Erdoğan has no right to deprive Turkish people of EU membership

The year-long fight between the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) and the Fethullah Gülen community entered a new phase after the detentions of daily Zaman editor-in-chief Ekrem Dumanlı and Samanyolu TV station editor Hidayet Karaca, along with more than two dozen others, mainly from the police department. Government officials repeatedly underline that this was a judicial process and has nothing to do with the government, but they are hardly convincing.

For many, the operation launched against the Gülen community on Dec. 14, only three days before marking the first anniversary of the commencement of a massive corruption and graft probe that dealt a huge blow to the government’s credibility, is a pure attempt to take revenge against its one-time closest ally.

One of the objectives of this operation would be to distract public attention from corruption-related developments on the first anniversary of Dec. 17 and to shift the country’s agenda to the so-called threats against national security. The detention of Dumanlı, the editor-in-chief of one of Turkey’s leading newspapers, would also serve to intimidate other dissident journalists, (while further damaging freedom of expression).

The operation would also help the government build its pre-election campaign once again, basing it on the fight against the so-called “parallel structure” by highlighting the Gülen community’s alleged threats against national security. From this perspective, one could argue that Dec. 14 marked the launching of the AKP’s election campaign, which will continue in due course with other waves of operations.

This is not the first time that the AKP has done something similar. It is just repetition of what it did before the March...