Erdoğan’s thin skin has clearly contributed to the mutual sense of irritation. “If the West calls someone a dictator,” he says, “in my view that is a good thing.” Addressing a rally in Ankara on the first anniversary of the aborted coup, he showed what he thought of opinion on the continent: “I don’t look at what Hans and George say. I look at what Ahmet, Mehmet, Hasan, Huseyin, Ayse, Fatma, and Hatice say.”
