Friday
Jun182010
Turkey Inside Line: Ankara's Attack in Iraq; Relations with Israel
Friday, June 18, 2010 at 9:24 
Cross Border Operation: The Turkish Armed Forces (TSK) announced on Wednesday that three commando divisions, supported with one special forces battalio,n followed PKK (Kurdistan Workers Party) guerillas/terrorists up to 3 kilometres across the Iraqi border. It was stated that four PKK followers were killed.This was the first operation since February 2008, when 240 guerillas/terrorists and 27 Turkish soldiers were killed.
Meanwhile, ten PKK members who returned to Turkey in October as part of the government’s initiative to resolve the Kurdish issue were arrested Thursday. Charges against the group were brought in two separate indictments: the festivities that welcomed them back to Turkey led to the allegation “being a member of a terrorist organization” and the statements they subsequently gave constituted “making propaganda for a terrorist organization”.
Turkish-Israeli Relations: Israeli Government officials persuaded activists, led by former member of Parliament Alex Goldfarb and Modi’in Meretz activist Pinhas Har-Zahav to cancel the voyage to northern Cyprus, in a "reverse flotilla" to protest those trying to break the Israeli blockade of Gaza.
Israeli officials were reportedly concerned that the manoeuvre ould remind international media of the Gaza flotilla when most attention had shifted to issues like the British Petroleum spill in the Gulf of Mexico and the World Cup.
In the United States, two lawmakers warned Turkey over its tension with Israel and its close relations with Iran. "There will be a cost if Turkey stays on its present heading of growing closer to Iran and more antagonistic to the state of Israel," Representative Mike Pence, the third-ranking Republican in the House of Representatives, said. Pence added that he was ready to reevaluate his past reluctance to support a congressional resolution denouncing World War I-era killings of Armenians by Ottoman forces as "genocide".
Democratic Representative Eliot Engel called Turkey's actions "disgraceful", adding that although Ankara was a member of NATO, it had stopped looking westward.
After Ankara's called its under-18 football team back from Israel, the European Volleyball Confederation announced on Thursday that four matches between Israeli and Turkish teams in women league have been canceled.
Reader Comments (12)
Turkey Shelves Israeli Cooperation,
Considers breaking off Ties;
Israel Lobbies in Congress denounce Ankara
http://www.juancole.com/2010/06/turkey-shelves-israeli-cooperation-considers-breaking-off-ties-israel-lobbies-in-congress-denounce-ankara.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.juancole.com/2010/06/turkey-shelves-...
Suddenly, the Israel lobby discovers a genocide
Some of the most powerful leaders in the American Jewish community have stepped forward in recent days to acknowledge the 1915 Armenian Genocide at the hands of Ottoman Turkey.
On the surface, this would seem unremarkable. As victims of the Holocaust, Jews might be expected to stand beside the Armenians and their tragedy. After all, the massacres and death marches across Anatolia during the fog of World War I became a model for Hitler himself.
But this sudden embrace of the Armenian Genocide actually marks a shameless turnaround for the major American Jewish organizations. For decades, they have helped Turkey cover up its murderous past. Each year, the Israel lobby in the U.S. has played a quiet but pivotal role in pressuring Congress, the State Department and successive presidents to defeat simple congressional resolutions commemorating the 1.5 million Armenian victims.
http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2010/06/16/israel_lobby_genocide_armenia/index.html" rel="nofollow">http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2010/06/16/is...
Catherine,
Yes its quite odd that the "armenian genocide" is being rediscovered by both Israel and some US statesman. Welcome to the world of geopolitics when the concerns for previously dead are only pawns with no consideration to the injustice done to these unlucky souls. Regardless it is about time Turkey answer for the Armeniand, Assyrian, and Greek genocides. It is also about time for them to recognize the ongoing genocide in Darfur intead of saying there is no genocide. God I hate politicians!!!
Thx
Bill
Hi Bill,
The first time I ever saw documentary evidence of the Armenian Genocide was not in an American or any European museum, but in the Armenian Museum outside Vank Cathedral in Isfahan. They even had newsreels from the time showing the atrocities (sort of like seeing the famous scene from Lawrence of Arabia in shaky black and white). All my life I'd heard nothing but the strongest denials from Turkey that there was even historcal evidence to prove that they carried out a genocide against the Armenians. So my outrage was huge when I realised I had to come all the way to Iran to see the documents, photos and newsreels showing it as clear as day.
Last year we actually visited the Genocide Memorial Museum in Yerevan, Armenia (akin to the one in Jerusalem in historical importance and emotional significance for each people). There, of course, the body of evidence and testimonials assembled is truly overwhelming and after a visit, just like in Jerusalem, you can never shake the horror from your mind.
That's the background to this "new outrage" :-) I've been feeling since I found out via information and links here that US Jewish lobbies and the Israeli government (in the http://Salon.com" rel="nofollow">Salon.com article I link to above) have actively thwarted attempts to recognise the Armenian Genocide and who perpetrated it.
Creepy! I had exactly the same experience - in the Armenian Museum outside Vank Cathedral...
Wow. We've been on the same wavelength for much longer than our presence at EA! Amazing.
And I'm also glad to see I'm not the only one (besides my husband of course) who's had this experience. It's incredible how effective the policy against recognition of the Armenian Genocide has been.
Even in Turkey the denial of the "Armenian Genocide" isn`t anymore absolute - at the anniversary of the beginning of the massmurder - at the 24. April - there was a commemoration at the Bosporus in Istanbul.
But this event was protected by 1000 (!) policeman.
By the way - since decades all the American Presidents made statements to commemorate the massmurder and to condemn the armenian genocide annuely at the 24 of April. As distinct from statements of former American presidents ( with one exception ) Obama used a plain language: Obama talked clearly about of a "Genocide of Armenian people".
Hi Gunniy,
I remember watching the scenes from Ankara on Aljazeera English last April. It was so encouraging to see for the first time a Turkish commemoration of the Armenian Genocide - even though they were surrounded by security forces. I wonder what the police thought was going to happen - someone would drop a candle and start a fire? ;-). I believe the use of "Genocide of Armenian people" was a first for Mr Obama as well. Last year he said "massacre".
Hi Catherine
you are right - but what happened in Istanbul is just only one indicator of the condition of the turkish society: Deeply devided. One part takes care for their islamic behavior in trying to find consensus with the arabic neigbours including Iran - and the other part is strongly orientated to the west. It`s a hard clash of culture - from my point of view I can see it every day.
Some times ago everybody inside Istanbul was taken into prison when talking about the Armenian genocide. Many turkish writers made this expierience. Therefore I was really astonished when I watched the commemoration on TV.
Catherine - Did you find a solution with your problems with disqus? I really don`t want to critizice - but to me the special quality of EA - never reached by others - are both:
It`s the execellent work of Scott and the comments of readers. To me its not possible to separate both aspects - the comment section is the salt inside the soup cooked by Scott.
Have you read the last comment of Megan? This kind of contributions - as others - I always found very interesting - and I can`t conceive EA without this kind of comments.
But what I can`t understand - why is it so difficult to involve commentators who doesn`t wan`t or can`t use disqus? Be on EA or not to be - shouldn`t be a question of the used software. Ore not?
Hi Gunniy,
I'm aware of the huge cultural differences within Turkey because here in Holland there is a major Turkish community, so a fair number of internal Turkish debates are also held here. Also, we get Aljazeera English, which either in news reports or documentaries has good coverage of Turkish issues and has devoted special attention to cases like the murder of the Armenian Turkish journalist Hrant Dink and the criminal charges brought against against novelist Orhan Pamuk for his statement "Thirty thousand Kurds have been killed here, and a million Armenians. And almost nobody dares to mention that. So I do".
As for Disqus, nothing has improved. Neither Mozilla nor Disqus have addressed the lack of compatibility between Disqus and Firefox. I use a workaround: I open EA in Internet Explorer and use FF for everything else. Otherwise I'd be having non-stop browser crashes. Since I tried this way of working I've been fine.
Thanks for asking btw - I was planning on posting this tip for others but didn't want to put it back in a very old thread.
Gunniy,
Is this the last comment by Megan you mean?
http://enduringamerica.com/2010/06/18/iran-document-the-tajzadeh-criticism-and-the-reformist-way-forward-sahimi/#comment-57595538" rel="nofollow">http://enduringamerica.com/2010/06/18/iran-docu...
If so, you'll see in my comments below hers that I'm troubled by the same issue.
Catherine
I mean this two comments inside the link above - at first the info Megan gave about Khomenei who dealt with the American President Carter before his comeback to Iran. And the next comment about disqus politics. This was the reason of writing my comment about the "connection between the soup and the salt". Because I don`t want to miss this type of comments for software reasons.
http://enduringamerica.com/2010/06/18/iran-analysis-how-europe-can-help-mamedov/#comment-57551531" rel="nofollow">http://enduringamerica.com/2010/06/18/iran-anal...