THE ARMENIANS, THE JEWS AND ISRAEL
Thu, May 26, 2011
Until recently, Israel chose to ignore the genocide in the Ottoman
empire.
In 1915-16, during World War I, the Turks were responsible for the
massacre of as many as 1.5 million Armenian inhabitants of the Ottoman
Empire. Among the first to warn about the nature and scope of the
atrocity was Aaron Aaronsohn – the renowned agronomist from Zichron
Ya’acov who established the Nili spy ring, which in the course of
the war collected information about Ottoman military movements and
other strategic issues and passed it on to the British authorities.
Several of Aaronsohn’s relatives and colleagues actually witnessed the
bloody manifestations of the massacre. In November 1916, Aaronsohn
sent the British authorities a memorandum entitled “Pro Armenia,”
in which he described the atrocities.
The previous month, he had sent a long letter to Judge Julian Mack –
a leading American Zionist – in which he tried to convince him to
adopt a pro-British position, inter alia describing the massacre of
the Armenians and claiming that the Ottoman policy against both the
Armenians and the Jews (who he feared might suffer a similar plight)
had “made in Germany” written all over it. The Ottoman Empire, it
may be recalled, was an ally of Germany in the war, and at the time
Aaronsohn was writing, many Jews held pro-German or neutral positions.
The Jewish yishuv in Palestine, the Zionist Organization and the State
of Israel since 1948 could not claim ignorance of what happened to
the Armenians.
And yet until recently, Israel has chosen to ignore the event, with
numerous excuses, each of which is shameful in its own right.
The first is that since Turkey denies that a systematic massacre of
Armenians ever took place, as well as minimizing the numbers involved
(a number that justifies the term genocide), and since for years
Israel regarded Turkey as a strategic ally – one of the few Muslim
states it could regard as such – Israel would do well not to “let
sleeping dogs lie.”
The fact that other states, including the US, adopted a similar policy
seemed to justify Israel’s position.
The second excuse was that referring to the massacre of the Armenians
as genocide might belittle the enormity of the Holocaust – an Israeli
attitude that applies to other cases of genocide as well (and is,
in my opinion, not just unjustified, but disgraceful). The Jewish
Holocaust – in terms of both its circumstances and its manifestations
– is without doubt unique. Nevertheless, this does not justify our
belittling or ignoring the horrors that have occurred to other peoples.
The third excuse is that since we do not like others criticizing
our treatment of the Palestinians, we should avoid criticizing other
states for the way they treat their minorities. This excuse is simply
foolish, and may easily boomerang, because no matter how problematic
our record of treating our Arab citizens (and the Palestinians in
general) might be, it bears no resemblance to the sorts of acts we are
talking about. On the contrary, given the nature of the Arab-Israeli
conflict, our record – though certainly not free of blemish – cannot
be described as involving massacres or acts of genocide at all, as
some, including the Turks, can. The Turks are the first who should
be confronted with the difference, and it is a shame that only now,
when Israel’s relations with Turkey have deteriorated to unprecedented
levels due to unbridled Turkish attacks, Israel has finally decided
to have its public say on the Armenian genocide.
For years, various MKs from Meretz have tried to get the Knesset to
hold a public debate on the subject. Until last week, the only sort
of debate to which the Foreign Ministry, speaking in the name of
the government, would consent was one in the Knesset Foreign Affairs
and Defense Committee, whose proceedings are confidential and whose
minutes are not published.
On May 18, the plenum finally decided, following a motion brought
forth by MK Zehava Gal-On, to hold an open debate on the subject
in the Education, Culture and Sports Committee – the proceedings of
which are public, with full minutes published on the Knesset website.
No one opposed the subject’s being referred to the committee,
and all the speakers, from Right and Left, religious and secular,
spoke in its favor. All one can say is: “better late than never,”
but what a shame it took so long.
The writer is a former Knesset employee.