The Fallout from Turkey’s Constitutional Referendum
Turkey will hold a constitutional referendum on April 16th. Voters will decide on amendments that would change the structure of governance in the country from a parliamentary system to a presidential one—which will greatly increase the powers of the president. This special vote has been called by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to give him the power to combat terrorists.
Additionally, the changes would conveniently give Erdogan the sole authority to appoint or dismiss vice presidents, ministers and high state officials. He could legislate by decree and set Turkey’s national budget without parliamentary approval. Erdogan would have the power to dissolve parliament and trigger parliamentary and presidential elections. He would also be able to run for two five-year terms, and subsequent terms by simply dissolving parliament before the end of his current term.
If the constitutional amendments are accepted, the parliament would lose all the authority to monitor the executive branch. Erdogan and his underlings would have a total liberty to act as they please. The parliament would continue to have the authority to draft and enact laws, but anything it passes could be struck down by the president. Since Erdogan controls the puppet parliament, there is little possibility of a conflict.
The citizens of the Turkey are basically voting to make official Erdogan’s dictatorship. His willingness to put the matter to a vote, shows his intention to mask his despotism with flowery words.
The referendum will have little effect on the current mechanism of Turkey’s government. Since the failed coup of last July, Erdogan has ruled the nation with an iron fist. The vote would only make permanent the emergency powers that the president has already assumed.
Independent media in Turkey have been all but silenced with over 160 media outlets and publishing houses closed down, and over 120 journalists and media workers currently jailed pending trial. Over 100,000 civil servants have been summarily dismissed or suspended without due process and over 47,000 people have been jailed pending trial.
Anyone trying to start an opposition newspaper can expect to be charged with supporting terrorism. If Turkish prosecutors have their way, some journalists could spend the rest of their lives in prison for daring to oppose the government.
President Erdogan may not recognize (admit) fascism in his own government, but he’s quick to identify it in other countries. He scolded the Netherlands for allowing Will Geert to run for office. Erdogan said in a speech in Istanbul, “I thought Nazism was over, but I was wrong.”
When tensions erupted between Berlin and Ankara over the right for Turkish operatives to rally Germany-based Turks, Erdogan compared Germany’s government with that of the Nazi era.
Erdogan also has very thin skin when it comes to satire aimed in his direction. When German comedian Jan Böhmermann made fun of Erdogan, the Turkish government demanded his arrest.
The negotiation process for Turkey’s EU membership began in 2005, but has been at a standstill for years. The lack of freedom in Turkey was the main stumbling block. The passing of the April 16th referendum will likely make membership impossible. The EU would have to ignore a key rule that bans member states from being run by a dictator.
Erdogan has cleverly headed off an embarrassing rejection by calling for a referendum on EU membership. He can have his minions vote to walk away from EU membership, and then he can easily deflect criticism by saying he is just following the will of the people.
Turkey has a pinnacle role to play in Bible prophecy. At some point Russia and a horde of Middle East countries will launch a surprise attack against Israel. Erdogan has already made it clear that he is ready to join forces with Russia. If next week’s vote sets up Erdogan as the absolute ruler of Turkey, there will be no political force left to prevent him from fulfilling his destiny.
“And the word of the LORD came unto me, saying, Son of man, set thy face against Gog, the land of Magog, the chief prince of Meshech and Tubal, and prophesy against him, and say, Thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I am against thee, O Gog, the chief prince of Meshech and Tubal:
And I will turn thee back, and put hooks into thy jaws, and I will bring thee forth, and all thine army, horses and horsemen, all of them clothed with all sorts of armour, even a great company with bucklers and shields, all of them handling swords: Persia, Ethiopia, and Libya with them; all of them with shield and helmet: Gomer, and all his bands; the house of Togarmah of the north quarters, and all his bands: and many people with thee” (Ezekiel 38:1-6).
–Todd
New World Order Throwing Fit
Senator John McCain (R-Arizona) was quick to get behind mainstream media microphones and cameras. He did so immediately following President Trump pulling the bill to repeal and replace the Affordable Healthcare Act (Obamacare) from consideration of the House of Representatives.
The former presidential candidate, acknowledged as a severe critic and opponent of the new president, presumed to instruct Mr. Trump on how he might approach Democrats in order to improve the soon-to-implode health system President Obama ramrodded through Congress.
McCain then launched into his thoughts on how Trump and himself are totally on the opposite ends of the ideological spectrum with regard to America’s rightful place so far as world leadership is concerned.
The senator talked about how he believes the United States should come closer to the European Union (EU) and totally embrace NATO as part of a new world order. He implied that Trump foolishly rejects this approach, wanting America more or less to be isolationist in its approach to dealings with the world around our nation.
McCain said “The new world order is under tremendous strain.” While speaking at the Brussels Forum, he went on to say that the world “cries out for American and European leadership” through the EU and NATO, and said that the EU and the US needed to develop “more cooperation, more connectivity.”
McCain, chairman of the U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee, said, “I trust the EU.” He said further that the EU was “one of the most important alliances” for the U.S. and that the EU and NATO were the ” [most effective organizations] in history”–in maintaining the peace for the last seventy years.
McCain’s strong implication was that Trump’s idea of moving away from the so-called new world order was opposite of the direction America should move. The nation must, he implied, embrace this alliance in order to save the world in keeping peace and security in view.
I am reminded of Psalms chapter 2 about the end-times powers that be that will have no deity to rule over them, but declare that humanist effort will prevail. I believe the tremendous upheaval we have seen, particularly since Trump’s election, is minion-driven enragement. The insane statements and movements are centered in the fact that God has intervened, for whatever reason, into Satan’s plans to install world government.
It is just a postponement–a temporary setback–for the new world order builders, but it has driven them into manifesting the insanity that reprobate minds come to, as indicated in Romans chapter 1.
All of this involves two of the end-times characteristics the apostle Paul prophesied in his 2 Timothy chapter 3 foretelling.
I wrote about this in-depth in my latest book Rapture Ready…Or Not: 15 Reasons Why This Is the Generation That Will Be Left Behind. I include a portion of that presentation here.
Sadat’s Prophetic Legacy
Those of us old enough to remember can still see the smiling faces of U.S. President Jimmy Carter, Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin, and Egyptian President Anwar Sadat shaking hands on the White House grounds. It was prelude to the formal peace treaty that was concluded and signed on March 26, 1979. The treaty became effective January 1980.
The two nations–Israel and Egypt–had been in a perpetual state of impending war since Israel became a nation on May 14-15, 1948.
Israel agreed, as part of the accord hammered out in Washington D.C. in 1977, to completely withdraw all military forces from the Sinai Peninsula. Israel had won the territory in the 6-Day War of 1967. Egypt agreed to leave the area demilitarized.
Additionally, the agreement guaranteed Israel free shipping passage through the Suez Canal. Also, it gave recognition of the Strait of Tiran and the Gulf of Aqaba as international waterways.
The treaty effectively made Egypt the first Arab state to officially recognize Israel and the first to make an agreement with the Jewish state.
Anwar Al-Sadat was successor to Gambel Abdul Nasser, the dictator who fiercely waged war against Israel in times leading up to the 1956 war and then in the 1967 war. Sadat was a fierce warrior himself during those wars against the hated Israeli intruders as they saw them. None of the major Arab states recognized Israel as a legitimate nation-state. None today officially do so–except Egypt.
Much of the Muslim world was enraged when Sadat signed the historic treaty. In my estimation, this set in motion a truly satanic rage that has escalated since, bringing us to where things are today.
Most all Muslim states are in agreement with Nasser’s long-ago declaration that Israel must be eliminated–eradicated from the face of the Middle East.
Anwar Sadat led the 1973 Yom Kipper War. He was at the center of its planning and execution.
The Arab forces were overwhelming, and by every metric of military strategic methodology, it was thought that Israel’s days were numbered.
The Yom Kipper assault was indeed a surprise to even the brilliant Israeli generals at the time–among whom was the Israeli strategists, Menachem Begin.
The Arab coalition assault at first made heavy inroads into Israeli territory. But the tide soon–miraculously, some say–turned, and Israel routed the much larger forces and captured large portions of land from its enemies.
I observed all this and especially Anwar Sadat after all these developments. I was then and remain convinced that he came to realize that–like Pharaoh came to realize finally–that Israel’s god…is God.
Sadat, a hardened Muslim-Arab warrior, I determined, changed considerably. He still was a strong leader, but with a much softer eye toward Israel–toward the West, for that matter.
Anwar Sadat paid for his embrace of Israel and the Western world with his life. He was assassinated by Muslim military elements within his own ranks near Cairo on October 6, 1981, while reviewing a parade that memorialized, strangely enough, a part of the battle that had initiated the Yom Kippur War.
Despite the death of Sadat by such violence, his successor, Hosni Mubarak–also severely wounded during the attack–held to the agreement Sadat had made with Israel. The agreement has, in effect, remained to this day, even in spite of the time of Egyptian inner-turmoil when the Obama administration worked to install the Muslim Brotherhood leadership, that organization and others overthrowing Mubarak.
The Egyptian soon became irate with the Muslim Brotherhood tyrant, Mohamed Morsi, who tried to reinstall strict sharia law and other freedom-suppressing actions.
Morsi was put out of office by the peoples’ demand, despite the Obama administration’s attempt to influence the situation. Abdel Fattah el Sisi, a much less restrictive leader along the lines of Sadat, is now president, having overthrown Morsi. He met this week with, in my view, a much less freedom-suppressing United States president than the previous one.
It was Sadat’s first reaching out to a foe who had severely “whupped” him–as Muhammad Ali might have put it–that has made possible a better working relationship in all of this Middle Eastern madness. It is Anwar Sadat’s foundation-laying that continues to at least provide Israel some degree of buffering protection against it’s blood-vowed enemies.
His influence is seen within the most recent, unfolding news.
Egyptian and Jordanian leaders both were in Washington, D.C., to meet with President Donald J. Trump this past week. The meeting was to include talks on Iran, Isis, and the Palestinian-Israeli peace process. It was el Sisi’s first meeting in the White House. He had been treated as persona non grata by President Barack Obama in the view of many.
Apparently, a number of those within the diplomatic community dealing with the Israeli-Palestinian peace process see el Sisi as being a player in working toward bringing the two sides together. While the Bible makes clear that a man-made peace deal between Israel and “the many” will end only in Israel’s having to flee for its national existence, the Lord also said “Blessed are the peacemakers.”
Sadat tried to make peace, and it remains a resilient peace under the governing hand of el Sisi. Some who study the prophetic picture see Egypt as a nation that will be immensely blessed and will embrace Israel as a friend.
The nations are scheduled to be split during that judgment into the sheep and goat division, according to Matthew chapter 25. The Bible indicates that Egypt is a nation on the scene during millennial times. It will be Israel’s friend. So, Egypt obviously will make it into the “sheep” nations during that division.
Perhaps Anwar el Sadat put that blessing into motion when he met Menachem Begin with a smiling handshake on the White House lawn all those years ago.
–Terry