We must never forget Turkey’s ‘first solution’
Jasper Gerard
Sunday January 21, 2007
_The Observer_ ()
My wife is only alive because her great-grandmother hid in a laundry
basket, peeking through slats as troops bayoneted the rest of her
family to death. She is crying upstairs as I write because history
stubbornly refuses to move on. A fellow Armenian, a newspaper editor,
has been shot dead in Istanbul. His mistake? Reminding Turkey it still
hasn’t apologised for – or even admitted – the genocide of 1.2m
Armenians under the cover of the First World War.
Hrant Dink had already been convicted of this ‘crime’, for which Orhan
Pamuk, Turkey’s greatest novelist, was also prosecuted. Just imagine
if a British editor was gunned down and men in size 12s bundled off
Martin Amis for, say, daring to mention Bloody Sunday. There would be
riots in London Fields. But because it’s in Turkey, a moderate Muslim
state needed in the War on Terror, Brits who normally speak for the
marginalised are watching Big Brother. They shrug: ‘Let’s fight the
new war, not the old.’ The problem is, it is the same war, and as
Dink’s bloodied body suggests, there has never really been a
ceasefire.
To qualify, this is not all about religion, about Muslims (Turks)
versus Christians (Armenians): nationalism as much as religion
prevents Turkey uttering the fearful ‘sorry’. But if Armenians weren’t
Christian, would Turkey have refused for so long? And would the West
have been quite so squeamish about pressuring Ankara?
In extreme cases, Islamicists trade on Western self-abasement. So in
Britain last week it was claimed a terrorist suspect took refuge in a
mosque. Police refused to enter for ‘cultural reasons’. Would they
have been so polite if an IRA suspect had holed up in a Catholic
church? Another man allegedly involved in a plot to bomb targets in
London was said to have fled in a burka, knowing no policeman would
dare frisk him.
Turkey still doesn’t acknowledge Armenia. Its Prime Minister, Recep
Tayyip Erdogan, condemns the murder, but it was he who outlawed
so-called attacks on the state. He has also stepped up nationalistic
and Islamic tub-thumping, so while his condolences seem sincere, they
are about as valuable as a discourse on multiculturalism from Jade
Goody. And this is the guy with whom Tony Blair wants to chew over
European integration.
Istanbul dazzles. On frequent trips, I see the clash of civilisations
fought, not in mosques but in Moschino: the devil might wear Prada,
but so now do many of Allah’s followers. Materialism, not
spiritualism, will win this war. Mama might be shrouded in black, but
her daughter might be a short-skirted babe hopping into her
boyfriend’s open-top Mini.
Most Turks want progress, and we should help them. America, with a
Democrat Congress, should shortly join France in recognising the
genocide.
Winston Churchill once called it a holocaust. What a paradox that just
as Europe starts to consider outlawing Holocaust denial, Turkey
outlaws holocaust admittance. Hitler famously reckoned he would get
away with his Final Solution after studying Turkey’s first
solution. ‘Who,’ he asked ‘remembers the Armenians?’ The torchlit
procession of all nationalities weaving tearfully through Istanbul
suggests that, finally, the entire world remembers. Obama-mania in
the US only underlines Gordon Brown’s status as yesterday’s man.
As Barack Obama blows into the Presidential race, how wintry old
Britain seems. He inspires hysteria we reserve for Kylie Minogue
concerts. Sure, the odds are against him beating Hillary Clinton to
the Democratic nomination, let alone the likely Republican, John
McCain, to the White House. And his policy portfolio is slim even
besides David Cameron’s. But how much more exciting progressive
politics looks there than here.
Here, we crave a change of Tone, but will Gordon provide a change of
tone? Listing his priorities, Brown mentioned America before Europe,
three times. If the accent had not been Kirkcaldy rather than Fettes,
it could have been Blair.
There are hints Brown gets the new politics. He has leapt on Blair’s
mistake and accepted leaders (ie Blair) should not do a Prince Charles
and preach denial from the first-class lounge. And having duffed up
Alan Milburn, Gordon now steals his agenda, talking about enabling
rather than bossing folk. But even if New Gordon weren’t so surreal,
he would be too late.
Obama renders Gordon a goner. Brown replacing Blair is like peeling
back wallpaper to find an even drabber, mouldier offering behind.
Gordon might be the towering figure of his generation; alas, it is of
the last generation.
EM Forster on Big Brother
A cultivated, charismatic Indian brought low by smears from a gaggle
of dumb, racist, insecure British women; I talk, naturally, of A
Passage to India.
How familiar Big Brother would look to the author of that great novel.
EM Forster shows how being trapped in a ‘horrid, stuffy’ confined
space can send you bonkers. His Marabar cave is ‘entirely devoid of
distinction’, though from the cultural desert of the Big Brother
house, it probably sounds like Claridge’s. In the book, English Miss
Quested wrongly accuses Indian Dr Aziz of sexually assaulting her in
the cave; in the show, Danielle Lloyd wrongly accuses Shilpa Shetty of
eating with her hands. And if Miss Quested lacks ‘physical charm’,
what could Shetty say of Jade Goody?
Certainly there are differences. Aziz fancies himself as a Mughal
emperor, not a Bollywood sex-kitten. And Aziz mutters: ‘Damn the
English, even at their best,’ whereas Shetty is only seeing them at
their worst. In the fictional tale, the British ‘all get rude after a
year’; on reality television, it takes a week. Forster has a
policeman say: ‘I have never known anything but disaster when English
and Indians attempt to be intimate.’
Incidentally, the colonial copper goes on to say while there couldn’t
be intimacy there could be ‘intercourse’; a relief for Liz Hurley who
is marrying an Indian, or at least a half-German Indian.
Are the gloomsters – including Forster – right about the relationship
between our two peoples? Today both sides must encourage Indians here
to integrate more, but now we meet as equals, the Anglo-Indian union
is fruitfully intimate – as shown by the betrothal of one of our own
cinematic sex kittens. The colony has colonised us, to mutual
advantage.
Thanks to that success, only racism can still outrage British
sensibilities. This is why we are the world’s least racist major
country. Passage from India has a very happy ending.
Segolene needs a Denis Thatcher
We hear men are bored of ‘trophy wives’ as they prefer intellectual
stimulation. And I’m sure that’s right. But is it time ambitious women
bagged trophy husbands? Take Segolene Royal. She was looking good to
be next President of France. Then her partner, a rival socialist
politico, announced his amour would raise taxes. So brilliantly did
this obliterate her poll lead, she could now be spending more time
with her family than she might wish. ‘Men!’ she must scream.
A trophy husband would confine himself to saving the
orang-utan. Reporters would coo over his designer suits: ‘So cute, he
must do Botox.’ This is what Cherie thought she had, but turned round
to find the little man was PM and being sized up for war crimes.
Though no beauty, Denis Thatcher was a model trophy husband. Once,
Maggie’s lecturing of a president was interrupted by strange
noises. They peered behind a sofa and found Denis snoring. He had a
dictionary for drink (snifter, sharpener, snorter, snortorino) but
never uttered a word, possibly because he was too pissed. Segolene
needs a Denis.
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