Abdallah Bozkurt/Stockholm
The long arm of Turkey’s ruling Islamist Justice and Development Party (AKP) recently hosted an anti-Semitic lawyer who made disturbing statements calling for the destruction of Jews and prophesying an apocalyptic scenario in which Muslims would exterminate all Jews at the end of time.
Fatih Ünal, a prominent AKP member and deputy chairman of the Ankara City Council, recently visited Stockholm at the invitation of the Swedish branch of the Union of International Democrats (UID), formerly known as name of the Union of International Turkish Democrats (UITD), a proxy group linked to the political party of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
In an October 19 tweet, Ünal wrote: “Ü Ünal, oh Zionists, oh Jews: one day, a Moses will emerge to dismantle the paper castles you have built. The trees that shelter you will offer no refuge either… There is no benefit in fearing the inevitable (death).
The AKP politician was referring to the widely publicized prophecy of the tree of Gharqad, in which it is predicted that Muslims will confront and kill Jews in the end times, and suggested that this prophecy could soon come true. In a previous tweet dated May 3, 2021, he expressed a desire to bear witness when this prophecy comes true.
Additionally, in another tweet on October 14, he claimed that one day Israel would face destruction, and he expressed a desire to be on the front lines when that time arrives.
Photographs from a gathering in Stockholm on October 17 show Ünal chatting with a group of 13 people seated around a table. Among those present were Özer Eken, who heads the Swedish branch of the UID, and Atila Altuntaş, a journalist with Turkey’s official Anadolu news agency. The meeting was held in an office at the Stockholm Wholesale Market in the city’s Årsta district.
The UID’s habit of hosting controversial Turkish figures is not limited to the recent incident. In May 2022, they invited Abdurrahman Uzun to address the Turkish diaspora in Stockholm. Uzun, known for past expressions of anti-Semitism and calls for the destruction of Israel, has also made controversial statements.
After a protest featuring a depiction of President Erdogan hanging upside down in downtown Stockholm, Uzun described Sweden as an enemy of Turkey and promised that Turkey would respond to Sweden using a language it understand.
Uzun is widely recognized as a social media provocateur who supports the Erdogan government’s policies and targets the president’s critics and opponents. Furthermore, he has a history of promoting hatred and spreading discriminatory views against LGBTI groups. Uzun went so far as to call homosexuality a disease that the West seeks to introduce into Turkish society. His actions and statements align with a pattern of online trolling and align with the government’s agenda, often to the detriment of vulnerable communities.
The UID also helped organize meetings in Stockholm in April 2022 for Osman Nuri Gülaçar, a Turkish national with a controversial past. Gülaçar, who was previously indicted and briefly imprisoned on terrorism charges, has been the subject of investigations involving known al-Qaeda figures, including a former Guantanamo Bay detainee.
Gülaçar has expressed support for the Taliban in Afghanistan, al-Qaeda in Mali and al-Shabab in Somalia, calling them resistance fighters. He also argued that Muslims react to Western imperialism through these groups.
The UID itself is known to harbor radical Islamist figures within its ranks. Talip Oguz, UID representative in Belgium, posted a message on social media platform X on October 10, suggesting that Israel will be eradicated and that Hamas attacks will bring relief to oppressed Muslims. He deleted the tweet after receiving strong backlash.
The UID in Sweden was established as a non-profit organization (ideell förening) in April 2014 by Eken and his associates in the Botyrka municipality of Stockholm under registration number 802487-7535. Public records reveal the organization shares the same address as Eken’s residence. In March 2021, Eken was appointed general coordinator of all UID operations, covering Denmark, Norway, Finland and Sweden.
During its formative years, UID received support from Metin Külünk, a trusted associate of the Turkish president and a childhood friend. Külünk visited Stockholm in 2015 while serving as vice president of the AKP’s external relations directorate, providing assistance and advice in the early developments of the UID.
Külünk is considered a radical Islamist and has been identified as one of the key figures involved in funding a right-wing group known as Osmanen Germania in Germany. This funding is linked to the group’s activities, including the purchase of weapons, the organization of demonstrations and actions against critics of the Turkish leader.
Külünk’s alleged association with the group is not surprising as he was previously prosecuted for his involvement in the Islamist group Akincilar (Raiders) in the late 1970s and early 1980s Court documents from investigations into Akıncılar during this period reveal that Külünk operated within the third cell of the Raiders armed unit and was responsible for weapons and armed operations.
According to witness statements included in the indictment, Külünk was the leader of the group’s armed wing. During a police raid on July 12, 1979 against a gathering of 30 or 35 people who were allegedly undergoing weapons training in a mountainous area known as Demirciler Yaylası in Bolu province, law enforcement discovered a handgun and blocks of dynamite in Külünk’s possession.
He was also investigated as a suspect in the Islamist terrorist group known as the Greater East Islamic Raiders Front (İslami Büyük Doğu Akıncıları Cephesi, İBDA/C or IBDA-C). According to a confidential report prepared by Interior Ministry inspectors, the 11th High Criminal Court of Ankara issued a ruling on September 5, 2007 authorizing wiretapping of Külünk’s phone in decision No. 2007/4540. The wiretapping application, filed with the court by the intelligence service of the National Security Directorate, was presented on the grounds of the need to decipher the IBDA-C network in Turkey.
IBDA-C, listed as a terrorist organization by Turkey, the European Union and the United States and known for its militant and fundamentalist positions favorable to Al-Qaeda and the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIS) , recruited Turkish jihadists. fight in Syria. It is decidedly anti-Semitic and anti-Western.
Following the Hamas terrorist attacks of October 7, which subsequently triggered an escalation of the Israeli offensive in Gaza, the IBDA-C group called for a siege of all military bases housing NATO and US troops. -United in Turkey, a declaration of total war against the Jews, the confiscation of property belonging to Jews and those who trade with Israel or support the Israeli economy and the imprisonment of Turks who supported Israeli views and opposed Hamas.
“Jewish capital that belongs to Israel, that pumps money into Israel and that controls the lifeline of the economy must be confiscated immediately,” said Ali Osman Zor, a prominent figure in IBDA-C. Zor, who has a criminal record and previously served time for participation in terrorist activities, made the statement in a video interview posted on the group’s online platform, adimlardergisi.com, on October 18, 2023.
The 2023 election results filed by the Turkish Embassy in Sweden show the popularity of Erdogan’s AKP among the Turkish diaspora in Sweden:
Turkish_Election_2023_results_Sweden_diaspora
In October 2016, the UID also invited Cem Küçük, a government propagandist who was investigation in 2012 for his alleged ties to the Quds Force of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) in Turkey. Küçük, who works for Erdogan’s propaganda outlet TGRT, reportedly coordinated his media work in close cooperation with government officials. He even called for the assassination of critical Turkish journalists abroad by the Turkish intelligence agency MIT.
The UID led electoral campaigns in support of the Turkish president and his party among the Turkish diaspora in Sweden. It works closely with the Turkish Embassy and other Turkish government agencies. Eken himself led an unsuccessful campaign to secure a place on Erdogan’s political party list in the 2023 national elections.
In the parliamentary elections on May 14, Erdogan’s party came first, winning 33% of all eligible votes, including 4,399 from the Turkish diaspora in Sweden. The far-right and racist Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), an ally of the AKP, came fourth with 1,403 votes, or 10 percent of the votes cast.
Of the 42,801 people eligible to vote in the Turkish elections in Sweden, only 13,672 voted, or 31.94% of eligible voters. The Turkish diaspora in Sweden is estimated at around 100,000 people. In the presidential election on May 28, Erdogan managed to obtain 47% of the votes in Sweden.
Indeed, polling data indicates that Erdogan and his party hold considerable influence within the Turkish diaspora in Sweden, with almost 50 percent of expatriates supporting them. This susceptibility to extremist discourse promoted by the Erdogan government and its vast media apparatus is a source of concern.
Furthermore, organizations like UID contribute to the spread of these extremist narratives among Turkish expatriates by inviting controversial figures from Turkey and providing them with a platform to propagate such views.