• In 1999, an earthquake struck near Istanbul, killing 17,000 people and leading to the rise of the AKP, or the Justice and Development Party.
• On Monday, two major earthquakes hit Turkey and Syria, leaving more than 11,000 people dead, four times that number injured, and many still missing.
• The AKP has spent the past several years on nationalist campaigns, attacking Kurds in Turkey and Syria, and by threatening its neighbor Greece.
• It has focused on ideology—exhorting women to bear “at least three children” and creating a “pious generation” by opening up many religious schools.
• The government has used infrastructure projects to highlight its break with the past, but has failed to prepare for this catastrophe.
• Turkish citizens have called out on social media to wealthy real-estate and construction-company owners to bring their earthmovers and other heavy machinery to the wreckage sites.
• In the affected region, a shopping mall, a historic mosque, and hospitals were destroyed, forcing patients and caregivers out in the cold.
• The government has shut down many independent media outlets and restricted Twitter, preventing emergency help from reaching desperate areas.
• On election day, people should remember the bare hands of rescue workers and residents digging people out from under our cities.
Published February 8, 2023
Visit The Atlantic to read Ayşegül Sert’s original post Turkey’s Trust in Government Has Turned to Dust
