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Mustafa Kemal Ataturk:

The Enemy of Islam

By Mohammad Elfie Nieshaem Juferi

origin: www.bismikaallahuma.org

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Abstract

A brief history of the life and policies of one of the most vehement enemies of Islam,

Mustafa Kemal Atatürk. He was the founder of the secular Turkish state. It is an unfortunate

thing that a lot of his policies are still being practiced in Turkey till this day. Women are still

not allowed to wear the hijab in Government buildings and schools as it is seen to be a sign

of fundamentalism. I have personally come across a group of Turks who shouted Bismillah

ar-Rahman ar-Rahim loudly before they all drink alcohol which is very much the result of

Kemalism. May God bless those who follow His path.

Atatürk's Early Life

Mustafa Kemal Atatürk was born in 1881 in a shabby quarter of Salonika. After resigning

from his job as petty Government clerk, his father, Ali Riza, twice failed in business, sought

escape from his miseries in alcohol and died of tuberculosis when Mustafa was only seven

years old. His mother, Zubaida, in strict purdah and entirely illiterate, ruled the family. In

contrast to her husband, she was a devout believer and a pious Muslim. Like every other

Turkish woman of her day, her entire life centred round her eldest son. With her deep

religious convictions, Zubaida wanted him to become a pious scholar. But the son had

different ideas. He fought tooth and nail against any kind of authority and was openly

insolent and abusive to his teachers. He was arrogant in the extreme in the presence of his

fellow students and refused to join the other boys in their games which made him justifiably

unpopular. If he were interfered with in any way, he fought them, preferring to play alone.

Once during one of these violent episodes, a teacher, blind with fury, intervened and beat the

boy so hard that his honour was offended. Mustafa ran away and refused to return to the

school. When his devoted mother tried to plead with him, he stormed back at her.

Zubaida was in despair, not knowing what to do. Finally an uncle suggested sending him to

the military cadet school in Salonika and making a soldier of him. Since it was subsidized by

the government, it would cost them nothing; if the boy demonstrated ability, he would

become an officer; if not, he would at least remain a private. In any case, his future

livelihood was assured. Although Zubaida did not approve, before she could stop him,

twelve year old Mustafa persuaded one of his father's friends to sponsor him with the college

authorities. He took the examination and passed as a cadet. Here, he found himself. He was

so successful academically that one of his teachers bestowed upon him the name 'Kemal',

which means in Arabic, "perfection."

Because of his brilliance in mathematics and his military subjects, he was promoted to a

teaching position on the staff where he much enjoyed flaunting his authority. After obtaining

the highest grades in his final examinations, he graduated with honors in January 1905 with

the rank of Captain.

During this period he joined a rabidly nationalistic students society known as the Vatan or

"Fatherland." The members of the Vatan prided themselves on being revolutionaries. They

were bitterly hostile to the regime headed by Sultan Abdul Hamid II and condemned him for

his suppression of all so-called "liberal" ideas which undermined the authority of Islam.

They never wearied of blaming Islam as responsible for Turkey's backwardness and vent

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their bitter spleen upon the allegedly antiquated Shariah, and made the Sufi mystics the

object of special ridicule.

The members of the Vatan were bound by oath that they would oust the legitimate Sultan

and replace him by a Western-styled government complete with Constitution and

parliament, destroy the authority of the ulema or religious scholars, and abolish purdah and

the veil, declaring absolute equality between men and women. Soon Mustafa Kemal became

its chief.

Mustafa Kemal's opportunity for extending his influence finally came when, just before the

ousting of Sultan Abdul Hamid in 1908 by the Young Turks, its ruling party, The

Committee of Union and Progress invited him to join them. However, being a late-comer,

he was obliged to carry out orders when his nature demanded that either he control

everything or take no part at all. He grew increasingly restless and dissatisfied. He had no

respect for the other members whom he regarded as beneath his contempt. He particularly

hated such sincere Muslims as the Prime Minister, Prince Said Halim Pasha (1865-1921) and

the Minister of War, Anwar Pasha (1882-1922), with whom he quarreled incessantly.

For the next ten years he distinguished himself in the military profession as he was a born

soldier and leader. Gradually by dint of his domineering personality, combined with

shrewdness, he assumed more and more political influence. He spent his evenings in secret

meetings behind locked doors planning for the coup d'etat which would give him absolute

dictatorial power. His opportunity arose when at the end of the First World War, he took the

lead in defending the territorial integrity of Turkey against the combined European powers

who were intent upon dismembering "the sick man of Europe" and hastening his demise

with all deliberate speed.

By thwarting these sinister designs and whipping up the enthusiasm of the populace to fight

to the death for their country, Mustafa Kemal Pasha became a national hero. When the

Greeks were defeated and Turkey's victory assured, the Turkish people went delirious with

joy. They hailed him as their Saviour and bestowed upon him the honorific title 'Ghazi' or

"Defender of the Faith".

Invitations from diplomats now overwhelmed him urging him to become their champion of

the East against the West. To the Arab statesmen he replied in the State Assembly: "I am

neither a believer in a federation of all the nations of Islam nor even in a league of all the

Turkish peoples under Soviet rule. My only aim is to safeguard the independence of Turkey

within its natural frontiers - not to revive the Ottoman or any other Empire. Away with

dreams and shadows! They have cost us dear in the past!"

To the Communist delegations seeking his support he expressed himself even more bluntly:

There are no oppressors nor any oppressed. There are only those who allow themselves

to be oppressed. The Turks are not among these. The Turks can look after themselves.

Let others do the same. We have - but one principle - to see all problems through

Turkish eyes and guard Turkish national interests.[1]

Mustafa Kemal Pasha's declared policy was to make Turkey within its natural frontiers a

small, compact nation and, above all, a prosperous, modern state respected by all the other

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nations of the world. He was so convinced that he and he alone was qualified to accomplish

this task that he claimed:

I am Turkey! To destroy me is to destroy Turkey![ 2]

Atatürk Destroys Islam

No sooner had he assumed power than he made bold to declare that he would destroy every

vestige of Islam in the life of the Turkish nation. Only when the authority of Islam was

utterly eliminated could Turkey "progress" into a respected, modern nation . He made

speech after public speech, fearlessly and brazenly attacking Islam and all Islam stands for:

For nearly five hundred years, these rules and theories of an Arab Shaikh and the

interpretations of generations of lazy and good-for-nothing priests have decided the

civil and criminal law of Turkey. They have decided the form of the Constitution, the

details of the lives of each Turk, his food, his hours of rising and sleeping the shape of

his clothes, the routine of the midwife who produced his children, what he learned in

his schools, his customs, his thoughts-even his most intimate habits. Islam - this

theology of an immoral Arab - is a dead thing. Possibly it might have suited tribes in

the desert. It is no good for modern, progressive state. God's revelation! There is no

God! These are only the chains by which the priests and bad rulers bound the people

down. A ruler who needs religion is a weakling. No weaklings should rule! [ 3]

When Abdul Majid was elected as Caliphate, Mustafa Kemal Pasha refused to allow the full

traditional ceremony to be performed. When the Assembly met to discuss the matter,

Mustafa Kemal cut the debate short: "The Khalifa has no power or position except as a

nominal figurehead." When Abdul Majid wrote a petition for an increase in his allowance,

Mustafa Kemal replied thus:

The Khalifate, your office is no more than an historical relic. It has no justification for

existence. It is a piece of impertinence that you should dare write to any of my

secretaries! [4]

On March 3, 1924, Mustafa Kemal presented a Bill to the Assembly to oust the Caliphate

permanently and establish the Turkish nation as a purely secular state. However, before this

Bill was even introduced and made known, he had prudently made certain to muzzle all

opposition by declaring it a capital offence to criticize anything he did:

At all costs, the Republic must be maintained...The Ottoman Empire was a crazy

structure based upon broken religious foundations. The Khalifa and the remains of the

House of Usman must go. The antiquated religious courts and codes must be replaced

by modern scientific civil law. The schools of the priests must give way to secular

Government schools. State and religion must be separated. The Republic of Turkey

must finally become a secular state. [5]

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Consequently, the Bill was passed without debate and the former Khalifa and his family

exiled to Switzerland. The new regime then enacted the following :

The preamble of the new (Turkish) Constitution speaks of full dedication to the

reforms of Atatürk and Article 153 prohibits any retrogression from these reforms. It

said:

No provision of this Constitution shall be construed or interpreted as rendering

unconstitutional the following reform laws which aim at raising Turkish society to the

level of contemporary civilization and at safeguarding the secular character of the

republic which were in effect on the date this constitution was adopted by popular vote:

1. The law of the unification (and secularization) of education of March 3, 1924

2. The Hat Law of November 25, 1925

3. The law on the closing down of dervish convents and mausoleums and the abolition

of the office of keepers of tombs and the law on the abolition and prohibition of

certain titles of November 30, 1925

4. The conduct of the act of (civil) marriage of February 17, 1926

5. The law concerning the adoption of international numerals of May 20, 1928

6. The law concerning the adoption and application, of (the Latin letters for) the

Turkish alphabet (and the banning of the Arabic script) of November 1, 1928

7. The law on the abolition of titles and appellations such as Efendi, Bey or Pasha, of

November 26, 1934

8. The law concerning the prohibition against the wearing of (indigenous) garments of

December 3, 1934

Complete denial of Ataturkism remains impossible and inconceivable. It is impossible

because the Constitution prohibits it and inconceivable because old and young have

accepted many of the consequences of the reforms and Westernization retains its

popular magic as the promise for a richer life.[6]

During the period these reforms were being enforced, Mustafa Kemal Pasha married a

beautiful, European-educated lady named Latifa, who, during the struggle for Turkey's

independence, was encouraged by him to dress like a man and demand for women absolute

equality. But the moment she grew self-assertive and insisted upon being treated as a

respectable wife instead of trampled upon like a doormat in his unfaithfulness, he furiously

divorced her, and sent her away. The irony was that earlier, Kemal was responsible for

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annulling the Islamic form of divorce, and yet he pronounced the talaaq when he divorced

his wife. A few months after his divorce, the anullment of the Islamic divorce was lifted.[7]

After his divorce from Latifa, his shamelessness knew no limits. He drank so heavily that he

became a drunkard and a confirmed alcoholic. Venereal disease wrecked his health.

Handsome young boys became objects of his lust and so aggressive was his behaviour

toward the wives and daughters of his political supporters that they began sending their

womenfolk as far as possible out of his reach.

Indeed, a close associate of Atatürk, Riza Nur, observed that:

Our respected leader has one habit. He loves women. He has to change them rapidly.

He must be the chief court-taster. [8]

In describing his character, H. C. Armstrong writes:

Mustafa Kemal Pasha had always been a lone man, a solitary, playing a lone hand. He

had trusted no one. He would not listen to opinions that were contrary to his own. He

would insult anyone who dared to disagree with him. He judged all actions by the

meanest motives of self-interest. He was insanely jealous. A clever or capable man was a

danger to be got rid of. He was bitterly critical of any other man's ability. He took a

savage pleasure in tearing up the characters and sneering at the actions even of those

who supported him. He rarely said a kind or generous thing and then only with a

qualification that was a sneer. He confided in no one. He had no intimates. His friends

were the evil little men who drank with him, pandered to his pleasures and fed his

vanity. All the men of value, the men who had stood beside him in the black days of the

War for Liberation were against him. [9]

And since no dictator can tolerate any rivals, Mustafa Kemal Pasha lost no opportunity in

crushing all political opposition.

The secret police did their work. By torture, bastinado, by any means they liked, the

police had to get enough evidence to incriminate the opposition leaders who were all

arrested. A Tribunal of Independence was nominated to try them. Without bothering

about procedure or evidence, the court sentenced them to be hanged. The death

warrants were sent to Mustafa Kemal for his signature in his house at Khan Kaya.

Among the death warrants was one for Arif who, after a quarrel with Mustafa Kemal,

had joined the opposition. Arif, his one friend, who had stood loyal beside him

throughout all the black days of the War for Independence - the only man to whom he

had opened his heart and shown himself intimately. One who was there reported that

when he came to this warrant the Ghazi's gray mask of a face never changed; he made

no remark; he did not hesitate. He was smoking. He laid the cigarette across the edge of

the ash-tray, signed the death warrant of Arif as if it had been some ordinary routine

paper and passed on to the next.... He would do the thing properly. He would give a

ball at Khan Kaya that night also. Every one must come--the judges, the Cabinet, the