Author: Ani Basmajian

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan

Israel Invokes the Armenian Genocide in Slamming Erdogan

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey on Sunday threatened military action against Israel accusing the Jewish State of atrocities being carried out against Palestine and Lebanon. The Turkish leader cited interventions in Karabakh as a blueprint for its proposed attack.

Meanwhile, Israel responded by accusing Turkey of “building its economy on the Armenian Genocide,” calling Erdogan a “megalomaniacal dictator.”

“We must be strong to prevent Israel from doing this to Palestine,” Erdogan told reporters on Sunday. “Just as we entered Karabakh, just as we entered Libya, we will do the same to them,” he added. “There is nothing to prevent us from doing it. We just need to be strong so that we can take these steps.”

This became yet another public admission by Erdogan that Turkey was actively involved and engaged in the 2020 Artsakh War, a fact being downplayed by Turkish diplomatic circles and ignored by the international community.

Earlier in the day, in an address to the International Asia-Political Parties Conference being convened in Istanbul, Erodgan called Israel’s actions “barbaric.”

“The blood-stained genocide network continues to kill innocent children, women, and civilians without any rule or principle, ignoring all kinds of human values,” Erdogan said at the conference.

Sharply condemning Erdogan’s remarks, Israel’s Heritage Minister Amichai Eliyahu accused the Turkish leader of hypocrisy, noting Turkey’s history of territorial aggression in Cyprus and its treatment of minorities, particularly the Kurds, reported MSN.com.

“Turkey, which conquered Northern Cyprus and controls Kurdish territories in the east, dares to lecture us on morality. Turkey, which built its economy on the Armenian Genocide, dares to accuse us of genocide. Turkey, which enforces Islamization by force, dares to speak about human rights,” Eliyahu said in a statement. 

“The hypocritical Erdogan doesn’t impress anyone with this current circus,” he continued, describing the Turkish president as a “megalomaniacal dictator” with “imperialist ambitions” who sees himself as “an Ottoman Sultan while being no more than a pathetic tyrant of a country with a collapsing economy and a dead democracy.” 

Eliyahu’s remarks went further than only criticizing Erdogan, implying that it was time for Israel and Turkey to “close this sad chapter of relations” and vowing to bring a proposal before the Israeli government to sever diplomatic ties with Turkey completely.

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A scene from the popular demonstration that led to Armenia’s Independence in 1991

A court in Yerevan has banned the screening and distribution of a film about the 1990’s Armenian Independence movement, which has references to the 1988 Karabakh Liberation Movement. The court sided with a lawsuit filed by Armenia’s Public Broadcaster.

The film, “Our Path to Independence” was directed by Tigran Paskevichyan and produced on commission by Public Television of Armenia—the very entity that brought the lawsuit. The court ruling prevents the film from being screened in the public.

The decision effectively prevents audiences from seeing the progression of the 1988 Karabakh movement and the declaration of independence in 1990, Paskevichyan told CivilNet.

The broadcaster argued in court that it owns the rights to the film because it financed the project.

“They say, we paid for it, so we bought it,” the director told Civilnet, adding that he would have accepted such a claim from a private company, but not from the public broadcaster.

The lawsuit was partly based on a screening held on May 2, 2025, at the headquarters of the opposition Armenian National Congress political party. Paskevichyan said he screened the film not only on that date but on multiple other occasions.

Before the legal dispute, the director had asked the broadcaster for permission to screen the film on other platforms but received no response. Despite the ruling, he said he plans to continue organizing screenings.

The chairman of the Public Broadcaster’s Council, Vasak Darbinyan, told CivilNet he was unaware of the case. Other council members could not be reached either.

This is not the first time Paskevichyan has faced obstacles in screening his work. His earlier film, Armenia’s Lost Spring, about the March 1, 2008 violence and the events that preceded it, also struggled to secure venues. He said similar restrictions existed under both former presidents Robert Kocharian and Serzh Sargsian, but described the current situation as unprecedented.

“Something has always been banned under every administration, but reaching the point where you are not even allowed to show your own film is the ultimate low,” he said.

Independence narrative under renewed scrutiny
The controversy comes amid broader political debates over Armenia’s independence narrative. The 1990 Declaration of Independence, which references the unification of Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh, has become a point of contention in both domestic and foreign policy discussions.

Azerbaijan has called the reference a challenge to its territorial integrity and has demanded constitutional changes as part of peace negotiations. Armenian authorities have launched a constitutional reform process, and a new draft is expected to remove references to the declaration.

Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said in parliament last week that the declaration had embedded a “logic of conflict” in Armenia’s statehood.

“If you build your independence on conflict with all your neighbors, you make it impossible to live in your environment without external help,” he said, adding that such a framework increases dependence on outside actors.

The controversy can also be tied to Pashinyan’s rejection of the concept “historical justice,” which he said continuously paints Armenians as victims and prevents complete acceptance of their status as Armenians.

His reference, made last week, was directed to forcibly displaced Artsakh Armenians, who, he claimed should “settle down” in Armenia and accept their fate, without seeking justice for their displacement, which has been deemed ethnic cleansing by Azerbaijan.

Pashinyan said that by claiming ethnic cleansing Armenia was opening the door to counter claims of the same crimes by others.

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