ISTANBUL: The US-based cleric Fethullah Gulen, who constructed a strong Islamic motion in Türkiye and past however spent his later years mired in accusations of orchestrating an tried coup towards Turkish chief Tayyip Erdogan, has died. He was 83.
Herkul, a web site which publishes Gulen’s sermons, mentioned on its X account that Gulen had died on Sunday night (Oct 21) within the US hospital the place he was being handled.
Gulen was a one-time ally of Erdogan however they fell out spectacularly, and Erdogan held him answerable for the 2016 tried coup during which rogue troopers commandeered warplanes, tanks and helicopters. Some 250 individuals had been killed within the bid to grab energy.
Gulen, who had lived in self-imposed exile in america since 1999, denied involvement within the putsch.
Based on its followers, Gulen’s motion – often called “Hizmet” which suggests “service” in Turkish – seeks to unfold a reasonable model of Islam that promotes Western-style schooling, free markets and interfaith communication.
For the reason that failed coup, his motion has been systematically dismantled in Türkiye and its affect has declined internationally.
Identified to his supporters as Hodjaefendi, or revered trainer, Gulen was born in a village within the japanese Turkish province of Erzurum in 1941. The son of an imam, or Islamic preacher, he studied the Quran from infancy.
In 1959, Gulen was appointed as a mosque imam within the northwestern metropolis of Edirne and started to come back to prominence as a preacher within the Nineteen Sixties within the western province of Izmir, the place he arrange pupil dormitories and would go to tea homes to evangelise.
These pupil homes marked the beginning of an off-the-cuff community which might unfold over the next many years via schooling, enterprise, media and state establishments, giving his supporters intensive affect.
This affect additionally unfold past Türkiye’s borders to the Turkic republics of Central Asia, the Balkans, Africa and the West via a community of colleges.
