[11] On 17 November 2022, he was sentenced to 8,658 years in prison for leading a criminal gang, engaging in political and military espionage, sexual abuse of minors, and other charges.

[23] Following the Turkish coup e'tat in September 1980, Oktar began regularly attending the Molla Çelebi Mosque in nearby Fındıklı.

[20][21] Between twenty and thirty of these followers formed a group around Oktar between 1982 and 1984, soon thereafter joined by newly-converted private high school students who also came from affluent backgrounds.

[24] Yüksel said Oktar presented "a refined and urbanized version" of Nursi's teachings "to the children of the privileged class", avoiding a high pressure or traditional, old fashioned approach.

[20] Like Nursi, Oktar argued against Marxism, communism and materialistic philosophy, but attached special importance to refuting evolution and Darwinism, as he believed they were being used to promote materialism and atheism.

"[21]Oktar claims that, due to the political upheaval in Turkey during this period, he was unable to continue his studies and so devoted his energy to writing books upon leaving school.

(Oktar ran and also served as honorary president of both BAV and the later Millî Değerleri Koruma Vakfı)[citation needed] As reported by Solberg, members of the BAV discarded their "overtly Islamic garments" in favor of "designer clothing" and "proclaimed themselves supporters of the ideals" of the founder of modern Turkey, Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, despite the fact that Atatürk was secularist.

The following year, Oktar founded the Foundation for Protection of National Values (Millî Değerleri Koruma Vakfı, or MDKV), through which he networked with other Turkish nationalist organizations and individuals on shared issues.

[39] According to Middle East Eye, his TV programs were known for featuring him discussing Islamic principles, while (somewhat incongruously), "scantily clad women with bleached blonde hair danced around him to popular music.

[41] Other charges Oktar faces range from sexual intercourse with minors and kidnapping children to holding people captive, political and military espionage, money laundering and torture.

[56] Truman State University physicist Taner Edis, who was born in Turkey, says the secret to BAV's success is the huge popularity of the Harun Yahya books.

[58] Oktar has been called "fiercely opposed to the theory of evolution"[10] and Darwinism, which he believes undermines religious belief, thus leading to "the discord, atheism, terrorism and extreme political ideologies" of contemporary life.

In 2005, Professor Ümit Sayın summed up the effect of the BAV's campaign when he said to The Pitch:[57]In 1998, I was able to motivate six members of the Turkish Academy of Sciences to speak out against the creationist movement.

They're afraid they'll be attacked by the radical Islamists and the BAV.In September 2008 Oktar issued a challenge offering "10 trillion Turkish lira to anyone who produces a single intermediate-form fossil demonstrating evolution".

Biology professor Kevin Padian at the University of California, Berkeley has criticized the notion that such fossils do not exist, stating that Oktar "does not have any sense of what we know about how things change through time.

'"[65] Taner Edis has said "there is nothing new in the Yahya material: scientifically negligible arguments and outright distortions often copied from Christian anti-evolution literature, presented with a conservative Muslim emphasis" concluding it "has no scholarly standing whatsoever".

[69] Padian said that people who had received copies were "just astounded at its size and production values and equally astonished at what a load of crap it is," adding that "[Oktar] does not really have any sense of what we know about how things change through time.

Except it's not a caddis fly, it's a fishing lure, beautifully crafted by master tier Graham Owen, with the clearly visible hook piercing the man-made abdomen.

The book suggests that the principal mission of Jews and Freemasons in Turkey was to erode the spiritual, religious, and moral values of the Turkish people and, thus, make them like animals, as stated in what Oktar refers to as their use of "Distorted Torah.

"[85] A Turkish painter and intellectual, Bedri Baykam, published a strongly worded critique of the book in Ankara's daily newspaper, Siyah-Beyaz ("Black and White").

"[92] Nevertheless, that year the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) described Yahya as "an anti-Semitic Turkish writer whose articles demonize Jews who support Israel as "godless" and blames them for committing atrocities."

[93] After his 2018 arrest Oktar was described by The Times of Israel as having "been criticized in the past for publishing books featuring anti-Semitic conspiracy theories and Holocaust denial, but in recent years has renounced them and held events to combat those phenomena in the Muslim world.

")[100] But others have questioned whether Oktar and his kitten cohosts are motivated by the empowerment of women and basing Islam only on the Quran (setting aside Sunni and Shia doctrines and traditions).

Journalist Meher Ahmad attempted to interview the women in Oktar's group about feminism in Islam, travelling to Istanbul in 2015 to make a video for Vice.

One unique variation by Oktar on the traditional prophesy of Gog and Magog is that their invasion will not be of hordes of warriors but of television programs they transmit, and that the blocking of them by the Two-Horned One (Dhu al-Qarnayn) will not be by some wall but by electromagnetic jamming.

[10] Oktar has also emphasized the importance in Islam of "the role to be played by Jesus at the end of the world", which permits him "to cultivate an ecumenical image"—Muslims and Christians will be joined in combat 'destroying the society established by the Antichrist, they will save mankind from atheism'".

Physicist Taner Edis of Truman State University, who has followed the case closely, says given the political pressures on Turkey's justice system, that's "not entirely implausible.

Among other things, it claimed that BAV used its female members to attract young scholars from rich families with the promise of sexual favors in exchange for attending events.

[21][109] In the face of all these allegations against BAV, the Chairman of the Court announced in the hearing on 29 February 2008, that testimonies obtained through unlawful means may not be considered as evidence based on article 148 of the criminal code.

"[106] On 19 September 2008, a Turkish court banned Internet users in Turkey from viewing the official Richard Dawkins website after Oktar claimed its contents were defamatory, blasphemous and insulting to religion, arguing that his personality was violated by this site.