ARMENIAN GENOCIDE JUST AS REAL TODAY

Visalia Times-Delta, CA
April 25 2007

Tuesday commemorated a historical event that the U.S. government
claims never occurred.

But the 92nd anniversary of the beginning of the Armenian genocide
is very real for thousands of people in the San Joaquin Valley whose
families were devastated by the systematic extermination of a people.

Commemorating and remembering the Armenian genocide is a act of
respect for them, as well as the historic truth. It also acknowledges
the diversity of our area and the history of individual groups that
helps us all appreciate different cultures.

The event known as the Armenian genocide began on April 24, 1915, at
the height of World War I. The Ottoman Empire, now modern-day Turkey,
was allied with Austria and Germany against the Western Allies. Part
of the empire was the nation of Armenia, and thousands of Armenians
lived within Turkey’s borders.

Armenians and Turks were antagonists, and Armenia had long chafed
under the rule of the Ottomans.

On April 24, the group known as the Young Turks, which was seeking
reform of the empire, rounded up Armenian leaders in Constantinople,
the capital of Turkey and the empire.

Between the years 1915 and 1918, the Armenians were massacred, tortured
and deported. Some were sent into the desert to die of hunger and
thirst. Their property and possessions were appropriated.

After a couple of years respite after WWI, the genocide continued.

At the beginning of World War I, about 2 million Armenians live in
the Ottoman Empire. By 1925, virtually none lived there. Estimates are
that as many as 1.5 million were killed. The rest had been scattered.

Many Armenians in the San Joaquin Valley started their lives here as
refugees from the genocide.

It is hard to imagine how such a thing could have occurred, but the
Turks used the same tactics the Nazis later used to exterminate 6
million Jews in Europe: They started by disarming Armenians, forcing
them to register and then rounding them up into ghettos. The began the
genocide under cover of a national news blackout under the pretense
of the need for security in wartime.

The present-day Republic of Turkey flatly denies that the genocide
occurred. Indeed it is not well known as a historical event, even
among people in our Valley.

The U.S. government has refused to acknowledge that the Armenian
people were the victims of genocide, which is defined as the organized
killing of a people with the express intent of putting an end to
their collective existence. The United States dares not antagonize the
government of Turkey, which occupies strategic military importance in
the Middle East, western Asia and the Mediterranean and borders Iran,
Syria and Russia.

Many politicians have appealed to the State Department, to a
succession of presidents and to Congress insisting that the United
States government acknowledge the Armenian genocide. It has become
an annual exercise in frustration for U.S. Rep. George Radanovich,
R-Mariposa. Apparently the good graces of the Turkish government are
more important than the truth.

Remembering the Armenian genocide is just as relevant to our time as
awareness of the Holocaust, of slavery of African-Americans and of
atrocities against Native Americans. Keeping those events fresh in
our consciousness is important so that we don’t repeat those awful
stains upon history.

It’s also important because of the diversity of our Valley, which
includes many thousands of people of Armenian descent. To help us
live together in a diverse community, we need to appreciate each
other’s history and culture, including refugees from war and genocide,
such as the Southeast Asians and Armenians, immigration to escape
deprivation, such as immigrants from Latin America and Asia, and the
struggle against racism and bigotry in our own country, such as that
suffered by African Americans.

In commemorating the Armenian genocide, we not only acknowledge this
injury against the Armenian people, we repeat the refrain that we
hope will one day also be common whenever anyone remembers the tragic
events 92 years ago: Never again.

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