The number of Turkish people with Anti-American sentiments has increased by 28 percent in just three years, a BBC poll showed on Wednesday.
According to the poll conducted by GlobalScan/PPC for the British broadcaster, the ratio of Turks that view the United States negatively stands at 64 percent, compared to 36 percent in 2014.
The research also showed that Turkey comes first in anti-U.S. feelings among NATO members. The ratio of people disliking the superpower also went up in other NATO countries as well, with a 22 percent increase in the UK which now stands at 64 percent, a 23 percent increase among the Spaniards, putting their percentage to 67, and a relatively small increase in France, which went up from 41 percent to 56.
Even the U.S.’ two neighbors disfavor the country more in 2017, with Canada standing at 73 percent which indicates a rather small decrease of 7 percent in favorability, and a major increase of 17 percent in Mexican antipathy towards the country, which now stands at 59 percent.
The President of the Program for Public Consultation (PPC), Steven Kull said that U.S. approval rates are even worse than the George W. Bush period, which marked the American invasion of Iraq.
“The U.S.’ favorability fell a little in the final years of Barack Obama, but now, it is even worse than the Bush era,” he said.
Over 18,000 people from 19 countries joined the poll, which also showed that Canada is by far the most ‘liked’ country in the world.
Turkish people’s unfavorable view of the U.S. most likely stems from the country’s support for the PKK’s Syrian wing, the PYD terror group and its armed wing the YPG, and the fact that American authorities are taking no steps for extraditing the fugitive preacher Fetullah Gülen, who has lived in self-imposed exile since 1999 in the foothills of the Pocono Mountains in Pennsylvania.
Despite the fact that “85 boxes of concrete evidence” – according to statements by President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and other officials – of Gülen and his shady network’s culpability in last year’s botched coup have been sent to the U.S. judiciary, no steps have been taken to bring him to justice. He still gives speeches from his 400-acre compound in Saylorsburg, which usually contains implied orders to his steeply obedient followers.
July 15, 2016 marked the day when Gülenist militants embedded in the ranks of Turkish military attempted to stage a coup against President Erdoğan and his democratically elected government. As a result of the failed attempt, 259 people died and over 2500 people were wounded.
