Istanbul, Turkey – I stopped here in the land of the Sultans en route to Rwanda for the twentieth anniversary of the genocide where I will be delivering the prayer at the national commemoration in Kigali. Many friends told me not to make the stop. Turkey is hostile to Jews and Israel, they said. Indeed, the day I traveled Israel issued a travel advisory for Turkey.
What I found was more nuanced. I visited southern Turkey last summer with Dr. Mehmet Oz and his family right after we toured Israel together but had not been to Istanbul for fifteen years. What a change. Back then you were hard pressed to find one woman with the Islamic hair covering. Today, it’s about one in three, with perhaps one out of 7 wearing the full niqab.
Still, walking around with a Yarmulke posed no problem and few, if any, were unfriendly.
The most jarring thing my son and I came across was a helpful receptionist at our hotel who is a student at the University of Istanbul studying political science. Seeing us pray on the Sabbath he asked us if it’s true, as it says in his University textbook, that Jews believe themselves chosen by God to control the world and are allowed to steal from, and murder, non-Jews in achieving that goal. We assured him that it was a horrendous lie and he said he did not believe it, anyway. But many Turks, he said, were getting a negative impression of Jews because of the Mavi Marmara incident and the “ugly” Israeli blockade of Gaza.
The very next morning I awoke to Thomas Friedman’s column in The New York Timestitled “Sheldon: Iran’s Best Friend,” a scathing attack on Jewish mega-philanthropist Sheldon Adelson whom Friedman says is a “foolhardy.. crude right-wing pro-Israel extremist” who is “trying to destroy Israel.” CLICK TO KEEP READING
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