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Tag Archives: Armenian genocide
P.S. Armenians & Kurds — “Atoning for a Genocide”
30 Oct
Easter Mass in Sourp Giragos in Diyarbakır, 2014. Because the church still has no priest assigned to it, a priest flies in from Istanbul. Pari Dukovic
From “A Century of Silence: A family survives the Armenian genocide and its long aftermath.“:
“As the villagers fled to Diyarbakir from the surrounding areas, it became a Kurdish city. In time, the Diyarbakir Kurds began to recognize that their role in the genocide was a kind of original sin in their modern political history. “I remember this one Armenian priest,” Demirbaş told me. “A Kurd was insulting him, and this priest told him, ‘We were the breakfast for them, you will be the lunch. Don’t forget.’ And that was important for me.'”” [My emphasis]
While we’re on Armenians, at a time when Syria plunges more deeply into hell than we had ever thought possible, when the West abandons the Kurds to Erdoğan and Assad, proving again that the U.S. is Turkey’s hamali, or that Turkey’s tail wags the dog, if you prefer, a historical reality check might be called for.
The American and almost every other media might be too superficial or too impatient to dig so deep historically because they’d lose their audience, but there is one, and one big thing that disproves Donald Trump’s assertion that Turks and Kurds have been fighting each other for centuries and are “natural enemies“ (see video below). And that is the fact that perhaps the greater portion of the massacres of Armenians and other Christians in eastern Anatolia during the last decades of the 19th c. and first two and a half decades of the 20th c. were conducted by Kurds.* Not by the Ottoman military, but by Kurdish para/irregular forces or just Kurdish tribal chieftains craving more land and authority and wealth, and conducting/justifying their campaigns of mass murder with the rippling green banner of Islam, under which Turks and Kurds were just brothers in defense of the faith. Only when the forces of modern nationalism started displacing the older bonds of religion and empire, did Kurds arguably start to feel themselves a separate entity from Turkish Muslims, and did the power of clan loyalties shift from semi-feudal to Kurdish nationalist ones; it’s even arguable that Republican Turkey’s anti-ağa, anti-religious and Turkification campaigns stoked the fires of the new Kurdish nationalism more than anything else. (Somewhat of a similar process occurs between the Ottomans and Muslim Albanians in the early 20th c., and Orthodox Greeks and Orthodox non-Greeks: Bulgarians, Macedonians, Vlachs, Albanian Christians — as the latter groups discovered/invented new identities to replace the old religious-institutional bonds.)
An Armenian woman and her children who were refugees of the massacres and sought help from missionaries by walking far distances. Photo unknown provenance.
So I’m sorry that couldn’t counter Trump’s claims of eternal Turkish-Kurdish enmity with something pretty about how — on the contrary — eternally well they have gotten along but rather by implicating both parties in coordinated mass murder. And forgive me the occasional snicker at Greek pro-Kurdish poses and the general sanctification of Kurds that we’ve witnessed in the past couple of decades.
Armenian victims of the massacres being buried in a mass grave at Erzerum cemetery. Photo unknown provenance.
* From Wiki:
(“In 1890-91, at a time when the empire was either too weak and disorganized or reluctant to halt them, Sultan Abdul Hamid gave semi-official status to the Kurdish bandits. Made up mainly of Kurdish tribes, but also of Turks, Yöruk, Arabs, Turkmens and Circassians, and armed by the state, they came to be called the Hamidiye Alaylari (“Hamidian Regiments“).[16] The Hamidiye and Kurdish brigands were given free rein to attack Armenians, confiscating stores of grain, foodstuffs, and driving off livestock, and confident of escaping punishment as they were subjects of military courts only.) [my emphasis]
And not just eastern Anatolia. Istanbul’s Kurdish population played a major role in the 1896 Hamidian Armenian massacres in the City, where hundreds were killed right there in Pera, in ab-fab Beyoğlu, in the middle of the elegant, Beaux Arts, now garish and overlit Istiklâl. Referred to this before and to how brilliantly these events are handled in the “Duck with Okra” chapter in Maria Iordanidou’s Loxandra.
Only fair, however, that I include a reference to this 2015 article from The New Yorker, “A Century of Silence: A family survives the Armenian genocide and its long aftermath.“ by Raffi Khatchadourian, in which the then mayors of Diyarbakır and the separate municipality of the Old City, Osman Baydemir and Abdullah Demirbaş respectively, apologize for the Kurdish role in the Armenian massacres and rebuild and restore the city’s main Armenian church, Sourp Giragos (Hagios Kyriakos in Greek) and allow it to function (see photo above) for the handful of Armenians left in the city. Khatchadourian‘s article has some beautiful photos too by Pari Dukovic.
“We Kurds, in the name of our ancestors, apologize for the massacres and deportations of the Armenians and Assyrians in 1915. We will continue our struggle to secure atonement and compensation for them.”
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NYT: Armenian Genocide — “For too long, Turkey bullied America into silence. Not anymore.” — Samantha Power
30 OctNot 100% sure how I feel about this; see “Screamers: Genocide: what is it and why do we need the term?“. I voice my major apprehensions there.
But “bully” is such an apt term for the Turkish Republic and the Turkish body politic (“thug” also comes to mind), that I think anything that puts Turkey in its place is a positive development.
Credit…Mario Tama/Getty Images
Power’s money quotes:
Although Turkish officials may see the vote as retaliation for Turkey’s recent forced displacement of Syrian Kurds, that operation — as well as President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s sweeping human rights crackdown in Turkey and his purchase (over American and NATO protests) of a Russian air defense system — simply reduced the impact of Turkish blackmail.
……..
First, as a baseline rule, for the sake of overall American credibility and for that of our diplomats, Washington officials must be empowered to tell the truth.
Over many years, because of the fear of alienating Turkey, diplomats have been told to avoid mentioning the well-documented genocide. In 2005, when John Evans, the American ambassador to Armenia, said that “the Armenian genocide was the first genocide of the 20th century,” he was recalled and forced into early retirement. Stating the truth was seen as an act of subordination.
When I became ambassador to the United Nations in 2013, I worried that I would be asked about the Armenian genocide and that when I affirmed the historical facts, I could cause a diplomatic rupture.
Second, when bullies feel their tactics are working, they generally bully more — a lesson worth bearing in mind in responding to threats from China and Saudi Arabia. The Turkish government devotes millions of dollars annually to lobbying American officials and lawmakers: more than $12 million during the Obama administration, and almost as much during the first two years of the Trump presidency. Turkish officials have threatened to respond to genocide recognition by suspending lucrative financial ties with American companies, reducing security cooperation and even preventing resupply of our troops in Iraq.
On Friday, the Turkish ambassador warned that passage of the “biased” House resolution would “poison” American-Turkish relations, and implied that it would jeopardize Turkish investment in the United States which provides jobs for a “considerable number of American citizens.”
It is easy to understand why any commander in chief would be leery of damaging ties with Turkey, an important ally in a turbulent neighborhood. But Turkey has far more to lose than the United States in the relationship. The United States helped build up Turkey’s military, brought it into NATO and led the coalition that defeated the Islamic State, which carried out dozens of attacks on Turkish soil. Over the past five years, American companies have invested some $20 billion in Turkey.
If Mr. Erdogan turns further away from a relationship that has been immensely beneficial for Turkey in favor of deepening ties with Russia or China, it will not be because the House voted to recognize the Armenian genocide. It will be because his own repressive tactics are coming to resemble those of the Russian and Chinese leaders. [my emphases]
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Arshile Gorky
19 MayA best friend of mine said the first photo on my grandmother post, reminds her of this work of the Armenian-American painter Arshile Gorky. It’s always made me think of my father and grandmother too.
Arshile Gorky’s The Artist and His Mother (ca. 1926–1936), Whitney Museum of American Art, New York City. Gorky’s mother died of starvation in Yerevan during the Armenian Massacres, after reaching that city from their village, Khorgom on the shores of Lake Van.
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(See:”Easter eggs: a grandmother and a grandfather“)
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Hrant Dink demonstration 2014: “the world’s top jailer of journalists”
20 Jan
Signs read: “We are all Hrant, We are all Armenian.” (click)
From Al Jazeera
Justice urged for slain journalist in Turkey:
Several thousand people take part in Istanbul rally to mark anniversary of Hrant Dink’s killing and demand justice.
Several thousand Turks have taken part in a rally, amid heavy presence of riot police, to demand justice for a prominent Turkish Armenian journalist murdered seven years ago.
A demonstration has been staged every year on January 19 since Hrant Dink’s murder. It has often turned into a general plea for justice.
“Murderer state will account for this,” chanted the protesters who had gathered on Sunday in Istanbul’s Taksim Square.
Questions still linger about the circumstances of the killing.
Dink, 52, a leading member of Turkey’s tiny Armenian community, was killed by a teenage ultranationalist outside the offices of his bilingual Agos newspaper on January 19, 2007.
He had campaigned for reconciliation between Turks and Armenians, but incurred the wrath of Turkish nationalists for calling the mass killings of Armenians during the first world war a genocide.
Dink’s supporters believe that those behind the murder were protected by the state and have asked for a deeper investigation to uncover officials who were allegedly involved.
Backing up widespread accusations of a state conspiracy, a former police informant accused of instigating the murder claimed during his trial last month that he had warned police of the plot but they failed to act.
Dink’s self-confessed murderer, Ogun Samast, a 17-year-old jobless high-school dropout at the time, was sentenced to almost 23 years in jail in 2011.
Sunday’s rally came as the Turkish government battled fresh protests in the wake of a corruption scandal involving the closest allies of Recep Tayyip Erdogan, Turkey’s prime minister.
On Saturday Turkish police fired tear-gas and plastic bullets to break up a protest by around 2,000 people over controversial plans to impose curbs on the internet.
Turkey has long been criticised for a lack of freedom of expression and has been branded the world’s top jailer of journalists.
Dozens of journalists are in detention, as well as lawyers, politicians and legislators, most of them accused of plotting against the government or having links with the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK).
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