Aaron Okin Columnist

Many critics of the war against terrorism have, from its outset, used the term "crusade" as a descriptor. Unfortunately for them, the parallel between the United States' actions in response to an attack killing thousands of its citizens and Christendom's wars with Islamic civilization over possession of sacred land is, at best, a superficial one.

In fact, as this grossly mislabeled "crusade" continues, there is an actual occurrence in the realm of international affairs that fits the spirit of the term far better than what the United States and its allies are doing - the European Union's attitude and actions in dealing with Turkish membership aspirations.

Can it be that Europe, a conglomeration of nations that has been treated as a shining beacon of morality in a world darkened by American misdeeds, has a flawed position? Yes, and it's not just flawed, it's a double standard that manifests cultural elitism in a very clear way.

Perhaps the biggest difficulty in detecting this fact lies in the lack of coverage on issues like Cyprus and Turkish EU membership in the face of more heated international disputes. It is uncommon to find information on these topics in the national press, let alone in a college publication. Because of this, a huge indicator of European bigotry goes unnoticed by a large segment of the population.

Cyprus has two distinct ethnic communities, Cypriots of Greek and Turkish descent, that have been feuding with each other since 1964. In 1974, Greek nationalists sought to overthrow the internationally accepted government and to unify with Greece. In response, Turkey deployed troops to the island to ensure the safety of the Turkish population. The split between the northern Turkish and southern Greek sides of the island continues to this day, in spite of international efforts to forge a solution.

The island's Greek-led government is the one the international community accepts, while the Turkish side's pseudo-state is given deference only by Turkey itself. The Greek side of Cyprus is set to join the EU this year, while candidate (and moderate Muslim) Turkey has had its efforts to become more "European" overlooked by the EU.

These efforts, including giving the Kurdish minority more language rights and abolishing capital punishment, were some of the EU conditions for Turkey entering into negotiations for membership. Turkey is the only candidate for membership that has not opened formal accession talks.

It's well known that Turkey has had some problems in the field of human rights, but thus far, EU engagement has seemed to work. Logically, if the EU is in the business of making people's lives better, it would want to keep raising the living standard of the Turks. Instead, it has elected to tie Turkish EU membership to the settlement of the question of Cyprus, a position without a good explanation, especially since talks are non-binding.

Europe may say it doesn't want to import conflict, but some of Cyprus, regardless of the full island's status when May comes, will become part of the EU. It just so happens that that side is the one that the United Nations claims was the aggressor in 1974. But, hey, it's fine - they're Christian.

No European state would allow its destiny to be contingent on the settlement of a foreign political dispute, yet this is exactly what the EU is asking of Turkey. It isn't as though Turkey can control the Turkish Cypriot negotiating position - the community elects its own leaders and, earlier this week, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Erdogan implored Kofi Annan to push talks forward. As for the Turkish military presence, the United Nations has even pushed a plan that allows it to remain.

EU powerhouse countries Germany and France have been venues of a startling number of attacks on Semitic residents, both Arab and Jewish, in recent years. Turks in Germany are a despised minority, and France was leading the fight to keep any references to religious influence other than Christianity out of drafts of a new European constitution. Even the official Vatican newspaper last fall made the claim that "Europe is either Christian or it is not Europe."

Turkey is being left out because it's Muslim, yet it pushes forward because being "European" is vitally important to its national goals.

The supposedly compassionate, tolerant European nations that the left invokes as role models in their criticisms of the U.S. policies have their true motivations exposed when the matter at hand does not pertain to what the Americans are doing - they are the real modern-day crusaders.

Aaron Okin is a regional development and political science junior. He can be reached at letters@wildcat.arizona.edu.