Is Obama's Buddy, Tayyip "Mosques Are Our Barracks" Erdogan Also A Reformist?

We have been informed by the media that newly elected Iranian president Hassan Rohani is a moderate -- this despite the fact that

• Rouhani boasted that while talks were taking place in Teheran, Iran was able to complete the installation of equipment for conversion of yellowcake
  
  
• In 1999, Rowhani declared that protesters who damaged public property would be tried as enemies of the state -- a crime carrying the death penalty [the 1999 describes Rohani as a hardliner].
  
  
• According to an indictment by the Argentine government prosecutor, Rohani was on the Iranian government committee that plotted the 1994 bombing of a Jewish community center in Buenos Aires.

But Rohani is not the first Islamist to be hailed as a moderate -- take Turkey's Erodgan, for example.
Obama's good friend, who was hailed as a moderate, has a decidedly immoderate history:

• Michael Rubin writes that in 1994, Erdogan disparaged secularism while he was Istanbul’s mayor:
  

  “Thank God Almighty, I am a servant of sharia,” he declared in 1994, and the following year he described himself as “the imam of Istanbul.”

• In June 1997, Erdogan made some Antisemitic remarks at a meeting celebrating Istanbul's conquest by the Ottoman Turks:
  

  "The Jews have begun to crush the Muslims of Palestine, in the name of Zionism...Today, the image of the Jews is no different from that of the Nazis."

• In 1998, The New York Times reported that Erdogan was charged with being a threat to Turkey:
  

  On Friday, prosecutors in the southeastern city of Diyarbakir filed charges against Mayor Reccep Tayip Erdogan of Istanbul, in connection with a speech he made in the nearby town of Siirt last year. In that speech, Erdogan, who is a leader of the Islamic-oriented Welfare Party, said,
  

  "The mosques are our barracks, the domes are our helmets, the minarets are our swords, and the faithful are our army."

  The indictment charged that by making that statement, Erdogan was calling his supporters to form "an army of jihad," or holy war. It also charged him with "using democracy to establish an evil order." If convicted, he could face up to three years in prison.

  Erdogan was sentenced to 10 months in jail -- but was freed after four months. Though his criminal record that should have prevented him from holding political office, the Parliament amended the constitution in 2003 and Erdogan was allowed to stand for a parliamentary seat. The rest is history.
  
  
• In 2009, Erdogan accused Israel of murder and control of the media:
  

  The media does not fully report Israel's "murder of innocent children" because the "world's media is under the control of Israel, and this needs to be emphasised."

Based on his Islamist history, Erdogan's continued anti-Israel antics since then should come as no surprise.

Obama and  Erdoğan from Sept. 23, 2009.
Obama's good friend -- the Islamist
(Official White House Photo by Lawrence Jackson)

But this appears to just be part of a growing pattern -- an extension of the Obama administration's whitewashing of not only the Muslim Brotherhood in general but also of Egypt's Morsi in particular.

And based on Obama's apparent readiness to arm Islamist extremists in Syria, this is a pattern that is only going to continue.

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Technorati Tag: Erdogan and Turkey and Rohani.