Researcher: Death of Erdogan’s archenemy will splinter opposition group

It is a broken movement that has lost a leader.

This is how associate professor emeritus at the Center for Middle East Studies Mehmet Ümit Necef describes the news about the death of the leader of the Turkish Gülen movement, Fethullah Gülen.

– The remains of the Gülen movement will splinter after his death, says Necef.

The Turkish television station NTV and several other Turkish media reported on Monday that the Islamic preacher and former imam Fethullah Gülen has died at the age of 83.

His death could be the end of an already weakened Gülen movement that lives in some places in Europe.

The movement has largely been eradicated in Turkey.

That’s what Mehmet Ümit Necef says, associate professor emeritus at the Center for Middle East Studies at SDU.

– Such movements gather around the strong leader. The leader often has an aura of untouchability. It is gone now, says Mehmet Ümit Necef.

Fethullah Gülen and the Gülen movement were labeled arch-enemies by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his government.

They accused him, among other things, of being behind the coup attempt in Turkey in 2016.

He was wanted by his home country Turkey, which tried several times to have him extradited from the United States, where he lived in exile.

And the Turkish government has done its part to remove the movement from the world map, says Mehmet Ümit Necef.

The failed coup attempt in 2016 left the movement weakened and without the political and economic power it had otherwise enjoyed before the coup attempt.

– It was a strong movement that had infiltrated major institutions in Turkey. The movement had members in the military, the legal system and the police, says Necef.

After the coup attempt, thousands of Gülen supporters were removed from their posts and imprisoned.

Gülen’s death will probably create discontent and political and religious confusion among supporters, he says.

After the coup attempt, the Turkish government set up a hotline for citizens to report Gülen support.

In Turkey, the main accusation against the Gülen movement is that they are pro-American and that the movement is the henchmen of the Gulf states in Turkey, says Mehmet Ümit Necef.

/ritzau/