. ISIS's rise weakened the local, moderate opposition that had been fighting the Assad regime, the Free Syrian Army foremost among them. ISIS constricted the area of influence of anti-regime forces instead of the regime in Syria. Thirdly, Turkey was turned into the object of conscious propaganda and was reflected - utterly wrongly - as a country supporting ISIS's politics. Despite declaring ISIS a terrorist organization through a decision of the Cabinet, through the efforts of the PKK and its Syrian arm, the Democratic Union Party (PYD), Turkey was accused of supporting ISIS. Unfortunately, this propaganda found an audience in the West. There is no objective basis on which the allegations that Turkey and especially that the Justice and Development Party (AK Party) has been working with ISIS can be placed. There are two elements that are mentioned for this point. The first is the members of ISIS from Turkey. The second is the use of the Turkish-Syrian border to join ISIS. With this type of approach, the U.K. and France should be declared the greatest supporters of ISIS, which is an absurd assertion. Secondly, the Turkish-Syrian border is not a mere 1 kilometer, it is 800 kilometers. And Turkey, despite persistently asking for intelligence aid from Western countries, has not received positive answers. In addition to all of this, the following must also be mentioned. None of the regional and global impacts ISIS has generated can be evaluated as being positive for Turkey.
The rise of ISIS has first and foremost strengthened the hand of and presented an amazing opportunity to the Assad regime. In the 20th century, many totalitarian administrations in the Middle East presented radical Islamist threats as a legitimizing excuse for their repressive policies and continued on their way with Western support. Similarly, ISIS's rise has brought about the sanctioning of the Assad regime as a secular power in Syria. ISIS's rise opened the path of the PYD, the Syrian arm of the terrorist organization PKK with which Turkey has been fighting for 30 years and brought about the result of this organization becoming a legitimate power in the international arena. The PYD and its military arm People's Protection Units (YPG) have suddenly become heroes as national resistance organizations.
In addition to all of this, ISIS's actions have caused a global rise in Islamophobia. Turkey has played a very active role in challenging Islamophobia at the global level. The relationship that is attempted to be constructed between ISIS and Turkey is not just causing Turkey's image to corrode, it is also enfeebling the resistance process to ISIS; it is causing an approach to the problem from a romantic framework and not from a realist perspective.
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