TURKEY'S ULTRANATIONALIST "VALLEY OF THE WOLVES"

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 ANKARA 000024 SIPDIS SIPDIS E.O. 12958: DECL: 01/03/2018 TAGS: PGOV PHUM PREL OSCE TU SUBJECT: TURKEY'S ULTRANATIONALIST "VALLEY OF THE WOLVES" TV SERIES REMAINS A HIT REF: A. ANKARA 19 ¶B. 07 ANKARA 462 ¶C. 06 ANKARA 783 Classified By: A/Political Counselor Kelly Degnan, reasons 1.4(b),(d) ¶1. (C) Summary and comment: Turkey's popular television drama "Valley of the Wolves" is back on the air and setting new records in its fourth season. "Show TV" temporarily canceled the program in February 2007 due to government pressure and viewer complaints over the show's violence. Television ratings and Internet statistics demonstrate that viewers eat up the sensational plots that loosely parallel real-life events; they are not dissuaded by the show's critics, who maintain the series stokes nationalism and routinely vilifies religious minorities. EU and academic contacts agree the series reinforces a societal suspicion toward non-Muslims that Turks are exposed to in mandatory public school courses on religion. While there is no consensus on whether the program influences behavior, its continuing popularity is an indication of persistent societal intolerance that perceives non-Muslims as outsiders (ref A). End summary and comment. -------------- "Valley of the Wolves" Still a Hit -------------- ¶2. (SBU) "Show TV" began broadcasting again in May its popular television drama "Valley of the Wolves" after pulling it last February due to pressure by the government's Radio and Television Supreme Council (RTUK) and viewer complaints over the program's violence (ref B). The latest iteration, titled "Kurtlar Vadisi Pusu" ("Valley of the Wolves Ambush"), continues to follow the main character, Polat Alemdar, a patriotic undercover intelligence officer who infiltrated the mafia to take on unsavory elements of the Turkish state and organized crime. The show's immense popularity led to the controversial 2005 blockbuster movie spin-off, "Valley of the Wolves, Iraq" -- a crassly anti-American, anti-Semitic film that became Turkey's highest-grossing movie ever (ref C). The show's cancellation in February raised a debate over whether limiting free speech in the name of curbing violence and extreme nationalism is censorship or responsible government, and whether the show is a product of surging nationalism or a contributor to it. Though the legal community and academics were split, the public strongly demanded its entertainment: in a poll of nearly 1 million people conducted by a mainstream newspaper, eighty-eight percent labeled the cancellation censorship and said the series should be aired. ¶3. (SBU) Since its re-launching, "Valley" has consistently topped audience ratings and pulled in far more viewers than its competitors. The program's popularity spills over to the Internet; a Google search for "Kurtlar Vadisi," the shows name in Turkish, turns up over 2 million results, versus approximately 300,000 for PM "Recep Tayyip Erdogan" or President "Abdullah Gul." "Google Trends" shows that over the past four years searches in Turkey for "Kurtlar Vadisi" have immensely outweighed searches for other popular names, such as "Erdogan," "Gul," and "Bush." Internet searches peaked in January 2006 (the month prior to the film's release) and January 2007 (when Turkish-Armenian journalist Hrant Dink was murdered). Searches were highest in Diyarbakir, followed by Konya, Kayseri, Adana, and Erzurum. A "YouTube" search returns 37,300 results for "Kurtlar Vadisi," many of which are clips from the series that have been viewed hundreds of thousands of times. The program's website itself - www.kurtlarvadisi.com - evinces an active following where fans chat on topics related to the show and vote in polls for their favorite character or episode. ¶4. (SBU) Anecdotal evidence also demonstrates "Valley's" continued popularity. The owner of a popular mid-market Ankara restaurant told us on nights featuring an important soccer match or a highly anticipated episode of "Kurtlar Vadisi," receipts consistently are 10 percent lower than usual. He described the show's continued existence as simple economics, stating, "When the common man demands such entertainment, broadcasting companies will oblige." A Middle ANKARA 00000024 002 OF 003 East Technical University (METU) professor told us that many of his students watch and enjoy the show even though they are embarrassed to admit it. -------------- "Valley's" Disturbing Anti-Minority Slant -------------- ¶5. (C) Contacts from Turkey's religious minority communities believe the program feeds suspicion, hostility, and stereotyping. Ziya Meral, Christian Solidarity Worldwide's Middle East Consultant, told us "Kurtlar Vadisi" negatively portrays Turks like him who have converted from Islam to Christianity. This fall, in a thinly veiled variation of the brutal April murders of three Christians in Malatya (ref A), the series portrayed a teenage boy commissioned by a nationalist group to kill a Christian book publisher. Other recent episodes implied Christian missionaries were enemies of society, guilty of links to crimes ranging from the sale of body parts to prostitution. Jewish Community Executive VP Lina Filiba told us "Valley" is part of a larger problem of an irresponsible media that perpetuates false notions about Jews and other minorities. "Valley" and other TV programs, as well as books, magazines, and newspapers, have escalated their anti-Semitic content to a "frightening" level in recent years, she said. ¶6. (C) European Commission political officer Sema Kilicer told us the program had crossed the line from fictionalized entertainment into something that stoked a rising nationalist wave in Turkey based on fears that perceived enemies, such as Christian missionaries, need to be destroyed. Kilicer contends the show's anti-missionary messages reflect a societal suspicion toward Christians that stems from mandatory public school religious courses that negatively portray non-Sunni faiths. Muslim Turks are often particularly wary of Christians, Kilicer said, because they are associated with the Crusades, the Russian invasions of eastern Anatolia in the late 19th century and 1915, and European attempts to carve up the Ottoman Empire after World War I. Kilicer maintains that many Turkish citizens still suffer from a "paranoia that missionaries are stealing the religion of Turkish citizens." ¶7. (C) Orhan Kemal Cengiz, lawyer for the Turkish Kurtulus (Salvation) Protestant Churches, said disinformation about Christianity like that seen in "Valley" is widespread in national and local media. Government officials have also contributed. He noted that a day after the murders in Malatya, Niyazi Guney, a senior official in the Justice Ministry, remarked to Turkish parliamentarians that, "Missionary work is even more dangerous than terrorism and unfortunately is not considered a crime in Turkey." Cengiz also cited the Directorate of Religious Affair's (Diyanet's) March 2005 sermon that described missionary activity as "a scheme of foreigners to steal the faith of the young." (Note: the Diyanet has since espoused publicly the position that all faiths should be accepted in Turkey.) Cengiz believes the constant repetition of anti-missionary slurs has created a crime of "missionary activity" in the public's mind. Individuals of nationalist persuasion then decide to punish this "crime." -------------- "Valley" a Scapegoat for Societal Ills -------------- ¶8. (C) Ankara University Anthropologist Tayfun Atay believes "Valley" remains popular because it continues to invent plots that, though sensational, draw from real life, such as American soldiers' "hooding" of Turkish troops, the massacre of missionaries in Malatya, the "deep state," and the Kurdish issue. The public, especially ultranationalist youths, draw parallels between the plots and reality, according to Atay. He noted that the nicknames of those who plotted the Dink murder were the names of the actors on the series, and the youth who stabbed Catholic Priest Franchini in Izmir in late December stated he was influenced by the show (ref A). ¶9. (C) Though Atay is not certain whether the show influences behavior, he is convinced that it would be futile to pull the ANKARA 00000024 003 OF 003 program off the air. He believes "Valley" is a convenient scapegoat for those who wish to ignore numerous deep-rooted psychological complexes of the Turkish public. The rhetoric against missionaries existed long before "Valley", he noted, and is perpetrated by many segments of the population, including government officials. "Valley," according to Atay, is simply the latest symptom of a larger societal ill of xenophobia and racism. Pulling it off the air would only increase its popularity while doing nothing to solve the underlying mentality it reflects. 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