Sabbateans

Kar??yaka Municipality's March 8 posters, which cap sentences by AKP members with the slogan "none of your business," coincide with Davuto?lu's first post-election visit to ?zmirThe sentence needs to be delivered with one hand firmly on your belly, with the elbow provocatively jutted out, as if it could be used to deliver a blow to the chest of your opponent.

Although they developed after one of the biggest messianic movements in history, the Dönme crypto-religious community remains shrouded in mystery and subject to conspiracy theories in Turkey and elsewhere.

'The Burden of Silence: Sabbatai Sevi and the Evolution of Ottoman-Turkish Dönmes' by Cengiz ?i?man (Oxford University Press, 344 pages, £47)

The Middle Eastern Studies Center of top-ranking Harvard University hosted Turkish journalist-author Cengiz Çandar last week. Çandar spoke in the seminar "Understanding and Misunderstanding Turkey and the Middle East," with American academics bombarding Çandar with questions to unravel the dramatic changes in Turkey since the June 7 election.

Hakan Fidan?s decision to return to his former position as head of Turkey?s National Intelligence Agency (M?T) is ?felicitous,? President Recep Tayyip Erdo?an has said.

Erdo?an also strictly refuted opposition claims that the reappointment of Fidan, after he had resigned to stand for the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) in the upcoming June elections, was unlawful.

Two separate lawsuits have been filed for the cancellation and suspension of execution of the reappointment of Hakan Fidan to his post as head of the National Intelligence Agency (M?T) after he had resigned to run for parliament for the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) last month.

Hakan Fidan returned to work as the head of the National Intelligence Organization (M?T) late March 10 after he withdrew his application to run for parliament for the ruling party amid an ongoing legal dispute over his return to his former post.

The two-month-long adventure of former National Intelligence Agency (M?T) Chief Hakan Fidan, who was bidding to play a role on the political stage, has ended with his reappointment to his M?T post by Prime Minister Ahmet Davuto?lu.

A month after his resignation from his position as head of Turkey?s National Intelligence Organization (M?T), Hakan Fidan announced on March 9 that he wanted to return to his post, withdrawing his candidacy for parliament in the June 7 elections on the list of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Parti).

Hakan Fidan, the chief of the National Intelligence Organization (M?T), has had to abandon his desire to run for active politics from the ranks of the Justice and Development Party (AKP), four weeks after he resigned from his job.