Turkey Airport blasts. Family members of victims outside the Forensic Medical Center in Istanbul, June 29, 2016. Emrah Gurel /Press Association. All rights reserved. Shortly after the attack on Istanbul’s Atatürk airport on Tuesday night, a Greek colleague posted on his Facebook wall a message of solidarity with his Turkish friends. “Hang in there”, he wrote. “You are not alone.” One of his compatriots disagreed: “I think they are alone”.
“They are alone between an authoritarian government working on [its] own agenda and [a] Europe that reaches out to them when looking for favours. Secular, western looking Turkey is very much alone.”
The truth could not be expressed more bluntly. Amidst the maddening routine of mass suicide attacks, prayforistanbul hashtags, media blackouts and messages of sympathy and solidarity from world leaders, many in Istanbul and across Turkey feel increasingly alone and despondent in the face of a thick darkness engulfing the country ever so tightly. The EU‘s normative influence here has sunk as low as its reputation.
