ISTANBUL: Turkey’s main opposition scored a major blow against President Recep Tayyip Erdogan last month when it won control of Istanbul, but now faces a wounded government reluctant to relinquish power.
With Erdogan expected to stay in office until at least 2023, the new mayor of Istanbul, Ekrem Imamoglu of the secular Republican People’s Party (CHP), knows he must find a way to work with the president.
But the signs are mixed.
After Erdogan’s ruling AKP party lost Turkey’s largest city in a rerun vote on June 23, the president congratulated Imamoglu and described the vote as the “will of the people.”
But just days later his government moved to strip Imamoglu of key mayoral powers of patronage.
The show of strength raises strategic questions for Imamoglu, who has vowed to work “in harmony” with Erdogan but is also talked about as a future presidential challenger.
Having called for a meeting with Erdogan to address the urgent problems of the 15-million-strong metropolis, the new mayor has so far remained fairly vague about his plans.
He has promised to crack down on alleged lavish spending at the municipality and bring in international-standard auditors to assure transparency, warning that the city faces bankruptcy if urgent action is not taken.
Imamoglu also said he would create green belts in Istanbul, and return trees and grass to Taksim square in the heart of the city — echoing the demands of protesters who triggered a mass anti-government movement over the redevelopment of neighboring Gezi park in 2013.
Urban planners remain skeptical about his promises.
“Istanbul’s green space problem is not only about hostility to nature — it’s also a question of the economy,” said Sedat Durel, environment engineer at the Chamber of Environmental Engineers.
Durel said nothing will change without a fundamental change in the current governing mentality, which favors mass commercial development over natural spaces.
Imamoglu, who started out in his family’s lucrative real estate and restaurant business in western Istanbul, does not appear to have an obvious background to shift that mindset.
“Although there is hope it will not continue this way, we have yet to hear anything concrete,” said Durel.
After failing to mount serious challenges in elections for decades, Turkey’s main opposition has been revitalized by Imamoglu’s win.
Aside from the sky-high expectations, his biggest challenge may be overcoming a municipal council dominated by AKP members and its right-wing ally, the MHP, which together control 25 of 39 city districts.
Ege Seckin, an analyst at IHS Markit, said Imamoglu’s new job would be an “uphill struggle.”
“The government will go to great lengths to impede his work, seeking to validate their long-standing claim that the AKP is the only game in town when it comes to delivering basic services, and that all alternatives, including the CHP, are incompetent,” Seckin told AFP.
The first sign of trouble came immediately after the June 23 election, when Erdogan’s government issued a circular shifting the power to assign managers of municipal companies from the mayor to the council.
“We were informed of a change in legislation,” Imamoglu told reporters this month, warning against “political maneuvering” to limit his power.
The first municipal council meeting chaired by Imamoglu on July 8 — which was aired live, as part of his efforts at greater transparency — nonetheless saw positive messages from the AKP rank and file.
One AKP councilor, Tevfik Goksu, assured that the party would avoid “negative” attitudes and support any project that serves Istanbul.
The CHP remains unconvinced.
“Do I expect serious obstacles on some areas? Yes, I do, given their power and majority in the assembly,” said Tarik Balyali, a CHP spokesman in the municipal council.
But he warned the public would also blame the AKP if the party tried to undermine Imamoglu’s efforts to improve municipal services.
Many opponents of Erdogan hope Imamoglu can use the platform of Istanbul to mount a serious challenge at the national level — just as the president himself did in the 1990s.
But Imamoglu’s prospects depend not only on getting results in the city, but also on his ability to maintain support from divergent opposition groups including secular Turks and Kurdish opposition voters, and maybe even AKP dissidents, said Seckin.
“This was a relatively easier task for a municipal election, but a national-level competition is likely to be more vicious, and the fault lines separating different opposition factions are likely to matter far more,” he said.
Istanbul’s new mayor Ekrem Imamoglu faces tough road ahead after landslide win
Istanbul’s new mayor Ekrem Imamoglu faces tough road ahead after landslide win
- Ekrem Imamoglu must find a way to work with Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan
- The president has congratulated opposition leader Imamoglu and described the vote as the ‘will of the people’
Turkiye replaces pro-Kurdish mayors with state officials in two eastern cities
ANKARA: Turkiye stripped two elected pro-Kurdish mayors of their posts in eastern cities on Friday, for convictions on terrorism-related offenses, the interior ministry said, temporarily appointing state officials in their places instead.
The local governor replaced mayor Cevdet Konak in Tunceli, while a local administrator was appointed in the place of Ovacik mayor Mustafa Sarigul, the ministry said in a statement, adding these were “temporary measures.”
Konak is a member of the pro-Kurdish DEM Party, which has 57 seats in the national parliament, and Sarigul is a member of the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP). Dozens of pro-Kurdish mayors from its predecessor parties have been removed from their posts on similar charges in the past.
CHP leader Ozgur Ozel said authorities had deemed that Sarigul’s attendance at a funeral was a crime and called the move to appoint a trustee “a theft of the national will,” adding his party would stand against the “injustice.”
“Removing a mayor who has been elected by the votes of the people for two terms over a funeral he attended 12 years ago has no more jurisdiction than the last struggles of a government on its way out,” Ozel said on X.
Earlier this month, Turkiye replaced three pro-Kurdish mayors in southeastern cities over similar terrorism-related reasons, drawing backlash from the DEM Party and others.
Last month, a mayor from the CHP was arrested after prosecutors accused him of belonging to the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), banned as a terrorist group in Turkiye and deemed a terrorist group by the European Union and United States.
The appointment of government trustees followed a surprise proposal by President Tayyip Erdogan’s main ally last month to end the state’s 40-year conflict with the PKK.
Gaza civil defense says 19 killed in Israeli strikes
- More than 40 others wounded in three massacres caused by Israeli air strikes in the Gaza Strip
Gaza City: Gaza’s civil defense agency said that 19 people, some of them children, were killed in Israeli air strikes and tank fire on Saturday.
Agency spokesman Mahmud Bassal told AFP that “19 people were killed and more than 40 others wounded in three massacres caused by Israeli air strikes in the Gaza Strip between midnight and this morning,” as well as by tank fire in Rafah in the territory’s south.
Lebanon says at least four killed in Israeli strike on central Beirut
- Footage broadcast by Lebanon’s Al-Jadeed station showed at least one destroyed building and several others badly damaged around it
BEIRUT: Lebanon’s health ministry said at least four people were killed in an Israeli strike in the heart of Beirut on Saturday, with rescue operations still ongoing.
“The Israeli enemy strike on Basta Al-Fawqa in Beirut killed four people and injured 23 others,” the ministry said in a statement, giving a preliminary toll. Rescuers were still “removing the rubble”, it added.
A powerful Israeli airstrike targeted central Beirut on Saturday, security sources said, shaking the Lebanese capital as Israel pressed its offensive against the Iran-backed Hezbollah group.
Lebanon’s National News Agency said early on Saturday that the attack resulted in a large number of fatalities and injuries and destroyed an eight-story building. Footage broadcast by Lebanon’s Al-Jadeed station showed at least one destroyed building and several others badly damaged around it.
Israel used bunker buster bombs in the strike, leaving a deep crater, said the agency. Beirut smelled strongly of explosives hours after the attack.
The blasts shook the capital around 4 a.m. (0200 GMT), Reuters witnesses said. Security sources said at least four bombs were dropped in the attack.
It marked the fourth Israeli airstrike this week targeting a central area of Beirut, where the bulk of Israel’s attacks have targeted the Hezbollah-controlled southern suburbs. On Sunday an Israeli airstrike killed a Hezbollah media official in the Ras Al-Nabaa district of central Beirut.
Israel has killed several leaders of its long-time foe Hezbollah, Tehran’s most important ally in the region, in air strikes on Beirut’s southern suburbs.
Israel launched a major offensive against Hezbollah in Lebanon in September, following nearly a year of cross-border hostilities ignited by the Gaza war, pounding wide areas of Lebanon with airstrikes and sending troops into the south.
The conflict began when Hezbollah opened fire in solidarity with its Palestinian ally Hamas after it launched the Oct. 7, 2023 attack on southern Israel.
A US mediator traveled to Lebanon and Israel this week in an effort to secure a ceasefire. The envoy, Amos Hochstein, indicated progress had been made after meetings in Beirut on Tuesday and Wednesday, before going to meet Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Israel Katz.
Orchestra conductor mourns childhood home’s destruction in Israel’s southern Lebanon offensive
- Destruction of Lubnan Baalbaki’s childhood home in October came during Israel’s offensive in Lebanon
- Baalbaki’s family home in Odaisseh, designed by his late father, held more than just personal memories
BEIRUT: Lubnan Baalbaki, the conductor of the Lebanese Philharmonic Orchestra, watched on his phone screen as an aerial camera pointed to a village in southern Lebanon. In seconds, multiple houses erupted into rubble, smoke filling the air. The camera panned right, revealing widespread devastation.
He zoomed in to confirm his fears: His family’s house in the border village of Odaisseh, where his parents are buried, was now in ruins.
“To see your house getting bombed and in a split second turned into ash, I don’t think there is description for it,” Baalbaki said.
The destruction of his childhood home in October came during Israel’s offensive in Lebanon. The aim, Israel says, is to debilitate the Hezbollah militant group, push it away from the border and end more than a year of Hezbollah fire into northern Israel.
The Israeli military has released videos of controlled detonations in areas along the border, saying it is targeting Hezbollah facilities and weapons.
But the bombardment has also wiped out entire residential neighborhoods or even villages. The World Bank in a recent report said over 99,000 housing units have been “fully or partially damaged” by the war in Lebanon.
Baalbaki’s family home in Odaisseh, designed by his late father, renowned Lebanese painter Abdel Hamid Baalbaki, held more than just personal memories. It held a collection of Abdel Hamid’s paintings, his art workshop and over 1,500 books. All were destroyed along with the house.
What cut even deeper, Baalbaki said, was the loss of the letters his parents exchanged during his father’s art studies in France. Only a few remain as digital photos.
“The language of passion and love they shared was filled with poetry,” Baalbaki said.
In a book of poems and photographs his father created for his wife following her sudden death in a car accident, the first page reads, “Dedication to Adeeba, the partner of my most precious days, the love bird that left its nest too soon.”
Abdel Hamid painstakingly designed his wife’s tombstone. Later, he was laid to rest beside her in the garden next to the house. For their son, watching his childhood home go up in smoke brought back the pain of losing them.
It was a moment he had feared for months.
Hezbollah began firing missiles into Israel on Oct. 8, 2023, in solidarity with Hamas in Gaza. Israel responded with airstrikes and shelling. For nearly a year, the conflict remained limited.
After the war dramatically escalated on Sept. 23 with intense Israeli airstrikes on southern and eastern Lebanon as well as Beirut’s southern suburbs, Baalbaki and his siblings frequently checked satellite images for updates on their village.
On Oct. 26, explosions in and around Odaisseh triggered an earthquake alert in northern Israel. That day, videos circulated online, one of which showed their home being obliterated.
Until a few days before that, the satellite images showed their house still standing.
Now, Baalbaki said, he is resolved to honor his father’s dream.
“The mourning phase started to turn to determination to rebuild this project,” he said.
When the war is over, he plans to rebuild the house as an art museum and cultural center.
226 health workers killed in Lebanon since Oct. 7 — WHO
- Over 187 attacks on healthcare workers have taken place in Lebanon over 13 months, says UN health agency
- Fifteen of Lebanon’s 153 hospitals have ceased operating or are only partially functioning, warns WHO
GENEVA: Nearly 230 health workers have been killed in Lebanon since the start of Israel’s war in Gaza following the Oct. 7 attacks last year, the World Health Organization said.
In total, the UN health agency said there had been 187 attacks on health care in Lebanon in the more than 13 months of cross-border fire between Israel and Hezbollah over the Gaza conflict.
Between Oct. 7, 2023 and Nov.18 this year, “we have 226 deaths and 199 injuries in total,” Abdinasir Abubakar, the WHO representative in Lebanon, said via video link from Beirut.
He said “almost 70 percent” of these had occurred since the tensions escalated into an all-out war in September.
Saying this was “an extremely worrying pattern,” he stressed that “depriving civilians of access to lifesaving care and targeting health providers is a breach of international humanitarian law.”
Abubakar said: “A hallmark of the conflict in Lebanon is how destructive it has been to health care,” highlighting that 47 percent of these attacks “have proven fatal to at least one health worker or patient” — the highest percentage of any active conflict today.
By comparison, Abubakar said that only 13.3 percent of attacks on health care globally had fatal outcomes during the same period, pointing to data from a range of conflict situations, including Ukraine, Sudan, and the occupied Palestinian territory.
He suggested the high percentage of fatal attacks on health care in Lebanon might be because “more ambulances have been targeted.”
“And whenever the ambulance is targeted, actually, then you will have three, four or five paramedics ... killed.”
The conflict has dealt a harsh blow to overall health care in Lebanon, which was already reeling from a string of dire crises in recent years.
The WHO warned that 15 of Lebanon’s 153 hospitals have ceased operating or are only partially functioning.
Hanan Balkhy, WHO’s regional director for the eastern Mediterranean region, stressed that “attacks on health care of this scale cripple a health system when those whose lives depend on it need it the most.”
“Beyond the loss of life, the death of health workers is a loss of years of investment and a crucial resource to a fragile country going forward.”
