Funny: Turkey Blames “Jewish Lobby” for Economic Crisis 

The Times-UK reports that Turkish media have blamed the “Jewish lobby” for the sudden drop in the value of the country’s currency, based on a tweet from an Israeli academic. The Turkish lira has fallen by 20 per cent against the dollar this year and President Erdogan has repeatedly blamed an unspecified “interest-rate lobby” for manipulating the currency.

Turkey’s press is almost exclusively controlled by the state or pro-Erdogan businessmen after a crackdown on critical media. It seized upon a tweet by Edy Cohen that the crisis in the Turkish currency began shortly after the Israeli ambassador to Turkey was ordered to temporarily leave.

“Don’t you know that half of the world’s wealth belongs to only one Jewish family, which is Israel’s primary supporter?” Dr. Cohen said, in a tweet directly addressing President Erdogan and including the hashtag “Support the Turkish lira.” It was intended to be ironic, but was quickly picked up by Turkish media.