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THE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE AND ISRAELI RECOGNITION
Harry Hagopian
NowLebanon
http://www.nowlebanon.com/NewsArticleDetails.aspx?ID=277041&MID=0&PID=0
June 1 2011
Lebanon
In her piece Knesset moves toward recognizing Armenian genocide on
JPost.com on May 18, Rebecca Anna Stoil wrote that "The historical
facts supporting the Armenian genocide are solid and well-based. There
is still an argument between the Turkish nation and the Armenian
nation, but this argument cannot justify even a sliver of denial
regarding the Armenian people's tragedy. We find it difficult to
forgive other nations who ignore our tragedy, and thus we cannot
ignore another nation's tragedy. It is our moral obligation as human
beings and as Jews."
In fact, writing on Haaretz.com a day later under the title Knesset to
discuss Armenian Genocide amid deteriorating Turkey ties, Jonathan Lis
also explained how another parliamentarian, Zehava Gal-On, declared
to the parliamentary assembly her belief "that it was the duty of the
Israeli Knesset to make a clear stance on this issue, especially in
face of the thundering silence of past Israeli governments over so many
years." She segued, "It is important to stress - the moral obligation
to recognize the Armenian Genocide is not a left or right issue."
Going back to April 24, 2000, then-Israeli Minister of Education Yossi
Sarid also spoke at the 85th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide. He
referred to The Forty Days of Musa Dagh, whose Prague-born Jewish
author, Franz Werfel, had published his harrowing story about the
Armenian victims of the genocide in 1933 when Adolf Hitler had just
come to power. Sarid stated, "As Minister of Education of the State
of Israel, I will do whatever is in my capacity in order that this
monumental work The Forty Days of Musa Dagh is once more well-known
to our children. I will do everything in order that Israeli children
learn and know about the Armenian Genocide. Genocide is a crime
against humanity, and there is nothing more horrible and odious than
genocide. We, Jews, as principal victims of murderous hatred are
doubly obligated to be sensitive to identify with other victims."
Uplifting words then and hopeful exhortations now, and it still
feels we are witnessing another deja-vu in Israel in 2011. Indeed,
the way in which the Armenian Genocide is being horse-traded by
Israeli politicians in geopolitical markets is not quite ethical,
is it? Could it be that Israeli lawmakers are using this emotive
issue to vent their displeasure at Turkey - almost to spite it -
since relations sank to their nadir following the MV Mavi Marmara
flotilla raid of May 2010? Would this discussion have really happened
if the political and military alliance between Turkey and Israel had
been as strong today as it had been a mere few years ago?
However, I also admit that sheer political interests are structurally
dissimilar to ethics. So it would be a huge moral, let alone political,
achievement if Israel - the central hub of the horrendous Holocaust
that was visited by Europe upon the Jews in Poland, Germany and
elsewhere but for which the Arab World often carries the tab - were
to recognize at long last the Armenian chapter of genocide. After
all, writing on JPost.com on December 24, 2010 under the title Keep
Dreaming: This Week in Armenia following his return from Yerevan,
capital of Armenia, David Breakstone, chair of the World Zionist
Organization and member of the World Jewish Executive, stated
unequivocally that "We [Jews] cannot right the wrongs of the past,
but we can recognize them. Doing so would go a long way toward healing
an open wound." Breakstone added, "My visit to the genocide memorial
in Yerevan dispels any doubt that this holocaust was every bit as
ghastly as that experienced by the Jews a few decades later."
So while we are all agog watching this space, let me recall an article
by Raffi Hovannisian, former prime minister of Armenia and now leader
of the Heritage Parliamentary Party. Under the title Turkey, Israel
and the moment of truth on May 14, 2010, he wrote, "The Armenian
Genocide must never be allowed to become a political football for
selective use by two erstwhile allies to sort out their relations and
the contents of their closets... Recognition should not be a favour,
nor an instrument of self-serving leverage, but a matter of truth
and equity - simple, overdue, unrequited - and nothing more."
Whether this motion is recognized or not, I hope Armenians will
remember that they do not need Israel or any other country to tell
them that their forbearers underwent the Armenian genocide. Not when
they survived this heinous crime and in fact triumphed by overcoming
a project that strove to annihilate them. A robust people with their
natural fortes and foibles, do they need the cloying imprimatur of
other countries for them to realize that they defied the angels of
death in the late 1800s as well as from 1915 to 1923 and came out
victorious? I suggest not, since their - our - very celebration of
life is the strongest riposte to those who tried to get rid of them -
as will also their unflinching solidarity with all other victims of
genocide world-wide.
An after-thought here: Lebanon, whose parliament recognized the
genocide in May 2000, houses many fine journalists, not least Robert
Fisk, who enjoys an encyclopedic and sophisticated knowledge of
the Armenian holocaust. I so would like to have a cup of tea with
him today.
From: Baghdasarian
Harry Hagopian
NowLebanon
http://www.nowlebanon.com/NewsArticleDetails.aspx?ID=277041&MID=0&PID=0
June 1 2011
Lebanon
In her piece Knesset moves toward recognizing Armenian genocide on
JPost.com on May 18, Rebecca Anna Stoil wrote that "The historical
facts supporting the Armenian genocide are solid and well-based. There
is still an argument between the Turkish nation and the Armenian
nation, but this argument cannot justify even a sliver of denial
regarding the Armenian people's tragedy. We find it difficult to
forgive other nations who ignore our tragedy, and thus we cannot
ignore another nation's tragedy. It is our moral obligation as human
beings and as Jews."
In fact, writing on Haaretz.com a day later under the title Knesset to
discuss Armenian Genocide amid deteriorating Turkey ties, Jonathan Lis
also explained how another parliamentarian, Zehava Gal-On, declared
to the parliamentary assembly her belief "that it was the duty of the
Israeli Knesset to make a clear stance on this issue, especially in
face of the thundering silence of past Israeli governments over so many
years." She segued, "It is important to stress - the moral obligation
to recognize the Armenian Genocide is not a left or right issue."
Going back to April 24, 2000, then-Israeli Minister of Education Yossi
Sarid also spoke at the 85th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide. He
referred to The Forty Days of Musa Dagh, whose Prague-born Jewish
author, Franz Werfel, had published his harrowing story about the
Armenian victims of the genocide in 1933 when Adolf Hitler had just
come to power. Sarid stated, "As Minister of Education of the State
of Israel, I will do whatever is in my capacity in order that this
monumental work The Forty Days of Musa Dagh is once more well-known
to our children. I will do everything in order that Israeli children
learn and know about the Armenian Genocide. Genocide is a crime
against humanity, and there is nothing more horrible and odious than
genocide. We, Jews, as principal victims of murderous hatred are
doubly obligated to be sensitive to identify with other victims."
Uplifting words then and hopeful exhortations now, and it still
feels we are witnessing another deja-vu in Israel in 2011. Indeed,
the way in which the Armenian Genocide is being horse-traded by
Israeli politicians in geopolitical markets is not quite ethical,
is it? Could it be that Israeli lawmakers are using this emotive
issue to vent their displeasure at Turkey - almost to spite it -
since relations sank to their nadir following the MV Mavi Marmara
flotilla raid of May 2010? Would this discussion have really happened
if the political and military alliance between Turkey and Israel had
been as strong today as it had been a mere few years ago?
However, I also admit that sheer political interests are structurally
dissimilar to ethics. So it would be a huge moral, let alone political,
achievement if Israel - the central hub of the horrendous Holocaust
that was visited by Europe upon the Jews in Poland, Germany and
elsewhere but for which the Arab World often carries the tab - were
to recognize at long last the Armenian chapter of genocide. After
all, writing on JPost.com on December 24, 2010 under the title Keep
Dreaming: This Week in Armenia following his return from Yerevan,
capital of Armenia, David Breakstone, chair of the World Zionist
Organization and member of the World Jewish Executive, stated
unequivocally that "We [Jews] cannot right the wrongs of the past,
but we can recognize them. Doing so would go a long way toward healing
an open wound." Breakstone added, "My visit to the genocide memorial
in Yerevan dispels any doubt that this holocaust was every bit as
ghastly as that experienced by the Jews a few decades later."
So while we are all agog watching this space, let me recall an article
by Raffi Hovannisian, former prime minister of Armenia and now leader
of the Heritage Parliamentary Party. Under the title Turkey, Israel
and the moment of truth on May 14, 2010, he wrote, "The Armenian
Genocide must never be allowed to become a political football for
selective use by two erstwhile allies to sort out their relations and
the contents of their closets... Recognition should not be a favour,
nor an instrument of self-serving leverage, but a matter of truth
and equity - simple, overdue, unrequited - and nothing more."
Whether this motion is recognized or not, I hope Armenians will
remember that they do not need Israel or any other country to tell
them that their forbearers underwent the Armenian genocide. Not when
they survived this heinous crime and in fact triumphed by overcoming
a project that strove to annihilate them. A robust people with their
natural fortes and foibles, do they need the cloying imprimatur of
other countries for them to realize that they defied the angels of
death in the late 1800s as well as from 1915 to 1923 and came out
victorious? I suggest not, since their - our - very celebration of
life is the strongest riposte to those who tried to get rid of them -
as will also their unflinching solidarity with all other victims of
genocide world-wide.
An after-thought here: Lebanon, whose parliament recognized the
genocide in May 2000, houses many fine journalists, not least Robert
Fisk, who enjoys an encyclopedic and sophisticated knowledge of
the Armenian holocaust. I so would like to have a cup of tea with
him today.
From: Baghdasarian