Back in London after Turkey handed me a permanent entry ban for "the news I wrote," I think about ISIS leader Baghdadi's brother travelling freely in and out of the country, as it's the only piece I've written about Turkey since my last visit in May 2019. thenational.ae/world/mena/abu…
Unlike Jumaa Al Baghdadi, who apparently roamed in and out of Istanbul freely, I was escorted to my flight out of the city by this unfortunate plonker on a motorised tricycle. The irony and the shame were too much.
An intel source for the story about a senior ISIS member moving in and out of Turkey said "no one likes their dirty secrets being revealed to the world". You do appear to be very sensitive about this story @TurkeyMFA. It is very curious, indeed.
I have protested my ban to the relevant officials, and I am yet to hear any answers. But my treatment was nothing compared to that faced by journalists inside the country. Many journalists, both local and foreign, operate in fear, watching their every step.
More than 120 journalists remain jailed in Turkey, many on trumped up terrorism-related charges, some on no charges at all: reuters.com/article/us-tur…
Yes I can never go back to Turkey, but I was allowed to leave to my home country and had my luggage flown back to me. I saw a darker-skinned man violently assaulted and detained by six plainclothes policemen in the same room as me for protesting his own entry ban.
So I guess what I want to say is: many do not get the same light-handed treatment that I received for being a white British journalist. And, don't be fooled, Turkey is not a democracy, it's a dictatorship, one that I will never step foot in again.
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After two weird days as one of the few journalists inside the Four Seasons in Bahrain, I was left speechless by the Davos-esque Conflab on Palestinian Prosperousness, or “economic workshop,” hosted by Jared Kushner & co. Where do I begin? A thread.
1/ The tone was set before the event. Someone close to Jared sent me a strongly-worded email about this article, because I led with Pal reaction. A 1-on-1 was dependent on a fair hearing, I was told, ie ‘less Pal views please’. I work for an Arab paper. thenational.ae/world/mena/pal…
2/ In the lobby, I bumped into Richard Attias, the PR mogul named in the Panama Papers who tried to sue me 6 years ago over a story about his summits in West Africa. So that was a good start. He swanned around introducing VIP guests to each other as the organiser of the event.