THE EXODUS – PART II?
Burak Bekdil

Hurriyet
March 18 2010
Turkey

"The killings of Uighur Turks by the Chinese police during
demonstrations constitute genocide. I use this term intentionally."

(Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, July 2009)

"I went to Darfur myself and saw no genocide there. Muslims don’t
commit genocide." (Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, November 2009)

"Politicians cannot decide on genocides. This is the duty of
historians." (Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, March 2010)

This concise compilation of three statements on three different
dates within a span of eight months has been brought to the public’s
attention by Cem Toker, leader of the Liberal Democratic Party, or
LDP. Put in chronological sequence, the three remarks unmistakably
summarize Mr. Erdogan’s mindset on genocide.

When combined, the three statements allow us to safely conclude,
on the prime minister’s behalf, that: 1) Politicians other than Mr.

Erdogan himself should not make judgments about genocide, a crime
Muslims don’t commit but others – non-Muslim Chinese, for instance –
do; 2) The deaths of hundreds of thousands of Armenians cannot amount
to genocide, but the deaths of less than a hundred Uighur Turks can;
and 3) Genocide is something visiting dignitaries can "see," and if
they don’t see it, a genocide did not take place.

How convincing this mental calculus can be is a question we had better
leave to the reader’s judgment.

More alarmingly, what Mr. Erdogan and his foreign minister, Ahmet
Davutoglu, are trying to "market" in a nice gift wrapping that
reads "Turkey: A regional power" is becoming what it is privately:
a regional bully.

Almost a century after the mass deportation of Armenians from Ottoman
Turkey, a Turkish leader is talking about a second mass deportation of
Armenians, this time from Turkish Turkey. The Western press agrees that
Mr. Erdogan’s threat to expel thousands of illegal Armenian immigrants
in retaliation to American and Swedish lawmakers’ recognition of the
Armenian "genocide" amounts to racism.

Your taxi driver, or the owner of the shop on the corner, could have
made such insane proposals and you would smile back and tell him
it would not be nice if we made "Exodus II" in the 21st century. In
10 minutes time, you might forget what your taxi driver or the shop
owner had suggested, but it makes a difference if it is your prime
minister threatening Armenian immigrants with mass deportation – not
because of something they did wrong, but because foreign lawmakers
had passed resolutions.

In reality, how could Turkey deport 100,000 illegal Armenian
immigrants? Would the police launch a collective Armenian-hunt
throughout the country? Stop every illegal immigrant, raid their
homes? You are illegal here. Yes, sir. What’s your nationality?

Georgian, sir. Good, you can go. How about you? I am Armenian,
sir. Ha ha, got you! You are under arrest!

Of course, some cabinet minister, some advisor, some party bigwig
must be sitting on his desk by now, trying to find the diplomatic
language to "correct the prime minister" and to tell us that
"Mr. Prime Minister’s remarks were misunderstood." Similarly, the
army of pro-Erdogan columnists must be pondering how to pen articles
in defense of our liberal prime minister who would never think of
such a racist act. Here are a few proposals to help our colleagues:

They can claim that Mr. Erdogan threatened to expel the Armenian
immigrants because he was under pressure from the fascist generals
to do so. They can also claim that what the prime minister said was
really meant not as a threat to expel the Armenians but as a way
to illustrate to the world how hospitable we Turks are, especially
Islamist Turks. Would the secular Turks tolerate 100,000 illegal
immigrants? God forbid, they would have executed the Armenians had
they been in power!

A note to the prime minister’s advisors: Quickly organize an "Armenian
immigrant initiative." Organize a fancy gathering. Let the prime
minister speak to them, embrace them and shower them with precious
gifts. Tell them they are our dearest guests. The Armenians smile,
cheer for the prime minister, thundering applause, curtains down. Make
sure there is plenty of local and foreign press coverage. And, presto,
our liberal, warm-hearted, tolerant prime minister is back!

But, just in case, poor Armenian immigrants should better start
praying that some new distant foreign parliament does not join the
20 or so others already in genocide recognition these days. Or they
should start practicing to pose as Georgians if they come under
police interrogation.

.php?n=the-exodus-8211-part-ii-2010-03-18