Palestinian media is reporting that Khalid Meshaal, the Hamas political leader abroad, has congratulated Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu for the victory of their Justice and Development Party’s (AKP) in Turkish parliamentary elections on Sunday. According to the report:
November 6, 2105 GAZA CITY (Ma’an) — The exiled head of Hamas, Khalid Meshaal, on Monday congratulated Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu for the Justice and Development Party’s (AKP) win in the Turkish parliamentary elections on Sunday.
In a phone call, Meshaal expressed to Erdogan and Davutoglu his hopes for Turkey’s security and stability in addition to his hope that the AKP’s win would reflect positively on the ‘(Palestinian) nation’s causes,’ particularly regarding the Al-Aqsa Mosque compound.
The right-wing Islamist-leaning AKP has strong ties with the Hamas movement, and leaders of the Turkish party have met with Hamas leaders on multiple occasions.
On Monday, Hamas spokesperson Sami Abu Zuhri, said that a victory for AKP was a victory for Palestine, the Jerusalem Post reported.
AKP won the Turkish parliamentary elections with 49.4 percent of the votes, while its leading challenger, the Republican People’s party (CHP) took in only 25.4 percent. The elections held on Sunday were a re-vote, after AKP lost its parliamentary majority in June for the first time in 13 years.
Following June’s election, other political parties in Turkey were hoping to win a combined parliamentary majority over AKP in order to stem attempts by the right-wing party to reform the current government.
Last year Erdogan resigned from his seat as Prime Minister, and became Turkey’s first ever elected president.
With all the votes nearly counted, the AKP has won 316 seats in Turkey’s 550 seat parliament, a large majority, but still 16 seats short of being able call for a referendum to change the constitution and increase presidential powers, the BBC reported.
The Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood website followed with a statement offering its “sincere congratulations to the Turkish people” on the occasion of the AKP victory:
November 2, 2015 IkhwanWeb The office of the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood abroad offers its sincere congratulations to the Turkish people for their positive turnout and firm determination, and their jealous regard for their civil life and their dynamic rivalry within the boundaries of peaceful and civilized competition.
The election results and the impressive turnout, which exceeded 87%, show how the state’s strengths can be bolstered with the people’s free will and free choice when they are not subject to despotic and repressive military rule.
The primary purpose of repression, oppression and rule of the gun is to break and suppress the will of the people and to prevent the people from expressing their free will, so popular will under such military rule becomes an exercise in futility, irony and deception. That is when the proportion of people’s participation in democratic elections can be indicated with fingers of one hand.
Peoples who succeed in ending military rule and ousting the junta, tyranny and the rule of the gun, and establish the democratic practice of resorting to the people and their will, are capable of being more dynamic and able to express their free will without any ruler’s control or deception.
The Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood abroad offer their heartily congratulations to the Justice and Development Party and its leadership on their admirable performance in this election, triumphing over all other competing parties, on the large percentage of the votes of Turkish people won, which reflects the Turkish people’s growing confidence, and on the great endeavors they pursued, and still are, in domestic and international issues.
We hope the party and its leadership will continue these good endeavors, bringing the Turkish people more progress and advancement and independence, and bolstering support for just regional and international causes.
Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood Office Abroad Sunday – November 1, 2015
A 2011 report report authored by the GMBDW editor concluded that since 2006, Turkey has become a new center for the Global Muslim Brotherhood. That report also detailed Erdogan’s ideological ties to the Global Muslim Brotherhood network, ties which date back to Erdogan’s affiliation in the 1970s with the World Assembly of Muslim Youth (WAMY), a Saudi charity with known connections to extremist and terrorist groups. In November 2014,, the GMBDW reported on that Israel has arrested dozens of members of a Hamas terror network said to be funded and directed by Hamas officials in Turkey. In December 2014, the GMBDW discussed a report titled “Antisemitism Hits New High In Turkey” that examines the starling rise in antisemitism that has accompanied the government of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.