RECALLING THE CATASTROPHE OF EUROPEAN JEWS THE WORLD CAN’T FORGET ABOUT THE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE
Karine Ter-Sahakyan

PanARMENIAN.Net
11.11.2008 GMT+04:00

No president or prime-minister of Turkey will ever lay a wreath on
the Memorial to the victims of the Armenian Genocide, even if it
costs them a membership in the EU.

Last week Germany and Israel marked 70 years since "Kristallnacht"
(Crystal Night), Jewish pogroms in Nazi Germany, which served as
a prelude to the Catastrophe of European Jews (the Holocaust). On
the night of 9-10 November 1938 Jewish property was destroyed,
and thousands of synagogues were demolished and set on fire by the
Nazis. About a hundred Jews were murdered and thousands were arrested
or deported to concentration camps. The bloody pogroms received the
name "Crystal Night" or "The Night of Broken Glass" for the countless
broken windows of Jewish shops and houses covering the streets of
German cities.

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ At the Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial in Jerusalem,
Sunday, November 9 concerts, prayers and ceremonies were vowed
to mark the 70th anniversary of the tragic Nazi-incited riots in
Germany. German chancellor Angela Merkel, who was present at a
ceremony in Germany’s newly renovated largest synagogue, declared:
"We must not be silent to any manifestation of extremism. The lessons
of the nation’s past were crucial in confronting a current increase
in xenophobia and racism. Anti-Semitism and racism are a threat to
our basic values – those of democracy and respect for diversity and
human rights."

The words of Angela Merkel, as well as those of Konrad Adenauer
and other German chancellors prove that a truly civilized nation
will always be potent enough to recognize its bloody past and try
to repair its relations with other nations. In 1969 then Chancellor
Willy Brandt knelt in front of the Warsaw Ghetto memorial and asked
forgiveness for the crimes committed by his people in Poland.

Hence how does it happen that the Holocaust, which is of utmost
interest to Armenians since it occurred "thanks to" concealment of
the Armenian Genocide in the Ottoman Empire, now draws more attention
in the world than the first Genocide of the 20th century? One of the
reasons, if not the key one, is the "silent" position of Official
Ankara. For 93 years Turkey has not found itself strong enough
to recognize this fact and put a full stop to vain disputes of
politicians. Armenians might have their share of fault in all this,
since unlike the Jews they tried to survive by escaping to sheltering
countries. Be that as it may, today recalling the Catastrophe of
European Jews, the world simply can’t forget about the 1.5 million
of Armenians slaughtered in the years of the World War I.

Historical facts, which Turkish politicians love to appeal to when it
comes to the Armenian Genocide, state that Germany had its share in
the process of extermination of the Armenian nation by simply offering
the Young Turks a carte blanche for slaughter. Historian Toros Saryan
adduces strong proof on a secret agreement between Germans and Turks,
according to which Turkey was to take Germany’s side against Russia. In
exchange for it German diplomats were to shut their eyes to deportation
of Armenians from Western Armenia. Moreover, according to another
agreement of 2 August 1914 the Ottoman Empire expressed its consent
to German General Liman von Sanders to be in command of the Turkish
Army. Nevertheless, even with the German general the Turkish troops
were unable to defend themselves against the Entente, and Russia
in particular. And then they found a scapegoat in the person of the
Armenian population.

However, we are more interested in the position of victim
parties. Thanks to their solidarity the Jews were able to make Germans
pay for the Holocaust, otherwise the latter would go down in history
with the stamp of "murderers and tyrants". Germany did it and it is
still paying off great compensation to the prisoners of concentration
camps. And what are Armenians doing? Till 1991 it was only the Armenian
Diaspora that struggled for recognition of the Genocide, but, of
course, it could not do what a government can. Nevertheless, if we take
into account the time limits and the greater resistance of Official
Ankara as compared to Germany, it should be admitted that Armenia
has achieved some progress, though no president or prime-minister of
Turkey will ever lay a wreath on the Memorial to the victims of the
Armenian Genocide, even if it costs them a membership in the EU.