Announcement

Collapse
No announcement yet.

Turkey's Islamized Armenians Grapple With Tragic Roots

Collapse
X
 
  • Filter
  • Time
  • Show
Clear All
new posts

  • Turkey's Islamized Armenians Grapple With Tragic Roots

    TURKEY'S ISLAMIZED ARMENIANS GRAPPLE WITH TRAGIC ROOTS

    http://hetq.am/eng/news/24908/turkey%E2%80%99s-islamized-armenians-grapple-with-tragic-roots.html
    14:39, March 28, 2013
    By: Sibel Utku Bila

    DIYARBAKIR, Turkey - Abdurrahim Zorarslan's world turned upside down
    at age 25 when his Kurdish clan revealed to him he was Armenian.

    His father, a survivor of the Ottoman massacres, saved and Islamized by
    a Kurdish couple, had already died - without uttering a word about his
    real self. After much soul-searching, Zorarslan "listened to something
    inside" and "secretly" embraced his Armenian identity. Aged 53 today,
    he boldly speaks out and introduces himself as a Christian with the
    typical Armenian name, Armen.

    The self-rediscovery, however, has come with a cost. The retired
    driver is now at odds with his children and Kurdish wife, a devout
    Muslim wearing the black chador, but still believes that "one can
    reach nowhere with fear of his roots."

    Zorarslan is among a small but growing number of brave souls in
    Turkey's mainly Kurdish southeast who have come to openly embrace their
    Armenian origins, emboldened by the breaking of the Armenian taboo
    in Turkey over the past several years and the message of pluralism
    spread by the Kurdish political movement in the region.

    The re-connection is a painful process - not only because of
    deep-rooted fears over the 1915-17 massacres, but also the distinct
    fabric of the impoverished, rural southeast, where strict patriarchal
    norms rule closely-knit clans and Islam remains a powerful social glue.

    At the turn of the 20th century, Kurds and Armenians dominated the
    population of eastern Anatolia. Bonded to Turks in Islamic fraternity,
    Kurds joined the massacres orchestrated by their Ottoman rulers and
    seized the properties of slain or deported Armenian neighbours. Many
    Armenian children escaped death in the refuge of Muslim homes: Some
    were saved out of compassion; others were abducted to be raised as
    labourers or wives. The adoptees were Islamized and assimilated into
    Kurdish or Turkish culture. It is unknown how many survivors lived on
    as Muslims, with estimates ranging from tens of thousands to several
    hundred thousand.

    According to the accounts of descendants in Diyarbakir, Turkey's
    largest Kurdish city, some survivors kept memory of their Armenian
    identity, sought out other Islamized Armenians to marry and let
    their children know their roots. Others sank into silence and tried
    to obliterate their past, haunted by the horror of the massacres and
    eager to shield their progeny against persecution.

    Neighbours, however, never forgot. A common childhood memory
    of descendants is how their peers would taunt them as "gavur" or
    "infidels" in street games. Relatives would often give away the secret
    in the heat of household quarrels, calling a father or a grandmother a
    "dirty Armenian."

    Some complain that because of their Muslim faith they are often
    ostracized also by Turkey's Christian Armenians, who are concentrated
    in cosmopolitan Istanbul and number about 60,000.

    "The [descendants of] Islamized Armenians are 100% assimilated. But
    there is always someone to remind them who they are. They are not
    fully accepted by either side. It's dramatic," Gafur Turkay, the
    grandson of an Armenian survivor, told Al-Monitor in the yard of the
    ancient Surp Giragos Church in Diyarbakir, a monumental reminder of
    the city's once-thriving Armenian community.

    After decades of silent awareness, Turkay now introduces himself
    directly as "an Armenian." His father remains a devout Muslim who
    has made the Hajj pilgrimage to Mecca. Out of 18 siblings, only he
    and a brother have converted to Christianity.

    The 47-year-old insurer sits also on the board of the foundation that
    runs the Surp Giragos Church, rebuilt from ruins and re-opened for
    worship in October.

    He estimates that at least 1 million people in Turkey's southeast
    bear Armenian blood today, even though mixed marriages and natural
    population growth have diluted Armenian ancestries. The acknowledgement
    of Armenian roots, he explains, is a difficult matter since descendants
    remain strongly bound to Islam and equate Armenianness to Christianity.

    "More often than not those people are rigid Muslims - a trait they
    probably developed in order to gain acceptance and dispel suspicion.

    Let them be Muslims, but I wish they could at least accept their
    Armenian origins," Turkay said. "But I can't persuade even my own
    sister. 'God forbid! You can't make me call myself an Armenian'
    is all she says."

    For Zorarslan, the resentment of his own family is no match to his
    resolve to discover his roots. On his mobile phone, buzzing with
    the ringtone of an Armenian tune, he proudly displays pictures of
    cousins he has tracked down in France, the Netherlands, the United
    States and Istanbul. His eyes sparkle with excitement and then well up
    with tears as he recounts how some relatives were happy to reconnect,
    but others refused to answer letters and return calls. "Is it about
    religion? Do they worry we may not be really relatives or do they
    think I am after money? I'm still trying to figure out," he said.

    Behcet Sayan, 47, remembers how his grandfather would keep company with
    six other survivors in their native village near Diyarbakir and how
    the elderly men would chat in Armenian. A former construction worker
    who now greets visitors at Surp Giragos, Sayan says he has endorsed
    Christianity "at heart." He wishes other family members follow suit
    but is pessimistic. "My elder brother is a haji. You cannot change his
    mind even if you shred him to pieces. I wish my children follow me,
    but I know life will be difficult for them if they do. Let everybody
    make their own decision," he said.

    Surp Giragos, one of the largest Armenian churches in the Middle East,
    is still without a priest and a congregation. Nestled behind stone
    walls on a narrow cobbled street in the ancient heart of Diyarbakir,
    the edifice serves mostly as a tourist attraction.

    Al-Monitor's interview with Turkay in the churchyard was occasionally
    interrupted by young people, who, after touring the church, wanted to
    say hi and confide they also had an Armenian ancestor. Some inquired
    about the Armenian language courses launched in the city last year.

    Kevork Calis, the Armenian teacher who flies every week from Istanbul
    to teach the course, politely turned down a request by this reporter
    to attend one of the classes. "I have about 20 students. They are
    all descendants of Islamized Armenians. Many are attending secretly,"
    he explained.

    Compared to Turks, Kurds have been more forthcoming in efforts
    to reconcile with Armenians, driven by their own suffering in
    post-Ottoman Turkey and eager to advance their cause for pluralist
    democracy. Diyarbakir's Kurdish-held local administration, for
    instance, provided financial assistance to renovate the Surp Giragos
    Church and sponsored the Armenian language courses in the city.

    In February, prominent Kurdish politician Ahmet Turk admitted that
    "our grandfathers have blood on their hands" and apologized to
    Armenians. The apology, however, backfired as the veteran lawmaker
    appeared to reject direct Kurdish responsibility in the massacres,
    saying that Kurds were "manipulated" by Turks.

    Armenian opinion leaders cast further doubt over Kurdish sincerity,
    irked by remarks that jailed Kurdish rebel leader Abdullah Ocalan
    made in his fledgling peace process with Ankara. In a transcript
    leaked to the media in late February, Ocalan emphasized Islamic bonds
    between Kurds and Turks, and spoke in hostile terms about Armenians
    and other non-Muslims.

    Amid the soured climate, the Diyarbakir municipality is preparing
    for a fresh gesture. A monument dedicated to communities that have
    suffered persecution in Anatolia is expected to be unveiled in the
    city in the eve of April 24, the Armenians' genocide remembrance day.

    AL MONITOR - The Pulse of the Middle East; March 27, 2013
    http://www.al-monitor.com/pulse/originals/2013/03/turkey-islamicized-armenians-speak-out-embrace-roots.html

    (Sibel Utku Bila is a freelance journalist based in Ankara, who
    has covered Turkey for 15 years. She was a correspondent for Agence
    France-Presse (AFP) from 1999 to 2011, and articles she wrote during
    that period have been published in many newspapers around the world.

    She has worked also as an editor at the Hurriyet Daily News, Turkey's
    oldest English-language newspaper.)



    From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress
Working...
X