The ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP – Adalet ve Kalkınma Partisi) in Turkey is observing the development of the situation in the Arab World, especially in Egypt, Syria and Iraq, and participating where it can in developing the “revolutions" or subjecting them in the service of its plans in the Middle East and in the Muslim World. This is why we find it offering advice to the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, Tunisia and Libya. It is also in effect participating – with funds, weapons, training and laying out military and political plans – in Syria in favor of the opposition, at times in collaboration with its allies in the region, and at others independently from them. The fact of the matter is that the AKP's plans can be summed up in the “Brotherhoodization" of the Arab region and the establishment of relations with it based on Islamist political ideology, in order to spread its influence wherever the Muslim Brotherhood reaches power. It would thus form, in collaboration with the Brotherhood, a front in the face of Iranian influence, in view of Iran being the historical enemy of the Ottoman Empire, and one that seeks to export its revolution and its method of rule to the Arab World. The grand prize Ankara is now waiting for is the fall of the Syrian regime, while expecting the Muslim Brotherhood to be the alternative, in view of it being the most organized and politically efficient on the ground, in addition to its religious discourse being favorably met among the popular classes, where sectarian and confessional instincts control political orientation. Ankara expects the fall of the Assad regime to allow it to form a front that would stretch from Northern Syria to Northern Iraq, including Kurdish areas in both countries. As it imagines it, such an axis would besiege Baghdad and besiege Iran's influence, in preparation for toppling the regime in Baghdad or surrounding it with domestic enemies, from the center and from the North, and foreign enemies, especially from the “new" Syria, in addition to Egypt, where the Muslim Brotherhood is reinforcing its grip on power, and where it is beginning to implement its foreign policies, which are known to all – policies that can be summed up in an alliance between Cairo and Ankara to change the face of the region. Indeed, they represent its two main poles, whether in terms of ideology or in terms of human and military capabilities. To achieve this dream-plan, Turkey has sought to get closer to the Kurds of Northern Iraq, with whom it deals as if they were an independent state, without going through Baghdad. It is within such a framework that Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu visited the Kurdish province without informing the central government. A similar occurrence was the attempt by the Energy Minister to attend a conference and sign agreements with Erbil, an attempt confronted by Baghdad, which prevented his plane from landing. Moreover, Ankara and Baghdad are engaged in a struggle to attract the clans of central Iraq. Ankara has also welcomed Vice President Tariq Al-Hashimi, who has been sentenced to death in Iraq, and refuses to extradite him, in addition to organizing meetings for Iraqi leaders in order to turn them against their government, considering it to be a plaything in the hands of Iran. Iraq's Prime Minister Nouri Al-Maliki, on the other hand, is resorting to attracting those same clans by confronting the Kurdistan province and playing on the strings of Arab nationalism, and by supporting leaders of the “Awakenings" and appointing some of their kinsmen to high-ranking government positions (he thus insists that the Defense Minister should be from the Obeidi clan). He has also formed a group of Special Forces to confront the Kurds in Kirkuk and in ethnically mixed areas. Amid its battle against Iran for influence in the Arab World, Turkey relies on two pillars: its religious political ideology and the fact that it is a member of the North Atlantic Alliance (NATO), in addition to its good relations with Israel. And more important than all of this is the fact that the United States supports its plans in the Middle East, and considers it to represent, along with the Muslim Brotherhood's Egypt, a guarantee for its policies in the region. Indeed, they are the biggest Muslim countries in the region, and their influence there has indisputable historical roots. As for whatever domestic disputes are taking place inside both of them, they merely fall under the “democratic game". Fulfilling the Turkish dream would require breaking down and reconstructing countries in the Levant and Mesopotamia, i.e. additional civil wars. And Ankara knows that it will not be safe from their repercussions. Will it then reconsider the direction it is taking?
