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Met with Israel’s President, and Spoke at Armenian Genocide Conference

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Harut-SassounianBY HARUT SASSOUNIAN

Last week I spoke at the first conference on the Armenian Genocide in Israel, gave a lecture at the Armenian Patriarchate in Jerusalem, and attended a meeting with Israel’s President Reuven Rivlin.

Pres. Rivlin was a staunch supporter of Armenian Genocide recognition while he was Chairman of the Knesset (parliament). As President, he is now more circumspect, not wishing to contradict his government’s reprehensible silence regarding the Armenian Genocide. However, during his meeting with the scholars attending the genocide conference last week, Pres. Rivlin left no doubt that his position on the Armenian Genocide has not changed. He even used the term “Armenian Genocide” during the meeting. He also recalled his speech at the UN General Assembly earlier this year in which he specifically referenced the Armenian Genocide.

I reminded Pres. Rivlin that over two dozen countries have already recognized the Armenian Genocide and that Israel should also acknowledge it simply because it is the right thing to do! I expressed the hope that with his continued support Israel would complete ‘the missing page’ of my book which lists the countries that have recognized the Armenian Genocide!

I then handed Pres. Rivlin my book, “The Armenian Genocide, The World Speaks Out: 1915-2015, Documents & Declarations,” a copy of the speech I delivered at the conference, and my newspaper, The California Courier.

The Armenian Genocide conference was organized By Prof. Yair Auron and the Department of Sociology, Political Science and Communication at The Open University of Israel. Among the distinguished speakers were: Jacob Metzer, President of The Open University of Israel; Prof. Yair Auron; Prof. Israel Charny; Prof. Elihu Richter; Prof. Dina Porat, Chief Historian of Yad Vashem; Dr. Stefan Ihrig, author of “Ataturk in the Nazi Imagination”; Ragip Zarakolu, a prominent human rights activist from Turkey; Prof. Ayhan Aktar from Istanbul Bilgi University; Ya’akov Ahimeir, Journalist and Editor of Israel Broadcasting Authority’s weekly international news survey on Channel 1; Benny Ziffer, Editor of the literary and cultural section of Haaretz newspaper; and George Hintlian from Jerusalem’s Armenian community.

In my conference presentation, I expressed regret that The State of Israel has yet to acknowledge the Armenian Genocide. Here are excerpts from my remarks:

“I must first draw an important distinction between the position of the Israeli government and the people of Israel and Jews around the world who have been some of the leading voices calling attention to the Armenian Genocide and its recognition:

— Henry Morgenthau, U.S. Ambassador to the Ottoman Empire, during the Genocide;

— Franz Werfel, the Austrian Jewish novelist, who wrote in 1933 the international bestselling novel, “The Forty Days of Musa Dagh.” His book was translated into Hebrew in 1934 and was widely read by Jews everywhere, particularly in the Warsaw ghetto, as a source of inspiration for survival and resistance to the Nazis during the Shoah;

— Raphael Lemkin, the Polish Jewish lawyer, who coined the term genocide. He disclosed during a 1949 interview on the CBS-TV Program Face the Nation: “I became interested in genocide because it happened to the Armenians”;

— I would add to these historical figures the name of Yossi Beilin, who spoke out on the Armenian Genocide as Israel’s Minister of Justice on April 24, 2000, and as Deputy Foreign Minister in 1994, despite heavy pressures and criticisms from the Israeli government;

— We also fondly remember Minister of Education Yossi Sarid who was the keynote speaker in Jerusalem on April 24, 2000, the 85th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide. He declared: “I am here, with you, as a human being, as a Jew, as an Israeli, and as Education Minister of the State of Israel…. Whoever stands indifferent in front of it [genocide], or ignores it, whoever makes calculations, whoever is silent always helps the perpetrator of the crime and not the murdered.”

— I must include in this list of Righteous Jews, Professors Israel Charny, Yair Auron, Yehuda Bauer, Nobel Peace Prize winner Elie Wiesel, and a large number of Jewish scholars who were the trailblazers in writing articles and books on the Armenian Genocide, even before Armenian scholars.

— I must also commend Knesset members and former Knesset Chairman Reuven Rivlin — the current President of Israel — who staunchly supported Armenian Genocide recognition despite his government’s vehement opposition.

As it is well known, the Armenian Genocide was the ‘prototype’ of the Shoah in view of German complicity in the extermination of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire. In the process of that criminal cooperation, the German military learned from its Turkish ally practical evil lessons on how to organize and implement the elimination of an entire race! Hitler was emboldened by the silence of the world while Armenians were getting wiped out, to confidently declare on the eve of his invasion of Poland in 1939, “Who, after all, speaks today of the annihilation of the Armenians?”

Consequently, The State of Israel should have been the first country, and hopefully not the last, to recognize the Armenian Genocide! Who should empathize more with the victims of a genocide than those who have suffered a similar fate?

Those who give Realpolitik reasons to justify Israel’s reluctance to acknowledge the Armenian Genocide, should answer the following question: Would they accept the denial of the Shoah by another country, simply because it is in that country’s strategic interest to do so?

Equally illogical is the claim that now is not the right time to recognize the Armenian Genocide! When is a good time to recognize a genocide? Isn’t 100 years of waiting long enough?

Moreover, for years, we were told that acknowledging the Armenian Genocide would ruin Israel’s good relations with Turkey. Now, we are being told that Israel cannot acknowledge it in order not to make its bad relations with Turkey worse!

It would be immoral to exploit the recognition of the Armenian Genocide as a bargaining chip between Turkey and Israel. No political, economic or military interest should override the recognition of any genocide!

Israel should recognize the Armenian Genocide for one reason only: It is the right thing to do!”

Global research report: Israeli Military Admits to Supporting Al Qaeda and ISIS in Syria

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isis-IsraelThe Times of Israel reported 3 weeks ago:
Global Research: Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon said Monday that Israel has been providing aid to Syrian rebels, thus keeping the Druze in Syria out of immediate danger. Israeli officials have previously balked at confirming on the record that the country has been helping forces that are fighting to overthrow Syrian President Bashar Assad.

“We’ve assisted them under two conditions,” Ya’alon said of the Israeli medical aid to the Syrian rebels, some of whom are presumably fighting with al-Qaeda affiliate al-Nusra Front to topple Syrian President Bashar Assad. “That they don’t get too close to the border, and that they don’t touch the Druze.”

Al Nusra is Al Qaeda, and closely affiliated with ISIS.  And remember, there have NEVER been any “moderate Syrian rebels” … only Islamic Sunni jihadis.

As Vice President Joseph Biden admitted:

The fact of the matter is . . . there was no moderate middle. . . . [O]ur allies in the region were our largest problem in Syria. . . . They poured hundreds of millions of dollars and . . . thousands of tons of weapons into anyone who would fight against Assad except that the people who were being supplied were Al Nusra and al-Qaeda and the extremist elements of jihadis.

(Leaked NSA documents also show that Israeli special forces assassinated a top Syrian government official.)

Not all Israelis support this effort.  For example, Jacky Hugi  – an Arab affairs analyst for Israeli army radio – recently wrote:

Israel should back Assad

Anyone who wonders why is invited to look at neighboring Iraq or distant Libya. What’s happening there is likely to happen in Syria after President Bashar al-Assad.

In choosing between one bad thing and another, the balance tips toward the regime. The Israeli security establishment should gradually abandon its emerging alliance with the Syrian rebels …

The survival of the Damascus regime guarantees stability on Israel’s northern border, and it’s a keystone to its national security.

It is a dangerous, irresponsible gamble to choose Assad’s enemies and encourage his collapse — it would be playing with fire. The prominent elements among Israel’s potential future neighbors are mainly Jabhat al-Nusra, al-Qaeda’s branch in Syria, or the Islamic State ….

The original source of this article is Washington’s Blog
Copyright © Washington’s Blog, Washington’s Blog, 2015

First International Conference on the Armenian Genocide in Israel

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arton118360-462x353On November 2, the first international conference on the subject of the Armenian Genocide opened in Israel, in Tel Aviv. The conference titled hundred years the Armenian Genocide, was organized for the 100th anniversary of the Armenian Genocide was organized and hosted by the Department of Sociology, Political Science and Communication from the Open University of Israel.

The organizers of the conference are Yair Auron Dr. (Chairman), Dr. Isaac Lubelsky and Dr. Charbit – teachers who teach the Study of Genocide at the Free University of Israel (the only course on genocide in Israel).

During the conference’s opening ceremony, President of the Open University, Professor Jacob (Kobi) Metzer, Dr. Yair Auron and Dr. Isaac Lubelsky made the introductory speech.

They said the hundredth anniversary of the Armenian Genocide was an important date for them, they talked about the fact that Israel does not recognize the Armenian Genocide, and stressed the fact that this recognition is imperative for Israel.

“The Israeli recognition of the Armenian Genocide is my dream. She is not coming soon but … I will fight for almost 30 years for this event to take place, and because it takes place today, part of my dream come true. We expect that such a conference be held annually from now on, “said Yair Auron to Panorama.am.

“The aim of the conference was to discuss the Armenian Genocide among academics in an open … Above all, the Open University deals with the subject of the genocide seriously, and that is why this conference is important for us, “said Dr. Lubelsky to Panorama.am.

The conference also includes an exhibition Jewish Voice over the Armenian Genocide, which has loaned by the Institute-Museum of Armenian Genocide.

The opening ceremony was also notable because a choir led by Israeli Tomer Heiseg (piano Noam Ziggon) performed three songs for the audience with the famous song Erebuni Yerevan interpreted in Armenian.

At the end of the first day, the famous film Ararat about the Armenian Genocide by Atom Egoyan (with Charles Aznavour) was screened.

The conference will continue for two more days. Jewish participants from abroad are invited (including Turkish academics too).

On Wednesday, a meeting of participants in the conference with the President of Israel Reuben Rivlin is expected.

Nvard Chalikyan

Pressure on Israel to deny the Armenia Genocide

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sassounian.thumbBy Harut Sassounian,

Publisher, The California Courier
www.TheCaliforniaCourier.com
As relations between Israel and Turkey have become increasingly strained in recent years, shifting from strategic alliance to outright hostility, many analysts began to wonder about the Israeli government’s uncharacteristically muted reaction to Turkish Pres. Erdogan’s anti-Semitic diatribes and anti-Israeli actions.
Under these circumstances, Armenians and their supporters are puzzled by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s continued complicity in the Turkish government’s denial of the Armenian Genocide and the blocking of its recognition by the Knesset (parliament).
Some Middle East experts offer two explanations of Israel’s puzzling stance:
1) Despite the apparent bad blood between Israel and Turkey, the two countries continue their covert intelligence sharing and arms trade.
2) Azerbaijan, Turkey’s junior brother, has taken an aggressive role in pressuring Israel not to recognize the Armenian Genocide by using as leverage its purchase of billions of dollars of advanced Israeli weapons, providing Israel much needed petroleum products, and a base in Baku to infiltrate and spy on Iran with which it has a 400-mile border.
The Israeli government has become so overly sensitive to Azerbaijan’s diktats that during a recent visit by Armenia’s Foreign Minister Edward Nalbandian to Jerusalem, Israel’s Foreign Minister rudely refused to meet with him. Only through a last minute intervention, Mr. Nalbandian managed to meet with the President of Israel.

An article in the November 1 issue of The Jerusalem Post fully illustrates the extent of Israel’s kowtowing to Azerbaijan. At a time when most Western groups, including the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), refused to monitor Azerbaijan’s Parliamentary elections because of restrictions imposed by Baku, four Israeli Knesset members rushed to Azerbaijan to show their support for Aliyev’s despotic regime!
The Israeli delegation, led by former Foreign Minister Avigdor Lieberman, now chairman of the Israel-Azerbaijan Parliamentary Group, included ex-ambassador to the U.S. Michael Oren, Sofa Landver, and Yoel Razbozov.
The Jerusalem Post reported that Lieberman, as Foreign Minister, “worked to strengthen Israeli ties with Azerbaijan,” and quoted him saying in Baku that it is “an important country and a good friend of Israel…. Even in the time of the Soviet Union, [Azerbaijan] was known to treat its Jewish community well, and there is no anti-Semitism there. We must continue strengthening our relations with Azerbaijan.” Azernews also quoted him telling the Azeri Elections Media Center that Azerbaijan “is an example of democracy, stability, and successful foreign policy.” Most knowledgeable people would dismiss such ridiculous and false statements.
One wonders why the former Foreign Minister is so anxious to whitewash Azerbaijan’s past and present practices of anti-Semitism? After the four Knesset members return from Baku, they should be asked to disclose the lavish gifts they must have received in appreciation for their rubber stamping of the fraudulent elections in Azerbaijan. Not surprisingly, Aliyev maintained  its tight grip on power after his ruling party retained its majority in parliament, while the mainstream opposition boycotted last Sunday’s elections.
The Jerusalem Post reported that “Azerbaijan is considered the Muslim country friendliest to Israel, and the two countries have close ties and significant trade. Azerbaijan is Israel’s biggest oil provider, and trade between the two countries reaches $5 billion, more than with France. In recent years, Lieberman, then-president Shimon Peres, and Defense Minister Moshe Ya’alon visited Baku.”
In pursuing its arms for oil policy, Israeli officials have conveniently ignored Azerbaijan’s gross violations of human rights, lack of freedom of speech, and jailing of journalists and activists, including Leyla Yunus, head of the Baku-based Institute for Peace and Democracy, and investigative reporter Khadija Ismayilova of Radio Free Europe.

While it might be somewhat understandable that Israel and Azerbaijan are pursuing their self-interests, no matter how reprehensible the means, Armenia must also pursue its own national interests and counter the actions of any country that jeopardizes its security and questions the Genocide. The Armenian government should make crystal clear to Israeli officials that by selling multi-billion dollar sophisticated weapons to Azerbaijan, they become responsible for putting at risk thousands of Armenian lives. Azerbaijani officials have publicly announced that they intend to use the arms acquired from Israel to attack Nagorno Karabagh (Artsakh) and Armenia.

Lastly, Armenia should warn Azerbaijan that its unwarranted denials of the Armenian Genocide and pressures on other countries, such as Israel, to join its denialist cause, would further antagonize Armenians, making it impossible for them to accept any concessions on the Artsakh conflict.

Israel The enigma of the Armenian quarter of Jerusalem .

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arton118006-480x305Jerusalem Watch has four quarters, Jewish, Arab, Christian and Armenian …. The Armenians did not participate in any crusades or holy war in the region, the Armenian population not currently exceeds 8,000,000 in the world … and yet the Armenian community has an area covering one sixth of the area of ​​Jerusalem! The legitimacy of this neighborhood seems down in history without knowing exactly how; While we hear much about the Armenians in Jerusalem. They are so discreet that it is probably the reason why they are resident for some 2000 years. Try to trace some historic landmarks that explain the anchor of this community: There are 2100 years, Armenian empire extends to southern Lebanon and their armies through the region. From that moment a Jewish community settled in Armenia and vice versa in order to develop trade between the two regions. In 70, the Armenians of abo …

Read more, see link below

Thursday, October 29, 2015,
Jean Eckian © armenews.com
Other information available: on Cool Israel

Opinion: Islamic State “ISIS” Has two competing Client Turkey & Israel but Russia is spoiling it

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Erdogan-Netanyahu chessOpinion:

By Wally Sarkeesian

First thing first 95% all terrorist in Middle East, North Africa,  Belkin’s, Caucuses, are Sunni Muslims accept Hezbollah is Shia Muslim backed by Iran against Israel

Here is what is going on, Israel want to use Kurds to Create Kurdish corridor  from northern Iraq and Syria to Mediterranean, on the other hand Turkey want Islamic State to annex northern Syria and Iraq to create path through Iran to connect to Turkic nations like Turkmenistan “neo-ottoman Project”

That is the reason why the war is going on for 4 years and no end. because whenever Syrian government make progress against Islamic state Israel started bombing Syria on the other hand when the Kurds make progress on pushing Islamic State  out of the area  Turkey start bombing the Kurds this is the vicious cycle and the reality situation in middle-east. It’s Syrian and Iraqi citizens whom are paying the price of Erdogan and Netanyahu Chess game moreover most of the Islamic state Fighters  are from Sunni Muslim Turks from Turkic nations like Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan, Kosovo, and so on.

Turks and Israelis will eventually drug both USA and Russia into major showdown just like Turkey did on October 1962 Cuban missiles crisis where Turkey falsely persuade US to put missile in Turkey against USSR Soviet Union and that lead to USSR in Turn put missile in US back yard in Cuba consequently Cuba become the victim of Turkish conspiracy thousand of miles away now Turkey again is playing the same game turning Russia and US against each other  maintaining Turkish occupation of Anatolia which in 1923 they change the name to Turkey,  of course this time with help of Israel they will eventually confronting USA and Russia into major showdown time will tell.

Recently we have seen Russian military buildup in Syrian that prompted urgently Israel Netanyahu unplanned  travel to Moscow meeting Putin followed by Turkish Erdogan travel to Moscow to meet Putin, both are worried that Putin will spoil their plan and both are changing there standing toward Assad by saying Assad should be part of the solution.

Recall Mosul invasion by Islamic state and the fake Turkish hostages taking well that was  Erdogan first move and successfully topple Iraqi PM Nouri al-Maliki replaced with Turkish approved  Haider al-Abadi as PM. both Baghdad and Iraqi Kurdistan capitulated & handed over all oil pipe line to go through Turkey moreover, all new oil construction project from south of Iraq went to Turkish contractors too. as you might be aware of 20 Turkish worker have been kidnapped in south of Iraq Basra those are the Turkish contractor doing the jobs which previously done by Iraqi people consequently Iraqis are fleeing & becoming refugees while the Turks moving in taking over Iraqi construction business. to add insult to injury Turkey is asking for safe zone that is in reality the Annexation of Syria. as far as the Kurd situation is currently Erdogan have sort of divided the Kurd into two camp were Iraqi Kurdistan president Barzani is more less in Erdogan pocket,  however the Kurd in Turkey and Syria are totally oppose to Turkey’s domination and occupation of there land.

Here is some quote from Pan-Islamist Davatuglu’s Turkish PM book for you to understand Turkey’s road map:

He crystallized these ideas in the book ‘Strategic Depth,’ in 2001, a year before the Justice and Development Party, or A.K.P., came to power. In the book, he defined Turkey as a nation that does not study history, but writes it — a nation that is not at the periphery of the West, but at the center of Islamic civilization … Mr. Davutoglu saw himself as a grand theorist at the helm of his country as it navigated what he called the ‘river of history.’ He and his country were not mere pawns in world politics, but the players who moved the pieces.

According to Mr. Davutoglu, the nation states established after the breakup of the Ottoman Empire are artificial creations and Turkey must now carve out its own Lebensraum — a phrase he uses unapologetically. Doing so would bring about the cultural and economic integration of the Islamic world, which Turkey would eventually lead. Turkey must either establish economic hegemony over the Caucasus, the Balkans and the Middle East, or remain a conflict-riven nation-state that risks falling apart.

After becoming Turkey’s foreign minister from 2009, Davutoğlu had the opportunity to put these ideas into practice – with disastrous results:

As foreign minister, Mr. Davutoglu fervently believed that the Arab Spring had finally provided Turkey with a historic opportunity to put these ideas into practice. He predicted that the overthrown dictatorships would be replaced with Islamic regimes, thus creating a regional ‘Muslim Brotherhood belt’ under Turkey’s leadership.

History keep repeating itself.

Israeli police storm al-Aqsa, clash with Palestinians

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228720Israeli police raided the plaza outside Jerusalem‘s al-Aqsa Mosque on Sunday in what they said was a bid to head off Palestinian attempts to disrupt visits by Jews and foreign tourists on the eve of the Jewish New Year.

Police used tear gas and threw stun grenades towards Palestinian youths, who barricaded themselves inside the mosque and hurled rocks and flares, a Reuters witness said. Israeli Public Security Minister Gilad Erdan, in a statement, claimed the Palestinian youngsters also had pipe bombs.

There was no sign that these had been detonated. No serious injuries were reported and the compound, revered by Muslims as the Noble Sanctuary and by Jews as the Temple Mount, was opened to visitors after the violence subsided, police said.

Israel warns citizens against traveling to Turkey and Azerbaijan

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israel-warnIsrael’s Counter-Terrorism Bureau issued a travel warning for Israelis who are traveling abroad.

The list includes 33 countries, including Turkey and Azerbaijan, Jewish Press reported.

“It is recommended that the public avoid non-essential visits to these countries,” the message says.

The Bureau also issued travel warnings for several regions, including Chechnya (in Russia), , the Sinai peninsula.

Why Israel and Armenia Should ‘Adopt’ the Yazidis

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By

Iraqi Yazidi women hold placards during a protest outside the United Nations (UN)

Iraqi Yazidi women hold placards during a protest outside the United Nations (UN)

JERUSALEM — The recent horrifying New York Times exposé on the Islamic State’s sex slavery system targeting Yazidi women was one of the most-read articles on the paper’s website in the last days. And yes, in a doubly perverse sense it feels good to be morally outraged at ISIS for a few minutes. But let us not get all too comfortable with our outrage over what the Times titled “Theology of Rape,” because we like to forget just how easily we forget. The history of mass media and atrocities in the modern world has taught us that the hurdle for us to really care — to the point where something is done about atrocities in progress — is just astoundingly high. The history of the last century provides a seemingly endless list of atrocities that were not stopped, and rarely was this ever for a lack of information about them. We, at least as countries and societies, simply don’t really care. We would like to think we do, but, empirically speaking, we don’t — and the latest case in point is the sheer existence of a system of Yazidi sex slave trade in 2015.

We humans and we modern societies have a tremendous ability to compartmentalize what is going on in the world around us and to assign most of it to such a distance that it simply does not matter. We have an even greater ability not to care or to forget and suppress quickly what we read, hear and see about the tragedies and wars around us. Our ability as societies to ignore, downplay or misunderstand what is going on — in the face of reports, coverage and even discussion in our own media — has a long tradition.

Let me give you just two examples of a dark tradition of not caring too much to illustrate just how easy this is and was: In the 1890s great massacres broke out in the Ottoman Empire; under Abdul Hamid II tens of thousands of Armenians were killed in a span of about three years. Germany was especially close to the Ottoman Empire at the time and was rather well-informed about what happened. From its own sources and from English papers, the German press printed horror stories featuring such explicit depictions of the murder of Armenians by mobs in some localities that even over hundred years later they make for a highly disturbing read. And still they failed to instigate any great response by German society as such.

The papers aligned with the German government downplayed the atrocity reports as British propaganda or outright justified what was happening. Some critical papers were shouted down with the accusation of being obsessed with minority issues because they were Jewish-owned. Others were either silent or sought their own way out of a tragedy that warranted some kind of response, especially because Germany was a quasi-ally of the Ottomans at the time, often either by advancing racial justifications or by stressing that Germany had enough problems at home to care about first. But don’t judge Germany of the 1890s all too quickly, the other Great Powers also did next to nothing to help the Armenians.

ISIS is pretty clear about what it cares for and what it does not. What about us?

By the time the Armenian Genocide occurred, some 20 years later, one German paper, which was the widely acknowledged mouthpiece of political Catholicism, went a step further to justify not caring for the Armenians: it observed laconically that there were either many or not so many Christians in the Ottoman Empire, depending on the perspective. What the paper meant to suggest was that only if one counted the Orthodox Christians — the majority of Armenians were Orthodox — fully, as real Christians would the total number be high. It did not say so explicitly, but what it suggested was clear: because the victims are not really Christians, German Christians were not obliged to bother themselves with this faraway tragedy.

Another example — and a case in point that the size of the humanitarian disaster matters little to our ability to not comprehend, to suppress, downplay and so on — has to be the Holocaust as it was happening. Deborah Lipstadt and others have shown how often and almost casually news about the ongoing Holocaust was pushed to the less important pages of American papers and routinely downplayed in importance. A recent study by Michael Fleming examines how the news about Auschwitz traveled to the Allies and how it was received. He painstakingly documents all the hurdles that needed to be surmounted before this news — about what is today the iconic killing place of the Holocaust — was taken seriously by policymakers and news media at all. Fleming combats the myth about the Allies not having had reliable information about Auschwitz until late in war; well, they did, but it would be just all the more comfortable to believe that they did not.

ISIS’ Sex Slavery

So, now we have more horrifying news about ISIS and we are outraged by ISIS’ sex slave system. And we should be. But then what? By the time you looked up from that Times article to do the next thing you probably already began to put this disturbing piece of information some place away from the things that matter to you. We learn to do so every day. But somebody needs to care. Why? Because it is simply far too easy not to care about the Yazidis (and we had in fact already almost forgotten about last year’s near extinction of tens of thousands of Yazidis, almost miraculously saved by the Kurdish Peshmerga). Not only are they far away, the overwhelming majority of us just don’t have any Yazidis in our circle of friends and neighbors. And finally, and perhaps most importantly, they are neither Christian, Jewish or Muslim and their belief system is just foreign in the most literal sense to us.

Given their history, at the very least the state of Israel and Armenia should, in some form, politically adopt the Yazidis. Like the Armenians and the Jews in the 1890s, during the Armenian Genocide and during the Shoah, the Yazidis, too, have no state of their own, no army and no powerful enough lobby anywhere. And precisely because they don’t and because they are not “one of us,” they matter so much and should matter more than the threatened destruction of the ruins of Palmyra. After we have proven, as a world, that we do not care that much for the Christians, Sunni and Shia Muslims of Syria, or the Kurds and all the other inhabitants in now ISIS-controlled Iraq, the Yazidis should be the last straw. But they probably won’t be. ISIS is pretty clear about what it cares for and what it does not. What about us?

Source: huffingtonpost.com

Polonsky Fellow, Van Leer Jerusalem Institute

 

ARMENIA The Jewish community of Armenia calls on the Knesset to recognize Armenian Genocide

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arton114964-480x335The president of the Jewish community in Armenia Rima Varzhapetian sent a message to the Israeli parliament (Knesset) on a forthcoming discussion on recognition of the Armenian genocide.

The message says:

Dear Mr. Edelstein!

Dear members of the Knesset!

Members of the Jewish community of Armenia learned with great enthusiasm and hope the next discussion on recognition of the Armenian Genocide in the Knesset session.

The Knesset embodies a set of wise people to look and morally rights of the Jewish diaspora.

We place great hopes on the positive decision of the Israeli parliamentarians to recognize the tragedy of the Armenian people as genocide.

If we want to build a future, we must honor the past and represent an example to the new generation.

From the onset of Genesis to the creation of the State of Israel and until now, our people, the cost of enormous sacrifices, suffered the greatest moral challenge to meet the main requirements of the Almighty – the principle of justice.

Aware of this, the world’s peoples, governments and parliaments in many countries are closely watching the position of the State of Israel and the Jewish Diaspora on this thorny issue – the recognition of the Armenian genocide.

We, the Jews, have made the historic choice to make our universal moral principles that can not bend to political contingencies of the moment and an “opportunistic” misleading.

Looking straight into the eyes of Armenians, undergoing immense suffering, we Jews, see, like in the mirror, the suffering of our people. The hearts of most Jews and Armenians are waiting with trepidation the most important decision for the future of both peoples.

Tuesday, August 18, 2015,
Stéphane © armenews.com