Islamic Political Identity in Turkey

9The National OutlookMovement and the Riseof the Refah PartyMehmet Zahid Kotku was the brainchild of the party. He wanted tohave a party where Muslims could feel at home. We were, in fact,tired of being used by other center-right parties. I became involved inthis party because of Zahid Efendi. I remember that evening whenZahid Efendi invited Wve people and told us that “you are all mendedicated to the cause of protecting and advancing this nation. Thecore identity [kimlik] and character [ki7ilik] of this wounded nation isIslam. Your main heritage is Islam and as Muslims you can heal thiswound by listening to what our Turkish Muslim people want. Whatthey want is an Islamic sense of justice and the restoration of theirOttoman-Islamic identity.LütW Do:an, head of the Directorateof Religious AVairs, 1968–1971Mehmet Zahid Kotku, the renowned Nak7ibendi leader of the8skenderpa7a Cemaati, played a seminal role in the formation ofwhat would become the MSP, underscoring once again the positionof the Nak7ibendi order as the matrix of most leading contemporaryTurkish-Islamic sociopolitical movements. 1 He understoodthe connections between macro socioeconomic forces and microlevelethical issues at the individual level. He set the coordinatesof the MGH by pinning down the search for identity and justice astwo principles animating vast sections of Turkish society. 2 TheNak7ibendi Iskenderpa7a order Wrst mobilized a group of communityleaders and merchants to get Necmettin Erbakan to theGrand National Assembly from Konya in 1969. Soon after, Kotkuand his followers set the organizational model and necessarynetworks for the formation and evolution of the MGH into the MSP,