By Harut Sassounian
Publisher, The California Courier
After publishing viciously anti-Armenian articles for many years, some
Turkish newspapers have changed their tactics. They have adopted a more
subtle approach in attempting to scuttle the just demands of the Armenian
people. Instead of denying the Genocide outright, the Turkish press now
publishes articles that urge Armenians to "let bygones be bygones, and to
look to the future, not the past!" In other words, the Turks are advocating
reconciliation without truth or justice.
To make matters worse, the Turkish media from time to time publishes
interviews with some Armenians who reportedly make conciliatory statements
which are presented as evidence that not all Armenians are "hung up" on the
recognition of the Genocide.
For example, in the May 25th issue of the Turkish Daily News, Burak Bekdil,
after a recent visit to Armenia, published a lengthy commentary titled,
"Why Turks and Armenians must eventually shake hands." Using deceptively
accommodating language, Bekdil distorts the facts of the Armenian Genocide
and tries to undermine the Armenian demands.
He starts his article by calling the Genocide Memorial Monument in Yerevan
"the only symbol in the world that deeply divides two nations that lived
together in peace for centuries." By feigning to be indignant, Bekdil asks:
"how many more centuries the Turks and Armenians will be living under the
huge symbolic shadow of one monument?"
In one of the most outrageous lies in his column and in a blatant attempt
to pit Armenians and Kurds against each other, Bekdil shamelessly writes:
"The Armenians claim that the Ottoman Kurds, under orders from the empire
in 1915-18, systematically massacred 1.5 million of their ethnic kin living
in eastern Anatolia." While it is a fact that some Kurds collaborated with
the Turks and carried out deadly raids on Armenian caravans, no
knowledgeable person would claim that the Kurds committed the Armenian
Genocide, while the Turks acted as innocent bystanders. If that were the
case, the Turkish government would have eagerly recognized "the genocide
committed by the Kurds against the Armenians."
After repeating the standard Turkish lies on the Armenian Genocide, and
accusing Armenians of "systematically killing hundreds of thousands of
Turks," while only "thousands of Armenians died from cold weather,
starvation and disease," Bekdil sheds crocodile tears over the fact that
"in 2004, there are two nations, once friends, accusing each other of a
genocide that is said to have taken place 90 years ago and are locked over
the dispute, perhaps forever."
Bekdil seems quite ignorant about the most basic facts of not only the
Armenian Genocide, but of Turkish history. Otherwise, he would not have
asked the following very foolish question: "Has any Armenian ever been
curious enough to know how many Turks actually lived in eastern Anatolia in
1915-18 and, if by any chance there were a few, could those few physically
have been capable of massacring 700,000-1.5 million others?"
Bekdil espouses the baseless notion that the Diaspora is dictating to the
Armenian government its hard-line position on the Armenian Genocide.
Armenia "must maintain an extremely delicate balance between what reality
dictates and what its Diaspora sponsors impose," Bekdil falsely asserts. He
then makes several nonsense statements, such as: "The Armenian mindset is
deeply fractured. Diaspora Armenians think the genocide issue is their
'raison d'etre.' As for a possible deal with the Turks, they believe they
should represent the entire Armenian population. Are they not, after all,
the ones who financially keep the Armenian state alive?" Bekdil
conveniently forgets that Pres. Kocharian, at his own initiative, has
included the international recognition of the Armenian Genocide on the
foreign policy agenda of the Republic of Armenia. The Turkish officials are
the ones who reject Armenia's unconditional offer to establish diplomatic
relations, and they keep the border closed in order to force Armenia's
population into abandoning their historic claims.
Bekdil then introduces Nishan Atinizian of Boston -- one of the major
investors in the new Armenia Marriott Hotel -- as someone who "thinks it
would be grossly stupid if Turks and Armenians lived in hostility forever."
The Turkish commentator then claims that Atinizian thinks, "it is the
historians' job to find out what really happened 90 years ago." It is
highly doubtful that Atinizian would make such a statement. Armenians know
first-hand what happened to them. They need no historians to tell them what
happened in 1915! Such a statement would also run counter to the fact that
Atinizian generously contributes large sums of money to a major
Armenian-American activist organization that has, as one of its goals, the
recognition of the Armenian Genocide.
Bekdil claims that Atinizian is "fed up" with American politicians who
benefit from "the genocide industry" by getting campaign contributions from
Armenians, "promising to pay [us] back in genocide memorials." He is quoted
as saying, "I don't care if the Americans or the French recognize the
genocide. This is an issue between Armenians and Turks. What more should I
ask from the Turks if they opened their archives so that Turkish Armenians
could trace their family roots?"
Nishan Atinizian told me this week that most of the statements attributed
to him by Bekdil are false. Atinizian angrily said he would write to Bekdil
demanding a retraction and an apology. He had a conversation with the
Turkish commentator at the sidewalk cafe in front of Marriott hotel in
Yerevan and discussed mostly the potential benefits of opening the
Turkish-Armenian border.
Bekdil then continues his column and introduces another Atinizian, David,
of Yerevan - no relation to Nishan. The Turkish commentator presents the
following outrageous views as being those of David's which are supposedly
sensible like those of most "homeland Armenians": "a) injecting hatred into
the minds of generations of Turks and Armenians reflects an archaic
thinking that should have no place in the 21st century; b) the genocide was
masterminded by the Ottomans and carried our by the Kurds; c) it happened
because the Russians had engineered an Armenian uprising against the
Ottoman Empire; d) some 350,000 Turks died as well, as a result of Armenian
atrocities in 1915-18; e) the Turkey of today cannot be held responsible
for the genocide; and f) it is totally pointless, against international law
and unrealistic if some Armenians dream of any part of eastern Anatolia as
part of Armenia." Bekdil commends Nishan and David Atinizian for being
"realists." Nishan Atinizian, who was present during David's conversation
with Bekdil, told me this week that David did not make any of these
statements.
We hope that Nishan and David Atinizian and all other Armenians learn a
very valuable lesson - never agree to talk to a Turkish journalist, even
off the record! Otherwise, when the article comes out, and distorted
statements are published in your name, you have to do a lot of back
peddling to prove that you did not make the statements attributed to you.
The two Atinizians should take all necessary steps to set the record
straight so that the Armenian community worldwide would not believe that
they said the things the Turkish Daily News claims they did. The timing of
this Turkish commentary is most unfortunate, as the Atinizians and their
business partners are getting ready to celebrate the grand opening of the
Armenia Marriott Hotel in Yerevan next week. The last thing they need is a
controversial article in the Turkish press claiming that one of their
partners has made such disparaging remarks about the recognition of the
Armenian Genocide.
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