Investigating the Goals and Thoughts of Islamist Leaders in the New Turkey

The new Turkey (Republic of Turkey) was founded in 1923 by Mustafa Kemal Ataturk. After the establishment of the Turkish government (the new Republic of Turkey) in 1923, Kamal Ataturk took all his efforts to reduce Islam as a minimum religion to the private realm and to accelerate society more closely in line with the requirements of modernity in the contemporary era. But after his death, it became obvious that all his activities and plans to break the relationship with the Ottoman past (which represents the Islamic world) and reducing the influence of Islamic thoughts were not effective, and Islam continues to play a fundamental role in the formation of the Islamic-Turkish identity as well as the past. So the main question of this research is that: “who are the pioneers of Islam in the new Turkey and what their goals are?” The findings of the study confirm that two political Islamist movements led by Najmuddin Erbakan and social Islam led by Fethullah Gulen in Turkey are active in Turkey, which not only are significcant difference in aims and ideals, but also in strategies so that Arghakan, for the growth of the Islamists, has drawn on utopia city and jihad in order to achieve it, and wanted to achieve its goals by unifying Muslims and fighting with colonialism, while Gulen prefers to pursue his goals through educational, promotional and economic activities that of course had special emphasis on the Turkish nationalism.