Ilber Ortayli has passed and... I have mixed feelings.
I often hated his public intellectual performances, which often devolved into lumpen nationalism and even racism
At the same time, he wrote some great books of popular history, most notably İmparatorluğun En Uzun Yüzyılı (1983)
Don't miss it! Tues 12 pm ET, 3/17/26 http://dlvr.it/TRP4MY
My latest piece on Turkey and the Iran war:
1️⃣ NATO intercepted a second Iranian missile that entered Turkish airspace. Ankara warned Tehran, while Iranian officials denied responsibility and said they respect Turkish sovereignty. But Iran’s so-called “mosaic defense” strategy, 1/4
My essay for NYRB maps out how iran got to this point. “But January’s protests werenot just the prelude to a geopolitical contest. They offer a window intothe fortunes of Iran’s citizens, the changing structure of its state, & the trajectory of the regime the US now seeks to obliterate.”
Tweet from Daniel Pipes: "The uprising in Iran in early January suggested an even greater insurgency would then follow on the U.S.-Israeli campaign to erode regime power. Yet, the populace now appears cowed into near-silence. This ranks as the most surprising and disappointing development of the past week. Without a new uprising, the regime will likely remain in power, less powerful but more awful than ever. (The picture below is from Jan. 10 in Tehran.)"
Amazing how quickly "We're fighting this war for freedom of the Iranian people" becomes "The Iranian people are at fault for not rising up."
You could write the history of 21st century US foreign policy disasters in the Middle East as a biography of this one guy.
Mr. Erdoğan wants to lead the Islamic world and believes himself to be the guardian of Islam, a kind of modern-day Ottoman sultan. This explains why Turkey has been a bad partner for NATO when it comes to Iran. Ankara in 2012 reportedly divulged to Iran the identities of up to 10 Iranian citizens who were spying for Israel and gathering information on Iran’s nuclear-weapons program. Danny Yatom, a former chief of Israel’s Mossad, described this incident as a major blow against Western agencies trying to gather intelligence on Iran’s nuclear program. The U.S.-led Delta Force raid in 2015 on the compound housing Islamic State’s chief financial officer, Abu Sayyaf, found undeniable links between the terrorist group and Turkish officials. At the time, ISIS was earning millions of dollars a month selling oil on black markets. Turkey has also used the Syrian refugee crisis to extract concessions from the European Union. Examples include the 2016 EU-Turkey deal, under which the EU has agreed to provide €6 billion in aid to Turkey in exchange for Ankara’s commitment to stop irregular migration into the bloc, and the 2020 border crisis, in which Mr. Erdoğan announced that Turkey would no longer prevent refugees from entering Europe, an act the Greek government labeled “extortion diplomacy.” Should NATO continue its relationship with Turkey? What should its role be in the Middle East after the Iranian regime falls? When considering these questions, the U.S. shouldn’t forget that Turkey opposes U.S. foreign policy and is a headache for its allies.
Frankly this is a pathetic and also strangely short article but it says something about how deeply neurotic and ill the American intelligentsia is that it can even be published by WSJ
In NLR 157: an interview with Ervand Abrahamian.
A leading historian of modern Iran on the power structures of the Islamic Republic and the long-incubated American-Israeli assault.
newleftreview.org/issues/ii157...
It's so telling that these people are rushing to condemn "the campus left" at this moment
www.nytimes.com/2026/03/02/o...
so, torture. they’re torturing them as federal policy. entirely predictable, but that doesn’t make it any less evil
The amount of Western people you can find telling Iranians to not feel any possible emotion they might be having right now, yes they can be devastated, happy, angry, sad, furious, terrified - they have a right to all these and more: their oppressor seems murdered by the hands of their oppressors.
Additionally, I want to speak directly to Iranian New Yorkers: you are part of the fabric of this city — you are our neighbors, small business owners, students, artists, workers, and community leaders. You will be safe here.
Today’s military strikes on Iran — carried out by the United States and Israel — mark a catastrophic escalation in an illegal war of aggression. Bombing cities. Killing civilians. Opening a new theater of war.
I really am tired of Dems leaders
Not meeting the moment is the understatement of all time. Lead, follow, or get out the way
I promise you that the government that murdered Alex Pretti and Renee Good does not give a flying fuck about the protests in Iran.
The first deaths announced from the US-Israeli strikes on Iran: dozens of school girls. They hit an elementary school in Hormozgan.
People should stop and consider that it actually might be *more difficult* to consolidate power, as a matter of politics, in a place like Turkey than in the US.
Our hybrid lecture series brings together an outstanding international lineup exploring musical cultures across interconnected regions, from Central Asia to the South Caucasus and the Ottoman world.
For further details: orientalistik.univie.ac.at/fachrichtung...
Latest episode, from last week 📢📢
Murat C. Yildiz on “The Ottoman World of Sports: Refashioning Bodies, Men, and Communities in Late Imperial Istanbul” (@utexaspress.bsky.social)
👇👇
turkeybooktalk.com/2026/02/17/m...
So it's ok to start a war illegally against a nation of 92 million, for whom you have "no sympathy" as long as the purpose is clear?
The Big Dem line that Trump is a demented fascist domestically while simultaneously agreeing his foreign policy decisions just isn't gonna cut it anymore.
The state of U.S.-Canada relations aside (clearly the driving factor here), it is pretty abhorrent to see an otherwise liberal democratic leader flirting this hard with China, especially just days after they threw Jimmy Lai in prison. Quote Mark Carney
A throughline for so much of the American political commentariat, from left to right, is the utter and total incomprehension that American actions have consequences.
Apply by this Friday, February 20!
a stat i always cite is the number of anti-trans articles in the press went from 60 in a year, to 7,500
Applications for the Keyman Early-Career Scholars Article Workshop Spring 2026 are open until February 20. For more information, please visit: keyman.buffett.northwestern.edu/.../early-ca....
It's here! A very incipient starter pack for the art, architecture, and archaeology of the Islamic world. This is just a first quick effort, please let me know if I can add you or others so we can build up this community!
A decade long transatlantic panic about the civilizational threat of left-wing cancel culture and we now have an "anti-woke" censorship campaign taking out Plato at a major American university. Absolutely pathetic.
New episode drops tomorrow 📢👇
Burcu Karahan (@burcukarahan.bsky.social) on translating "One Thousand and One Kisses", a remarkable collection of erotic and humorous short stories published anonymously in Istanbul in 1923-24
Stay tuned 📌📌
turkeybooktalk.com
turkeybooktalk.substack.com
Photo of the young CLR James
On this day in 1901, CLR James is born in Trinidad. James was an important anti-colonial activist, socialist historian, theorist, journalist and cricket aficionado.
anticolonialhistory.com/event/148/
