Gülen criticizes remarks insulting members of Hizmet movement

Turkish Islamic scholar Fethullah Gülen has strongly criticized remarks that insulted members of the Hizmet movement, saying that these kind of behavior won't solve problems.

“Those who call a Muslim a [member of] gang, a network, a bandit and who sees them as gorillas and monkeys who are living in caverns.. these are nothing but a reflection of shabby thoughts on words, thoughts, expressions and no curve could be made straight with these [words],” Gülen said.

Gülen didn't directly mention Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan's name, but it was obvious that he was responding to the prime minister's remarks on Friday, when he said the government will “come down to your caverns and tear you to shreds.”

Erdoğan keeps repeating that a corruption probe that involves sons of ministers, businessmen and chief of the state bank is a “dirty operation” against his government and describes it as a foreign plot. He also accuses the Hizmet movement of being behind this plot against his government. As part of his campaign, Erdoğan purged more than a hundred police officials, removed head of the wiretapping body, issued a decree that forces police chiefs to inform their superiors before acting on prosecutors' orders and appointed two prosecutors to supervise the case -- moves observers described as a blunt intervention in the graft investigation.

For the first time in his life on Friday, Gülen cursed those who are behind the purge of police officials, saying that he can no longer tolerate to all the what he called “assymetrical assaults.”

Gülen criticized Erdoğan's abusive description of the Hizmet movement on his Sunday speech, published in herkul.org, a website that usually publishes his speeches, and said viewing houses of those who are living in poor conditions are “cavern” means Erdoğan doesn't know what a cavern is. Gülen said all these are expression of “worthlessness.”

Gülen said when “one says cavern, it is obvious that he is referring to monkeys, gorillas, bears, hyenas, snakes, centipedes..” and urged members of the Hizmet movement not to retaliate to this kind of “worthlessness” in the same way.

Speaking about the allegations that police officials and prosecutors who are behind the corruption raid are linked to the Hizmet movement, Gülen recalled a case that was filed against his speeches in 1999. Gülen said New Jersey's chief prosecutor reviewed the indictment against him and sent a report to judges in Turkey. He said that report, which indicated that the allegations in the indictment was ludicrous, was key in his acquittal of the charges. He said it was obvious that the American prosecutor and the judges in Turkey were only standing on the side of justice and that they had no links to him.

Gülen described these kind of behavior as a “right act” and blamed “others,” referring to the government, to call the corruption investigation as a “conspiracy.” “They are calling this right act a conspiracy; they are calling the unveiling of treason, infamy as a plot; there are attempts to defend treason and infamy,” Gülen added.

Gülen stated that the Hizmet movement doesn't have any kind of duty to unveil someone's “treason and infamy,” but that they're not in a position to intervene if someone else unveiled that “treason.” “This is something beyond us,” he stressed.

Published on Today's Zaman, 23 December 2013, Monday