Saturday 1 September 2007

Post-ADL Saga Analyses (including thoughtful ones from the Turkish press)

Commentary - ADL's Domino Effect: Genocide
Deniers are Falling one by one
By Harut Sassounian
Publisher, The California Courier

For too many years, Abraham Foxman and ADL's leaders have gone far beyond their organization's noble mandate of stopping "the defamation of the Jewish people," by meddling in international politics. The ADL had apparently appointed itself the guardian of Israel's strategic interests and the well being of Jews everywhere, particularly those in Turkey. Ironically, while constantly singing the praises of Turkish tolerance towards minorities, the ADL kept expressing serious concerns over the safety of the few Jews remaining in that country.
Foxman and his group would not have become involved in last week's controversy on the recognition of the Armenian Genocide, had they simply stuck to their mission of fighting anti-Semitism. As Herb Keinon pointed out in his August 24 column in the Jerusalem Post, the ADL, besides being unhelpful to Israel, is getting "in the way" of Israeli diplomacy by creating unnecessary and unwelcome complications.

ADL officials were acting as if they were in charge of Israel's security rather than heading a U.S. civil rights organization, forgetting that the duly elected leaders of Israel were fully capable of protecting not only the interests of their country, but those of their kinsmen residing in Turkey. In the process of recklessly delving into foreign politics, the ADL had no qualms about
collaborating with Turkish denialists and even lobbying on their behalf to block the passage of a congressional resolution affirming the facts of the Armenian Genocide.

Through a long series of unwise judgments and draconian decisions, Foxman managed last week to entangle his organization, the Jewish-American community as well the state of Israel in a major controversy which aggravated not only the Armenian-American community, but a large number of U.S. Jews and even the governments of Israel and Turkey.

After rejecting for years all pleas by Armenians and others not to cave in to Turkish blackmail on the Armenian Genocide, Foxman arrogantly fired last week ADL's regional director in Boston for disagreeing with the organization's denialist policy. Two members of the regional board resigned in protest anda major outcry ensued. Many highly influential Jewish American leaders denounced
Foxman publicly. The Boston Globe, the Los Angeles Times and scores of other newspapers published front-page articles, opinion columns, editorials and letters to the editor objecting to Foxman's heavy-handed style of running the ADL and questioning how an organization dedicated to countering discrimination and protecting civil rights could be a party to genocide denial.

After persistent calls for Foxman's resignation from the American-Jewish community, the ADL issued a statement acknowledging for the first time that the mass killings of Armenians were "tantamount to genocide." While many welcomed the reversal of ADL's long-standing policy of referring to the genocide as a massacre, this statement itself generated a new controversy. Many Armenians and Jews were not fully satisfied because Foxman's acknowledgment was not forceful
enough. They were even more upset by Foxman's declaration that the congressional resolution on the Armenian Genocide was "a counterproductive diversion and will not foster reconciliation between Turks and Armenians and may put at risk the Turkish Jewish community and the important multilateral relationship between Turkey, Israel and the United States." Some viewed Foxman's morally ambiguous statement as a continuation of his unwise efforts to play politics with
the genocide issue: an attempt to appease the Turks while accommodating his Armenian and Jewish critics.

Turkish leaders were shocked and alarmed by ADL's unexpected statement which might have the effect of further eroding Jewish support for Turkey's frantic efforts to block the congressional resolution on the Armenian Genocide. Furthermore, Turkish officials were very much concerned that other Jewish-American organizations would follow suit, eventually leading to the recognition of the Armenian Genocide by Israel itself.

Turkey's leaders immediately expressed their outrage to the highest officials of the State of Israel demanding that they pressure the ADL to retract its statement. Caught unawares by the ADL's reversal on the Armenian Genocide, Israeli officials reassured the Turks that their country's policy would remain unchanged and that they would contact Foxman and his group, even though they said they did not control the actions of American-Jewish organizations.

As pressure mounted on the ADL from Israel and Turkey, Foxman engaged in damage control by sending a polite letter to Erdogan expressing regret for the inconvenience caused by his group's statement. Erdogan, wanting to impress his countrymen on the eve of Turkish presidential elections, deliberately mischaracterized Foxman's letter as an apology and a retraction.

Erdogan had good reason to be alarmed. One day after the ADL statement, matters got worse when the American Jewish Committee (AJC), which for years has openly sided with Turkey on the denial of the Armenian Genocide, issued a statement by its Executive Director David A. Harris. In so many carefully crafted words, Harris acknowledged the Armenian Genocide by stating that protecting historical truth should be one of the highest priorities of the Jewish people.
A Simon Wiesenthal Center official told the Jerusalem Post last week that the Armenian Genocide should be recognized as a historical fact despite "the political ramifications." We have "an obligation to tell the truth about historical events - even if they sometimes create certain problems for us,"said Dr. Efraim Zuroff, the chief Nazi hunter of the Wiesenthal Center.

Dr. Zuroff was joined by Morton Klein, the president of the Zionist Organization of America, who told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency last week that it is "imperative for Jews to acknowledge the truth of the Turkish genocide against Armenians, notwithstanding Turkey's relationship with Israel." He added: "It's high time for Turkey to acknowledge that truth of history and move on."

The domino effect continued. One day after the ADL and the AJC statements, the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, the main umbrella group on Jewish affairs, held a conference call to discuss adopting a position on the Armenian Genocide.

Finally, Foxman announced that the ADL would consider going beyond merely acknowledging the Armenian Genocide and possibly support the pending congressional resolution. This issue would be put on the organization's national policy making agenda at its next meeting on November 1.

The only question now is whether the Armenian Genocide resolution would have already been adopted by the House of Representatives by the time the ADL holds its meeting on November 1. The hope is that neither the ADL nor other Jewish-American groups would lobby to block the resolution, sending a clearmessage to members of Congress that most American Jews support it, while the rest do not oppose it.

As this writer was quoted saying in last Sunday's Boston Globe: "the truth is finally prevailing over all sorts of political powers and pressures. And this has a domino effect. One by one all the pieces of denial are crumbling."

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Turkish Daily News
Facing history
Saturday, August 25, 2007
Yusuf KANLI

We have to understand that history is not just a record of
victories; there are as well defeats, retreats, treason, bravery,
intrigues, sorrows and joy.

It is rather difficult for us Turks to accept that history is not
just a book recording the victories of our glorious nation: It is
not. There are, of course, defeats, retreats as well as treason,
bravery, intrigues, sorrows, joy and all other aspects of the human
dimension which together with the victories form the history of our
nation.


It is still some sort of a taboo for many people in our society to
talk about the Sept. 6-7, 1955, incidents when the Greek minority of
Istanbul were compelled to leave their homes, their country, and
settle in Greece. Was it a voluntary emigration movement? It was
not. Years later it became evident that some elements in the Turkish
state instigated all the trouble by spreading false rumors to the
effect that the house where the founder of modern Turkey, Mustafa
Kemal Atatürk, was born had been torched in Thessalonica. Do we
think the Turkish state owes an apology to the Turkish citizens who
were forced to leave their country and settle in Greece? Indeed, it is
long overdue. It has since been verified that the Turkish state was
actually responsible for what happened on Sept. 6 and 7 to our Greek
Orthodox minority because of the state-sponsored -or some state
element sponsored- attack on them by an ultra-nationalist mob.


Are not the Sept. 6-7 incidents part of Turkish history? It is sad,
but they are. If we want to draw lessons from history we have to
concede this reality, teach it at our schools and make sure that no
such thing could ever be allowed to happen in our country again.

Turkey is not of course the sole country with such a shallow
historical understanding. Even today, it is rather dangerous for Greek
scholars to write about how Ýzmir (the Smyrna of the time) was
torched and burnt down by the retreating Greek occupation force and
some local Greeks collaborating with them.

Or, just recently, two Greek Cypriots disclosed that they were
eye witnesses to a mass murder of Turkish Cypriots executed by some
senior officials of the Greek Cypriot state. After their remarks
published in the Greek daily Politis they became the most hated people
in their community.

Yusuf Halaçoðlu, the chairman of a state-sponsored
organization, the Turkish History Society, has been in the headlines
these days with some `awkward' statements regarding the `real
identity' of some Kurdish Alevis and Turkish Alevis.

According to comments made by Halaçoðlu during a seminar that
while Kurdish Alevis racially belonged to a Turkmen tribe, the Turkish
Alevis were Armenians who converted to Islam to escape a forced
resettlement program in the first quarter of the last century. Some
people are attacking Halaçoðlu and accusing him of being an
`ultra nationalist,' some are even implying that he is a racist. Some
members of the Alevite community are preparing to take him to
court. In the ultra-nationalist segments, Halaçoðlu most
probably has become a hero once again.

Well, we are neither historians nor ethnologist to judge the
accuracy of the claims made by Halaçoðlu. He says he has a list
of names of the Armenian families who converted to Islam, became
Alevite and took Turkish Muslim names. If he has such a list, does
that mean there is such information in the state archives? If there is
such information in the state archives, has it ever been used in a
discriminative manner, let's say in recruitments, promotions or the
such?

These questions must be answered by the relevant state
bodies. Discrimination is a crime.

But, I would like to recall a famous saying before continuing
further on the Halaçoðlu case. It is said that the bravest of
the gypsies start to list his crimes when he attempts to explain how
courageous a man he is.

The ethnic `Turkiskness' of the Kurdish population of this country
has long been the subject of an intense campaign. Once upon a time
they were just `mountain Turks' and the noise they created while
walking on snow `kart kurt' in time became Kurd, thus the official
rhetoric once was that they were no different than other
Turks. Perhaps Halaçoðlu is just providing some further depth to
that myth with his Turkmen Kurds thesis. Is not that a pure act of
racism?

Did not Halaçoðlu, as the chairman of the state-sponsored
Turkish History Society, implicitly accept that there was such an
immense human trauma in the first quarter of the last century that
thousands or hundreds of thousands of `Christian Armenians'
`voluntarily' converted to Islam?

Of course neither I nor any one else of Turkey's 70 million people
can be held accountable for what might have happened in the first
quarter of the last century to Turkey's Armenians. But, is it not the
responsibility of the state to engage in serious research into
so-called genocide claims without committing itself to a policy of
absolute denial? Why should we wait for Armenians to join such an
effort in Turkey? Or, why should we spend efforts to convince - today
the Anti-Defamation League tomorrow who knows which country
or whatorganization - others that there was no such shame in our
historywhile we can indeed invite historians from all over the world,
provide them all the liberties and access to archives and come up
with a credible record of what might have indeed happened?

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Today's Zaman
28.08.2007
NICOLE POPE
Columnists
Shelving history

Have you ever watched "Life Laundry"? This BBC reality show involves a team of experts in clutter management swooping in on houses rendered almost unusable by their owners' pathological hoarding.

The show's appeal lies in the fact that it strikes a chord in many of us. Although outwardly the purpose is to help the show's participants manage and store their possessions more efficiently, it is really about freeing them psychologically from the weight of their past.

We may not all be accumulating rubbish to that extent, but we can sympathize with the tears of the willing victims forced to shed junk which, for reasons known only to themselves, they perceive as an invaluable part of their personal history. After all, we all go through life carrying a certain
amount of emotional baggage.

As Turkey once again pulled out all the diplomatic stops in its latest attempt to block recognition of the Armenian massacres as genocide -- this time by the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) -- it occurred to me that countries too could benefit from the "life laundry" treatment.

Few nations in the world are not burdened with a heavy past. Germany is still coming to terms with the Nazi period, Britain and France with their colonial past, while South Africa is struggling with the more recent legacy of apartheid and racism. Even neutral Switzerland had to admit that it owed some of its wealth to assets looted from Jews during World War II.

Countries may not be weighed down by possessions in the same way as individuals, but they too can be hindered in their progress if they get stuck in the past. The way they come to terms with events that happened in earlier periods helps them not only put ancient issues to rest, but it is
also often the key to solving problems they face in the present.

In Turkey's case, an official perception that non-Muslim minorities, as well as non-Turkish or non-Sunni groups, were the tools of the country's enemies still colors the way they are seen today. When the head of the Turkish Historical Society (TKK) refers to Alevi Kurdish citizens as being "unfortunately of Armenian origin," it is easy to see that the past is still
clouding the present.

The Armenian issue has been a ball and chain to Turkey for decades. Much diplomatic energy that could have been spent forging strong ties has been spent warning friends and foes off the "genocide" word. The Armenian diaspora deserves blame for turning the issue into a political arm's wrestling match, but it is also increasingly obvious that Turkey's strategy to contain the problem has not been successful. Spillage from Ankara's bulging historical cupboards is increasingly hard to contain.

As Turkey debates a new constitution, it needs to redefine the concept of citizenship more broadly to embrace citizens of all ethnic and religious origins. The Armenian question not only affects relations with many of Turkey's diplomatic allies, but also ties between the state and its own non-Muslim citizens. A similar lack of trust has so far prevented a constructive approach to the notion of Kurdish rights.

An open discussion on citizenship could be the start of a broader effort to sweep away some historical cobwebs. Facing the past head-on would allow ancient events, good and bad, to be shelved in their proper place. It would free Turkey to move forward with greater confidence, in control of the past rather than hobbled by it.

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