Genocide Denial Robs us of our Humanity
Mayýs 15, 2008
"Yeni Hayat"
Canadian Turkish Newspaper
Haber: Politika
The recent debate on Toronto District School Board’s (TDSB) decision
to develop a Grade 11 `Genocide: Historical and Contemporary
Implications’ curriculum, which has been approved by the Minister of
Education in Ontario, unleashed a sophisticated and deceptive campaign
to discredit the curriculum and the TDSB. Any rational, responsible
person would applaud the teaching of our students the catastrophic
effects of genocide, ethnic cleansing, and crimes against humanity.
That Turkish Government agents and lobbyists are campaigning to deter
TDSB from introducing this extremely valuable course is dismaying, but
not surprising. The well-funded and aggressive efforts by Turkey to
deny the Armenian Genocide have been so prevalent in Turkey and around
the world that they have become infamously known as -an industry of
denial.- The motives and methods of these history-distorting efforts
are well documented and studied by Holocaust and Genocide scholars,
historians, educators and psycho logists.
The Turkish denial machine employes falsehoods, innuendo,
unsubstantiated accusations and revisionist historical discourse to
promote its version of history.
What happened during the TDSB Program and Services Committee’s meeting
in Toronto on January 16 is another demonstration of the extent the
Turkish nationalists will go to silence anyone who does nor share
their revisionist narrative of history. The Turkish representatives
tried to intimidate and to silence such prominent Canadians as
Prof. Frank Chalk, director of the Montréal Institute for Genocide
and Human Rights Studies; David Warner, former Speaker of the Ontario
Legislative Assembly; Leo Adler, prominent criminal lawyer and human
rights advocate; and Hon. Jim Karygiannis, MP, who attended the
meeting to show their strong support for the curriculum and the
inclusion of the Armenian Genocide in the Grade 11 history course.
To try to curtail freedom of expression of any Canadian and to taunt
them with abuses and profanities is shameful and a threat to
democracy. The scene was reminiscent of the trials of many righteous
Turkish individuals who in recent years have challenged the Turkish
Government for its denial of the Armenian Genocide and who have been
silenced under Article 301 of the Turkish penal code.
It looks like The Turkish nationalists are trying to import that
anti-democratic modus operandi to Canada.
Since it would take volumes to categorically reply to Turkish
lobbyists’ falsehoods, I would like to address some of their
revisionist historical discourse. We will note their false suggestions
and then offer the factual corrections.
Introduction of the curriculum would incite hatred against Turkish
children.
It is claimed that if such a curriculum is introduced it would -create
hatred against Turkish children.-
Despite Turkish lobbyists’ allegations, there’s absolutely no shred of
evidence from any authority-government or educational-that Turkish
school children have been bullied by their Armenian classmates in
Canada. Raising fears that mentioning the Genocide of Armenians would
result in the persecution of Turks is a red herring intended to plant
fear among educational institutions in Canada.
Most Armenians and Turks overwhelmingly distinguish between the
perpetrators of the genocide in the Ottoman Empire in 1915 and people
of Turkish descent today, wherever the latter may live. The January 19
commemoration of the first anniversary of the assassination
Turkish-Armenian journalist Hrant Dink in Ottawa by a group of
Armenians and Turks, who are members of the Turkish-Armenian Dialogue
Group of Ottawa, is the best illustration of this attitude. Mr. Dink
was assassinated in front of his Istanbul office by a member of a
nationalist Turkish political group.
It is also possible to teach that genocide is wrong without teaching
hatred of the perpetrators. One can explain their motivations and why
they were wrong. One can explain the destruction and the suffering
they caused. This is being done successfully in our current
educational system where the Holocaust is taught without blaming
contemporary Germany or Germans.
After a decade of teaching about the Armenian Genocide in schools in
12 American states (New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Georgia,
Illinois, Kansas, Minnesota, Ohio, Rhode Island, Virginia, and
California), there has not been a single registered or documented
incident of -bullying, hate, and racism- against Turkish children.
Many righteous Turks during the Armenian Genocide risked their lives
to save their Armenian neighbours, friends, and business associates.
Furthermore, we value the many Turkish intellectuals, historians,
journalists and over 12,000 German-Turks who, despite death threats,
persecution, and prosecution challenged the official narrative of the
Turkish government on the Armenian Genocide and asked the Turkish
government to come to terms with this sad chapter of its history.
Here is what the German Turks wrote:
-What we have learned at school (Turkish) is a forgery of history.-
They asked the Turkish Government to repent for the crime of Genocide
which -we feel morally obliged to end their (Armenians) disillusions
and agony-. Furthermore, the association asked for -international
condemnation of the crimes committed against the Armenians, Assyrians
and Pontian-Greeks.-
While official Turkey denies its responsibility for the Armenian
Genocide, Turkish intellectual Taner Akçam wrote in the Turkish
newspaper Yeni Binyil (October 1, 2000):
-The manner in which the Armenian question is being discussed is in
itself indicative as to what is the main problem of our country. We do
not possess the culture affording open debate about mass murders. We
are devoid of the moral foundations which enable us to damn such
crimes. One needs to have a sense of sorrow in order to be able to
speak of the great human tragedies; but we do not possess such a sense
of morality. Look at the things that have been written about this
topic. In them you don’t find a single sentence, a single word that
recognizes the tragedy.-
When Turkish children learn about these righteous Turks, they can be
proud of the way these people acted. They will be absolved of any
responsibility. As renowned writer Ahmet Altan stated in May 2005: -I
have nothing in common with the terrible sin of the past Ittihadists
[the government of the day]… instead of justifying and arguing on
behalf of the murderers, why don’t we praise and defend the rescuers’
compassion, honesty, and courage?-
Historians are disputing the Armenian Genocide.
After 92 years and numerous history books, government documents
(British, French, United States, and even then-Turkish allies Germany
and Austria), photographs by war correspondents, massive coverage by
Western journalists, missionaries and NGOs, and documentary films, we
maintain that it’s redundant to try to prove what has been proven
countless times. After all, would anyone demand that a historians’
committee be formed to question whether the Holocaust took place?
The Turkish Government agents cite the same half-dozen historians and
writers to back their allegations. Practically everyone listed has
taught history at institutions where their chair has been funded by
the Turkish government. These historians have close relationships with
the government of Turkey; have privileged access to Turkish historic
archives and are provided with frequent all-expense paid trips to
Turkey. The publication of their books are often funded by the
government of Turkey.
Many genocide scholars have questioned the credibility of these
half-dozen historians.
Colin Imber, in the British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies, called
Justin McCarthy’s work: -Junk food, junk bonds and now junk history
… This is a cruel description, but one which is perfectly
appropriate for a book which is carelessly written, is often
misinformed, and shamelessly follows a Turkish nationalist agenda.-
Ton Zwaan, in de Volkskrant (Dutch newspaper) wrote: -Among bona fide
historians McCarthy is known as one of the professional deniers,
subsidized by the Turkish government.- Zwaan continued: -In a
groundless, hazy and disorderly argumentation replete with half-truths
and complete untruths, McCarthy attempts to persuade his readers that
an Armenian genocide never transpired in the Ottoman Empire in 1915
and 1916.-
Many Turkish historians, among them Taner Akcam and Muge Gocek, also
questioned McCarthy’s research and trustworthiness.
Guenter Lewy is a well know revisionist. His work-from the killing of
Roma Gypsies in the Second World War to the Vietnam War-is well
documented. This is what the Journal of Genocide Research wrote:
-Lewy’s . . . book which seeks not only to exclude the Nazis’ Romani
victims from the Holocaust-which is not anything new-but goes a step
further to say that they were not even the targets of attempted
genocide. . . `The Nazi Persecution of the Gypsies’ is a dangerous
book.-
After reading Lewy’s biased article on the Armenian Genocide,
Prof. Gregory H. Stanton, said: -I am appalled. It is such a blatant
denial article . . . As you know, the evidence for the Armenian
genocide does not just rest upon the three sources Guenter Lewy
attempts to discredit. (He doesn’t even do a good job of discrediting
those sources.) It also rests on literally thousands of eye-witness
testimonies, eyewitness reports by diplomats and missionaries, and a
mountain of other data. Lewy’s article is directly contrary to the
official opinion of the International Association of Genocide
Scholars, passed by unanimous resolution, declaring that the Armenian
massacres were genocide, and that attempts to deny that fact have no
basis in sound scholarship.-
Norman M. Naimark from Stanford University recently reviewed Guenter
Lewy’s latest book for the jounral Holocaust and Genocide
Studies. Naimark concluded that -… if Lewy wishes to maintain his
claims to historical objectivity by using accepted judicial
definitions of genocide, then the difficulty of finding direct
evidence for the Young Turks’ premeditated planning of mass murder
should not prevent him from concluding that genocide took place. At
its core, then Lewy’s argument is illogical.-
The International Association of Genocide Scholars, in a letter to the
Turkish Prime Minister labelled such historians as -scholars who
advise your government and who are affiliated in other ways with your
state-controlled institutions are not impartial. Such so-called
-scholars- work to serve the agenda of historical and moral
obfuscation when they advise you and the Turkish Parliament on how to
deny the Armenian Genocide.-
One of the historians Turks often cite to buttress their denialist
arguments is Bernard Lewis. Mr. Lewis has been convicted in French
court for denying the Armenian Genocide. His flip-flopping on the
Armenian Genocide is well documented. In an earlier version of his
book, -The Emergence of Modern Turkey,- Lewis wrote: -A struggle
between two nations for the possession of single homeland, that ended
with the terrible holocaust of 1915, where a million and half
Armenians perished.-
I have no intention to enter into a -my historian is more credible
than your historian- contest here, although the number of
international historians who acknowledge the truth of the Genocide of
Armenians exceeds the names cited by Turkish lobbyists by a hundred
fold. To mention just one group of 126 Holocaust scholars, among them
Elie Wiesel, Yehuda Bauer, Israel Charny, Steven Katz, Steven Jacobs,
and Irving L. Horowitz, who on March 9, 2000, issued a statement
declaring that -The World War I Armenian Genocide is an incontestable
historical fact and accordingly urge the governments of the Western
democracies to likewise recognize it as such.-
The Turkish archives are open. Armenians refuse dialogue
One of the most disingenuous Turkish arguments is that Turkish
archives are open and that Armenian archives are closed on the
genocide issue. They use this argument to mislead and to divert
attention from the real issue, the crime of Genocide. Furthermore,
they try to imply that Armenians have something to hide and do not
want to open their archives for inspection or to enter into a dialogue
with Turks.
What is the truth?
In regard to the Armenian Genocide, there are four main Turkish
sources of archives:
1-The Prime Ministerial Archives
2-The Committee of Union and Progress (CUP) [the governing party in
1915] Archives
3-The Special Organization [the organization which carried out the
Genocide] Archives
4-The Interior Ministry Archives.
According to the Istanbul Military Tribunal (1919 – 1921), which was
established to try Turkish Government leaders who had ordered the
implementation of the Armenian Genocide, most of the documents related
to the latter three organizations have been either -stolen or
destroyed.- During the trial, the Turkish persecutor in his
indictment, stated: -Investigation of what had occurred reveals that
important documents pertaining to this office [Special Organizations]
…have been purloined.-
In the same indictment, he also stated that -all of the documents and
ledgers of the Central Committee [CUP] have been purloined.-
Furthermore, many witnesses during the trials testified that the
documents of CUP had been removed by Central Committee member
Dr. Nazim.
In regard to the Interior Ministry Archives, Aziz Bey (former director
of General Security), revealed that Talt Pasha, the interior minister,
prior to fleeing the country, took suitcases of documents, information
and reports, and burned them.
The only archives which are open are the Prime Ministerial
Archives. These archives are limited to a small group of selected
historians who a priori have demonstrated their support of Turkish
government’s genocide denialist narrative. Furthermore, researchers
are allowed only 25 documents per day, which severely limits the
ability to work there.
Recently, Mehmet Sait Uluisik, a German citizen of Turkish origin, was
banned from entering Turkey to carry research in the Prime Minister’s
Ottoman archives on the role of Circassians in the Armenian
Genocide. The Circassians were armed and funded by the government of
Turkey.
Thus to claim Turkish archives are open to scholars is inaccurate. The
critical archives pertaining to the Armenian Genocide are not in the
archives, while the available ones are of limited access.
The accusation that Armenians refuse to dialogue with Turks is another
myth.
Numerous attempts have been made by the Armenian Government and the
Armenian Diaspora to dialogue with Turks. These attempts have failed
because of the Turkish Government’s intransigent and unreasonable
conditions. The Turkish Armenian Reconciliation Commission (TARC) is a
prime example. Turkish and Armenian members of TARC agreed to submit
the arbitration of the Armenian Genocide issue to a third party-the
International Centre for Transitional Justice (ICTJ). When ICTJ’s
report concluded that what happened to the Armenians in Ottoman Turkey
was a classic case of genocide and fulfilled four out of five
conditions set by the UN Genocide Convention, the Turkish government
pulled the plug on TARC by asking its Turkish members to withdraw from
the commission.
In response to the Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan’s letter to
the President of Armenia, to establish a -joint group of
historians… to study … the events of 1915,- Robert Kocharian, the
President of Armenia, on April 25, 2005, replied by saying: -Your
[Erdogan[ suggestion to address the past cannot be effective if it
deflects from addressing the present and future, in order to engage in
a useful dialogue, we need to create the appropriate and conducive
political environment..in that context, an intergovernmental
commission can meet to discuss any and all outstanding issues between
our two nations.-
The Turkish Government did not respond to the Armenian Government’s
positive approach to solve this issue. On April 11, 2006, the Foreign
Minister of Armenia Vartan Oskanian, reminded the Turkish Government
and the international community that -we remain amazed that a letter
sent by president Kocharian to Prime Minister Erdogan… remains
simply ignored because the Turkish authorities did not like the
response contained therein, and do not wish to broaden the scope of
dialogue beyond histology.-
More recently, the Foreign Affairs Committee of the Armenian
Parliament organized a conference in the Armenian Parliament on
Turkish Armenian relations. Among the invitees were Turkish professor
Yusuf Halacoglu (president of Turkish Historical Society), Sedat
Laciner (director of International Strategic Research Institute),
former Turkish Ambassador Omer Engin Lutem (head of the Armenian
Studies Institute of the Eurasian Strategic Research Center), Turkey’s
Foreign Minister Ali Babacan, and Dr. Can Paker (Turkey’s special
representative for relations with the European Union). None of the
Turkish invitees attended this important and unique conference. The
Turkish side missed a golden opportunity to meet Armenian politicians,
historians and scholars to discuss relations between the two
neighboring nations.
The Speaker of the Armenian Parliament, Tigran Torosian, voiced his
concern that Turkey’s decision not to participate in the discussions
would not contribute to dialogue between the two nations.
The above examples clearly show that Turkish government’s manipulative
offer of dialogue with Armenians is akin to the neo-Nazis’ suggestion
of an independent, objective historical commission to determine
whether the Holocaust took place or the Flat Earth Society’s offer to
hold an academic dialogue with National Geographic about the true
shape of the earth.
If the Turkish Government does not allow its citizens, historians and
intellectuals to freely discuss the issue of the Armenian Genocide in
Turkey, and prosecutes them under article 301 of the Turkish Penal
Code, how can one take its offer of dialogue with Armenians and the
creation of -historians commission- seriously?
The Canadian Armenian community does not bear any animosity towards
the Canadian Turkish community. On the contrary, we sympathize with
the members of the Turkish-Canadian community and Turks in general,
particularly when they have been mislead for too long and denied their
own history, by the Turkish Government.
We are hopeful the Turkish Government halts its campaign of
falsification of history and focuses on the Genocide issue without
hysteria, racism, nationalistic fanaticism and that the Turkish people
will acknowledge the misdeeds of their predecessors and extend a hand
of friendship to the Armenian people.
Ardash Amroyan