Divisions between Muslims and secularists have been laid bare, writes Nicholas Birch in Istanbul
To the casual observer, Turkish preparations for today's National Day are an uncomplicated expression of colourful patriotism. The streets are hung with red and white bunting. Above the capital city of Ankara, a parachutist unfolds a 40-kilo monster of a flag - 17 metres by 25 - into the cloudless sky.
Behind the scenes, though, the run-up to this 80th anniversary of the foundation of the Turkish republic has been stormy.
Tensions began two weeks back, when Turkey's president, Ahmet Necdet Sezer, sent out invitations to his annual reception. While he invited opposition MPs to bring their wives, male members of the Justice and Development Party (AKP) that has been in power since last November were asked to come alone.
Pure political bias from a man who is supposed to stand above politics? Not quite. Unlike the westernised and staunchly pro-secular opposition party, AKP has Islamist leanings. More importantly, most of the MPs' wives wear headscarves, the bane of Turkey's secularists.
The president's decision raised a barrage of protest among AKP deputies.
"National Day is for everybody, and everybody has the right to celebrate it," said Ms Nimet Cubukcu, an Istanbul deputy. "The decision shows a lack of respect for the people who voted us into power." Some of her colleagues were more forceful. One ostentatiously announced he would be spending the day at a mosque opening in western Turkey. Yet another implied he thought the president should resign.
Yet while most of the media joined AKP deputies in deploring the president's decision, he was not without his supporters.
"\ did what was required of him," wrote Mr Ferruh Demirmen, a US-based Turkish expert. "The constitutional court ruled several times in the past that wearing headscarves at state functions violates the principle of a secular state. Inviting \ wives would have amounted to an encouragement to break the law."
Mr Turker Alkan, a columnist for the liberal daily Radikal, disagrees. "The much-touted statement 'headscarves must not be worn on state property' is an empty slogan," he said. "If a covered woman brings a case to court, nobody is going to stand up and object to her presence on the grounds that 'this is state property'. They will only object, and rightly, if the judge insists on wearing one too." Likewise, he insisted, the wives of AKP deputies are guests, not civil servants.
Today's debate has its roots in the secular political system set up by Kemal Ataturk, founder of the Turkish Republic. But it is only with the rise of political Islam in the last 20 years that it has come to symbolise what Turkish secularists see as the struggle of modernity against medieval reaction.
Following the pro-secular army's successful campaign in 1997 to remove what many saw as an Islamist government from power, the state has cracked down hard on all signs of political Islam. Newly-imposed sartorial regulations prevented thousands of covered girls from attending university or sitting state exams.
When in 1999 newly-elected MP Merve Kavakci had the effrontery to walk into parliament wearing a headscarf, she was stripped of her position and later her Turkish citizenship.
"In part, blame for the present situation rests with some religious groups," said Hakan Yavuz, a US-based political scientist and author of two books on Turkish political Islam. "They have used the headscarf issue to promote their own agenda." Like other commentators, though, he is no less critical of Turkey's brand of secularism. "Turkish secularism is authoritarian, not liberal," he argued.
"Either you are like the elite, or you are against it. And the headscarf has come to represent a very superficial boundary between who's in and who's out, who's modern and who isn't." A point put more piquantly by Mehmet Yilmaz, chief columnist for the mass circulation daily Milliyet: "If you're a man, even if you're a proponent of \ Sharia law, you can put on a tie and go to the president's party," he said. "If you're a woman and you cover your hair, even though you may be a staunch defender of republican values, you can't."
Mr Yavuz does not share the belief, widespread among westernised Turks, that the AKP government is secretly planning a return to religious rule. But the new government's insistent demands for a Turkey based on respect for individual rights has not entirely won him over either.
"They're quick enough to stand up for their own rights," he said. "How about the rights of gays, or of groups like the Alevi," a highly unorthodox Shia Muslim minority that has its stronghold in otherwise solidly Sunni central Anatolia.
"If President Sezer had invited the AKP wives, plus gays, atheists and Alevis, he could have made this National Day reception an object lesson in democracy," he added.