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Asbarez: Projects for Peace Honors Anoush Baghdassarian as 2026 Alumni Award R

June 29, 2026June 29, 2026 Maral Chavushian

by Contributor

June 29, 2026

in Latest, News, Top Stories

Anoush Baghdassarian has been named the recipient of the Projects for Peace 2026 Alumni Award. She will use the award to advance her ongoing work with Rerooted, a community-centered digital archive and advocacy organization that preserves Armenian stories, strengthens identity, and supports justice efforts for Armenian communities facing displacement, violence, and erasure.

The annual award provides up to $50,000 in support of ongoing peace-building efforts of past Projects for Peace grant recipients who demonstrate innovation and persistence in working for peace and transforming conflict.

Baghdassarian received a 2017 Projects for Peace grant as an undergraduate at Claremont McKenna College for a project cofounded with Ani Schug, then an undergraduate at Pomona College, focused on documenting the stories of Syrian-Armenians who had resettled in Armenia during the Syrian conflict. Their project, “Restorative Memory: Eternalizing and Empowering Narratives of Syrian-Armenian Refugees,” sought to preserve whole histories: family memories of the Armenian Genocide, community life in Syria, experiences of war and displacement, and the work of rebuilding in Armenia. “Ani and I are over the moon,” Baghdassarian says. “Thank you all so much for this incredible honor and opportunity. We are so grateful.”

What began as a summer project has since grown into Rerooted, an organization founded on the idea that no matter how many times Armenians have been rerouted by conflict, they have continued to reroot in strong, thriving communities. Today, Rerooted has grown to include more than 25 communities, collected more than 400 testimonies, and trained more than 90 team members in its work of preserving memory and using it for action.

For Baghdassarian this announcement is only the start of how the award will raise awareness of Rerooted. “We can’t thank you enough for believing in this project and we are so excited to stay closely involved with you all and for all the events celebrating this important work.”

Rerooted celebrates and explores Armenian identity in communities around the world and advocates for their just and safe futures. Its digital collections of testimonies, photographs, and documents are designed to be accessible to researchers, teachers, artists, community members, and advocates. Through those collections, Baghdassarian and her collaborators create educational resources, interactive maps, legal reports, cultural heritage projects, and tools that show the resilience of Armenian communities while also supporting accountability and recognition.

The organization’s work now spans preservation, education, language, cultural heritage, and justice. Rerooted’s oral history interviews are used in classrooms from middle school to graduate school and address themes including human rights, diaspora, identity, refugee experiences, language preservation, minorities in the Middle East, and displacement. Its hundreds of hours of spoken testimony and time-coded transcripts also support efforts to preserve endangered Armenian dialects, including Western Armenian and Artsakhtsi Armenian.

With only a fraction of the 500 stories translated, transcribed, and published on the Rerooted website, Baghdassarian plans to use Project for Peace funds to tackle the backlog and “bring the resources to life.” This includes her vision to curate an interactive exhibit that would rotate among museums around the globe.

Baghdassarian’s work with Rerooted also reflects a deep commitment to justice. The organization listens to the needs of Armenian communities and follows the lead of narrators to explore mechanisms for accountability and recognition. Rerooted has partnered with law school clinics, student groups, the United Nations, and nongovernmental organizations to support report writing, case building, submissions to international legal bodies, and other efforts to ensure that Armenian voices are included in justice processes.

Netta Avineri, executive director of the Kathryn Wasserman Davis Collaborative in Conflict Transformation, says Baghdassarian’s work demonstrates how storytelling, documentation, and community trust can serve as tools for transforming conflict.

“Anoush embodies so many core principles of conflict transformation, deepening relationships with communities for collective awareness-raising around core social issues,” said Avineri. “Her collaborative process bridges disciplines, perspectives, and methods.”

Baghdassarian first listened to—and shared—the stories of Armenian people in her youth. Growing up in an Armenian family in New York, she regularly visited an Armenian senior home as a curious, impassioned middle school student.

“I would just go and spend time with the residents, asking them questions about their lives and listening to their stories, to their memories of the Armenian Genocide,” said Baghdassarian, adding that “every year since sixth grade” she asked her history and social studies teachers, “Can I please present about the genocide?”

Baghdassarian also recalls attending annual commemorations on Armenian Genocide Remembrance Day—April 24—which honors victims of the 1915 massacre of more than 1.5 million Armenians. Witnessing genocide deniers host their own assembly “literally on the block next to us” became a defining moment for Baghdassarian, one that led her to dedicate her academic and professional life to seeking “accountability for atrocity crimes.”

Since her original Project for Peace, Baghdassarian has continued to build on the connection between memory and accountability. She earned her JD from Harvard Law School and her master’s degree in human rights studies from Columbia University, and her professional path has included work connected to international law, human rights, and Armenian justice efforts. Her continued leadership of Rerooted, in close partnership with Schug and a broad network of volunteers, interns, legal fellows, language specialists, and community members, has turned a student peace project into a lasting platform for education, preservation, and advocacy.

Launched in 2022, the Kathryn Wasserman Davis Collaborative in Conflict Transformation is the centerpiece of a seven-year, $25 million grant aimed at incorporating conflict transformation skills into every corner of the Middlebury community while building a global network of scholars and practitioners.

Projects for Peace, which is headquartered at Middlebury College’s Center for Community Engagement, is a global program that encourages young adults to develop innovative, community-centered, and scalable responses to the world’s most pressing issues. Since 2007, students have used Projects for Peace grants to build knowledge, improve skills, and establish identities as peacebuilders and changemakers in communities around the world.

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CC: The Digital Blockade How Big Tech suppresses Armenian voices on social med

June 29, 2026June 29, 2026 Emil Lazarian

· JUNE 29, 2026

By Laura L. Constantine

AGBU Magazine

In September 2023, as Azerbaijani forces launched their offensive in Nagorno-Karabakh, forcing over 100,000 Armenians from their homes, another crisis was unfolding online. Armenians trying to document events in real time began noticing something unusual: posts disappearing, accounts restricted, views sharply reduced. Terms like “Artsakh,” “Armenian Genocide,” and even “genocide” itself appeared to trigger automated moderation systems. At the very moment global attention and awareness were most needed, Armenian voices were being muted.

This was not an isolated incident or a technical error. It points to a broader structural issue at the intersection of platform governance, financial incentives, and geopolitical pressure. This raises serious concerns for journalists, organizations, and anyone invested in free _expression_ in the Armenian world.

Not a Glitch

Evidence suggesting disproportionate moderation of Armenian-related content has accumulated over time. During the 2022–2023 blockade of the Lachin Corridor, the Facebook account of Artsakh’s President Arayik Harutyunyan, was suspended on August 26, 2023. According
to CyberHUB-AM, an Armenian NGO that tracks digital rights violations, the suspension resulted from a sustained campaign of complaints filed by Azerbaijani users, a pattern the organization had previously documented in its reporting on platform abuse during the 2020 War. This action effectively cut off a key communication channel at a critical moment, when information from the ground was already scarce. According to Armenpress, the office of President Arayik Harutyunyan confirmed that his Facebook account had been subjected to a sustained campaign of coordinated complaints over several months, which progressively restricted its reach, limiting the visibility of posts and disabling certain functions, until the page was rendered completely inaccessible on August 26.

The issue extends beyond isolated accounts. According to Freedom House’s Freedom on the Net 2021 report on Armenia, Facebook banned the accounts of numerous Armenian opinion leaders and media outlets for violating its terms of service. Rights activists noted that the decisions lacked transparency, and some of those banned were accused of hate speech without publicly available evidence to support the claims. The same report documented that during the 2020 War, Armenian media outlets’ YouTube channels were taken down as a direct result of mass reporting campaigns coordinated by users from Azerbaijan and Turkey.

Some journalists report experiencing “shadowbanning.” Content technically remains visible but receives minimal distribution, effectively preventing it from reaching any meaningful audience. Even the use of the word “Artsakh” appears, in some cases, to trigger automated content moderation systems.

The experience is not theoretical for those managing accounts for Armenian organizations. “We have had to learn to work around the platform’s invisible boundaries,” says Stephen Colangelo, the social media coordinator at AGBU. “Words like ‘genocide’ trigger sensitivity filters on social media platforms. Posts about Artsakh repeatedly see reduced visibility, not because they violate any policy, but simply because of the subject matter.” The result, he explains, is a form of self-censorship born of necessity. “You reword things, you soften the language, you adapt, because if you push too far, your reach drops, your account gets restricted, or worse, you get suspended entirely.”

Mariam Khaloyan, the director of Congressional Relations at the Armenian Assembly of America, observed similar dynamics. “During the 2020 War, it became increasingly difficult to effectively disseminate information related to Armenia and Artsakh. While content was being shared widely, I observed that its reach did not align with typical engagement patterns, particularly when posts were informational in nature or called for action.” She adds: “I have observed a consistent pattern. Content that is strictly informational—rather than provocative or algorithmically engaging—tends to receive disproportionately low visibility and engagement across platforms.”

Her experience reflects a larger reality of how platforms operate. As Tauhid Zaman, professor at Yale, explains, “TikTok and these other platforms select the content they show you. They can promote anything, demote anything. That means they can shift opinions any way they want.”

Image

Caption

Mariam Khaloyan (middle) of the Armenian Assembly of America highlights how Armenian-focused content often struggles to reach audiences. Photo credit / Facebook: Mariam Khaloyan

Incentive Driven

Social media platforms may present themselves as open public spaces, but they are, first and foremost, advertising businesses. These financial relationships influence which voices get amplified and which get quietly pushed aside.

According to Meta’s own published business case studies—of which there are multiple featuring Turkish Airlines—the carrier has run large-scale, targeted advertising campaigns across Facebook and Instagram for over a decade. As Reuters Events reported in an interview with Turkish Airlines’ Interactive Marketing manager, the airline manages over 20 local Facebook and Twitter accounts as part of a philosophy of being “globally yours as a local,” making it one of the most intensively involved airlines in social media activity globally.

Azerbaijan’s influence on Western institutions, meanwhile, has been documented through investigative reporting. The Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) uncovered what became known as the “Azerbaijani Laundromat”—a $2.9 billion laundering scheme used, in part, to cultivate influence across political and media institutions in Europe and beyond. According to OCCRP’s investigation, the money was used to pay off Western politicians and silence criticism of Azerbaijan’s human rights record abroad. The same investigations described efforts to channel government narratives through third-party voices— academics, think tanks, and commentators—to create the appearance of independent analysis where there was none. The real-world consequences of this scheme have since been confirmed by courts: as OCCRP reported and Deutsche Welle covered, a Munich court convicted former German Bundestag member Eduard Lintner of bribing public officials on behalf of Azerbaijan—the first time a German lawmaker was found guilty of such an offense.

Stealth Suppression

Beyond financial relationships, platform systems themselves can be exploited. According to Meta’s own Adversarial Threat Report, the company has formally acknowledged and documented coordinated networks of fake accounts engaged in mass-reporting campaigns targeting journalists, activists, and political figures. In Meta’s own words, “mass reporting activity” occurs when adversarial networks “coordinate to abuse our reporting systems to get accounts or content incorrectly taken down,” typically with the intention of silencing others. Critically, Meta’s reports have directly documented how, in the South Caucasus region, the company removed 589 Facebook accounts, 7,665 pages, and 437 Instagram accounts linked to the Youth Union of the New Azerbaijani Party, a network that posted content touching on “tensions between Armenia and Azerbaijan” and “Armenia’s actions during past escalations in Nagorno-Karabakh.”

Some journalists report experiencing “shadowbanning.” Content technically remains visible but receives minimal distribution, effectively preventing it from reaching any meaningful audience.

High Stakes

Conflicts unfold in real time across social media feeds, and the ability to document, share, and bear witness has become inseparable from the conflict itself. When one side’s accounts are suspended, their hashtags suppressed, and their posts quietly buried by automated systems, it is a form of erasure. Narratives shape how the world responds to crises, how governments decide to act, and ultimately, how history is written. Stories only survive if they are allowed to circulate. Suppressing an Armenian voice posting from Stepanakert in September 2023 is a decision about what future generations will know about what happened there. Platforms have become the arbiters of which voices reach the world during a conflict, and they are no longer neutral infrastructure.

The Armenian Assembly of America has witnessed similar patterns directly. “I have heard similar concerns from other organizations and community members. While largely anecdotal, these observations suggest a broader, shared experience across the community,” shared Khaloyan.

Bot Business

Armenians are not alone in raising these concerns. A December 2023 report by Human Rights Watch, Meta’s Broken Promises: Systemic Censorship of Palestine Content on Instagram and Facebook, documented widespread suppression of pro-Palestinian content across Meta platforms, including removals, account restrictions, and reduced visibility. Similar concerns have been raised by Uyghurs and Kurdish communities, pointing to a broader pattern of platform over-moderation affecting groups whose narratives often fall outside dominant media frameworks.

Compounding these challenges are the coordinated bot networks and disinformation campaigns, which actively distort online discourse. Bots rely on networks of automated or semi-automated accounts that amplify hostile narratives, flood comment sections, and artificially boost misleading or fabricated content. Investigations by CivilNet document how “bot” campaigns target Armenia on fake websites designed to mimic credible international media outlets. AI-generated videos and hundreds of anonymous accounts also work in concert to legitimize false claims.

Such infrastructure is not unique to actors targeting Armenia. Turkey has developed one of the most extensively documented state-linked troll and bot ecosystems in the world. Known as “AK Trolls,” these networks of fake accounts disseminate propaganda for the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) and target the opposition, operating through bots, compromised accounts, and coordinated retweets. In June 2020, Twitter suspended and removed 7,340 accounts attributed to the youth wing of Turkey’s ruling AKP for organized inauthentic activities. According to the Stanford Internet Observatory, the network consisted of batches of fabricated personalities created on the same day, alongside centrally managed compromised accounts. Research has also found that in 2019, fake accounts or bots generated an average of 26.7 percent of the daily top ten Twitter trends in Turkey. Turkey’s bot infrastructure has also been deployed internationally, including to legitimize its 2019 military offensive in northeastern Syria—demonstrating that these networks serve outward-facing geopolitical narratives directly relevant to the South Caucasus.

Azerbaijan operates in close alignment with this model. Researcher Karena Avedissian documents how Azerbaijan attempts to influence external audiences through troll farms, social media propaganda, Western PR companies, and funded academics to legitimize its narratives. Notably, Azerbaijani trolls on Twitter have repeatedly been ignored, while networks of other state actors’ bot armies have been taken down—a gap that, as Avedissian warns, allows autocratic regimes to use social media as a tool of disinformation, intimidation, and harassment abroad.

Together, these dynamics create a dual pressure: legitimate content can be limited through moderation or reduced visibility, while false or hostile narratives are simultaneously amplified. For smaller communities like Armenians, this imbalance can significantly shape what the world sees, and what it does not.

Content that is strictly informational—rather than provocative or algorithmically engaging—tends to receive disproportionately low visibility and engagement across platforms.

Algorithms Win

Algorithms reflect the priorities, incentives, and limitations of the institutions that design them. When those systems consistently disadvantage certain voices—particularly those documenting conflict or historical injustice—the consequences extend beyond individual posts or accounts. The issue is no longer about visibility. It is about who gets to participate in the global conversation and whose narratives are permitted to shape public understanding.

As Khaloyan emphasizes, the implications extend beyond visibility alone. “It is deeply concerning. Limiting the visibility of the word ‘genocide’ undermines efforts to educate the public and preserve history. Without the ability to share and discuss these realities openly, it becomes increasingly difficult to promote awareness and prevent future atrocities.”

When one side of a conflict can flood a platform with coordinated reports or purchase influence through advertising relationships, they do not need to win the argument. They simply need to ensure the other side is not heard. In an era where public opinion, international intervention, and even legal recognition increasingly follow the narrative that dominates online, the power to silence is the power to win.

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Why Turkey’s World Cup zone at Grand Park is ‘shocking’ and ‘offensive’ to Ar

June 29, 2026June 29, 2026 Karakhanian Suren

· JUNE 29, 2026

The massive, 3,050-square-meter pop-up with large, red signs and balloons was visible from the sky when NewChopper4 was overhead.

By Helen Jeong, nbclosangeles.com

While the nation of Türkiye may be successfully showing off its sports diplomacy skills during the 2026 World Cup, the team’s visit to Los Angeles has triggered painful memories and provoked historical grievances from Southern California’s Armenian community.

This week, Türkiye rented Gloria Molina Grand Park to set up the “Türkish Vibe Zone,” which was meant to create interactive fan experience and promote its national soccer team, especially for the historic match with Team USA Thursday. (Team Türkiye stunned the world Thursday evening by defeating the United States.)

The massive, 3,050-square-meter pop-up with large, red signs and balloons was visible from the sky when NewChopper4 was overhead. While the installation under the slogan “Türkiye is here” may seem harmless, Armenians in Los Angeles expressed anger and frustration, with some calling it a blatant provocation.

LA Councilmember Adrin Nazarian, one of the Armenian officials in LA, said what Türkiye set up at Grand Park is shocking and politically motivated, accusing the country of “abusing” LA’s hospitality.

“Turkiye is Here? No. The City of Los Angeles is here, and we extend no welcome to Genocide deniers or advocates of lawless aggression,” Nazarian, who is of of Iranian-Armenian descent, said. “We welcome athletes and their supporters as our guests, but our guests should leave their dictator’s propaganda at home and get it out of our park.”

The gesture is especially more offensive since LA is known to be home to the largest Armenian diaspora with a Armenian Genocide memorial set up at the very downtown LA park, Nazarian’s office told NBC Los Angeles.

Armenians’ animosity toward Türkiye stems from the 1915 Armenian Genocide, during which the Ottoman Empire systematically killed an estimated 1.5 million Armenians.

The deep historical trauma continues to reverberate as Armenians believe Türkiye has not taken accountability for the genocide amid ongoing border disputes in the region, according to Dr. Benjamin Radd, political scientist and senior fellow at the Burkle Center for International Relations at the UCLA International Institute.

“(There is) a lack of any proper, formal recognition, acknowledgement and accountability of what Türkiye historically had done,” Radd explained. “And then, in the present day, the conflict Armenia has had with Azerbaijan — and Türkiye siding with the Azerbaiijanis as sort of ethnic kinfolk — has exacerbating tension.”

However, Radd believes Türkiye’s Grand Park display may have more to do with its own diplomatic ambitions, not the purpose of provoking the Armenian community in LA, largely because of the ongoing war in Iran.

“There’s a tension on Türkiye as possibly being the next phase of diplomacy between the United States and Iran, between Israel and its partners,” Radd said. “It’s at an interesting political and diplomatic crossroads where it can play these multiple roles.”

Türkiye, which should be aware of the existence of a large Armenian community in LA, may also be sending a signal to the Iranian diaspora and Jewish-Americans.

“If the Türkish government is trying to basically give a diplomatic show of force, it has arrived now as a diplomatic power, as an international player that is to be respected,” the political scientist said. “It wouldn’t be surprising that it’s using a very large and public venue like what we’re seeing here as the place to showcase its arrival on the global stage, not necessarily as a slight to the Armenian community.”

The nine-day pop-up at the downtown LA park was expected to wrap up on Friday.

NBCLA reached out to Music Center, which operates Gloria Molina Grand Park, to see whether county officials discussed the conflict between Türkiye and Armenian people in LA before renting out the space but did not receive a response.

NBCLA also attempted to speak with officials at the Türkish consulate in Los Angeles.

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ANCA Joins Hellenic Allies, Bipartisan Congressional Call to Block $700 Millio

June 29, 2026June 29, 2026 Vanyan Gary

· JUNE 29, 2026

— Armenian and Greek American Organizations Back Titus Joint Resolution of Disapproval, Letter to House Leaders Against F-35 Program Readmission

WASHINGTON, DC – The Armenian National Committee of America (ANCA) is mobilizing alongside Hellenic American allies and a bipartisan group of U.S. House members to block the Trump administration’s proposed sale of more than $700 million in General Electric F-110 jet engines to Turkey — engines slated to power Ankara’s KAAN next-generation combat aircraft.

“Arming Erdogan doesn’t defend a friend,” said ANCA Executive Director Aram Hamparian. “Just the opposite. It arms and emboldens an enemy to attack our friends.”

The administration formally notified Congress of the sale on June 24, 2026, triggering a fifteen-day window for Congress to act. The ANCA is urging Armenian Americans to contact their Representatives in support of two efforts led by Rep. Dina Titus (D-NV): a Joint Resolution of Disapproval to block the engine sale outright and a letter to House leadership urging the introduction of a resolution to block Turkey’s return to the F-35 program.

Armenian Americans and supporters can take action now at anca.org/noengines.

Turkey was removed from the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter program in 2019 after Ankara purchased the Russian-made S-400 air defense system, prompting CAATSA sanctions imposed during Trump’s own first term. The FY2020 National Defense Authorization Act explicitly bars F-35 transfers to Turkey so long as Ankara retains the S-400. Turkey has not disposed of the system. The Trump administration is now simultaneously pursuing the engine sale and exploring a pathway to return Turkey to the F-35 program — moves that lawmakers from both parties say conflict directly with federal law.

Bipartisan Congressional Opposition

Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-NY), Ranking Member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, condemned the administration’s decision to bypass Congressional review: “The administration informed me it would once again bypass Congressional review for more than $700 million in defense articles to the Turkish military in yet another deeply troubling example of this administration’s open contempt for Congress’s oversight authority. The State Department did not even attempt to justify its decision. It did not invoke any emergency authority, did not present a written rationale, and for months refused to make a good-faith effort to brief me.”

Rep. Dina Titus (D-NV) announced she would act: “If POTUS continues down this path, I will introduce a joint resolution of disapproval.”

Rep. Chris Pappas (D-NH) was direct: “The law is clear: the Trump administration is required to certify to Congress that Turkey is in compliance with our laws before any sale can even be considered. We cannot reward Erdogan’s government while it continues to violate U.S. law and threaten our reliable, democratic allies. Absolutely no F-35s to Turkey.”

Rep. Josh Gottheimer (D-NJ) called on the administration to reverse course: “Erdogan cannot be trusted, this decision must be reversed.”

Rep. Nicole Malliotakis (R-NY) and Rep. Mike Lawler (R-NY) made clear the opposition crosses party lines. “There is bipartisan opposition,” said Rep. Malliotakis. “Turkey should NOT receive our best jets and military equipment.” Rep. Lawler agreed: “Congress legally prohibited the transfer of F-35s to Turkey in the first place. I remain deeply opposed to the sale of one of America’s most advanced military platforms to Turkey and do not believe it is in the best interests of the United States.”

Rep. Frank Pallone (D-NJ), Founding Co-Chair of the Congressional Armenian Caucus, called it “completely unacceptable — but also unsurprising — that Trump would override Congress to give a fellow wannabe dictator more tools to consolidate his rule.”

Hellenic American Organizations Sound the Alarm

Hellenic American Leadership Council (HALC) Executive Director Endy Zemenides noted that the legal and strategic grounds for blocking the sale have only grown stronger: “The reasons Turkey was kicked out of F-35s, the reasons CAATSA sanctions were applied, the reasons Congress has held arms sales are all still operative. In fact, the bill of particulars against Ankara is even longer today.”

Zemenides rejected the framing of U.S. arms access as a diplomatic courtesy: “Turkey remains in violation of U.S. law and continually undermines U.S. interests. Access to American arms is a privilege to be earned, not a ‘gift bag’ for hosting a NATO summit.”

AHI President Nick Larigakis issued a statement condemning the administration’s posture: “The American Hellenic Institute strongly condemns the Trump administration’s latest policy direction toward Türkiye, which reportedly seeks to advance defense cooperation with Türkiye at the expense of congressional oversight and adherence to U.S. law. Türkiye is a failed NATO partner that continues its illegal occupation of the Republic of Cyprus, routinely violates Greece’s sovereignty in the Aegean, undermines NATO cohesion through its ties with Russia, enables malign actors in the Middle East, including Hamas, and is a habitual violator of international law and norms, as well as U.S. law.”

The Titus Letter, the Proposed Legislation, and the Armenia Connection

Rep. Titus is leading two distinct Congressional efforts to push back against the administration’s Turkey arms policy.

The first is a Joint Resolution of Disapproval to block the F-110 engine sale outright. Congress has a narrow fifteen-day window from the date of formal notification — June 24 — to introduce such a resolution. Under the Arms Export Control Act, any joint resolution of disapproval must pass both chambers and could be vetoed by President Trump, making swift and broad Congressional support critical.

The second is a letter to House Majority Leader Steve Scalise and Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries calling on House leadership to introduce a Joint Resolution of Disapproval under CAATSA Section 216(c)(3) should the administration move to readmit Turkey to the F-35 program by circumventing or waiving CAATSA’s statutory requirements without a credible legal basis. Only the Majority or Minority Leader may initiate that process under the statute — making the letter’s ask both targeted and urgent ahead of the NATO summit in Ankara on July 7-8.

The letter makes clear that Turkey’s conduct across the region — not only its possession of the S-400 — disqualifies it from receiving one of America’s most advanced weapons platforms. Among the concerns cited: Turkey’s “material support to Azerbaijan in its military campaigns against Armenia.” The letter argues that rewarding this pattern of behavior with F-35 access risks emboldening further destabilizing conduct and undermining allies who have played by the rules.

Take Action

Armenian Americans and supporters are urged to contact their Representatives immediately in support of the Titus Joint Resolution of Disapproval, which blocks the F-110 engine sale, and the Titus-led letter to House leadership on F-35 readmission.

Visit anca.org/noengines to send a message to your Representative now.

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Photo Caption: The ANCA is mobilizing alongside Hellenic American allies and a bipartisan bloc of Congress to block the proposed $700 million U.S. jet engine sale to Turkey and any effort to return Ankara to the F-35 program in violation of federal law.

https://www.thecaliforniacourier.com/anca-joins-hellenic-allies-bipartisan-congressional-call-to-block-700-million-turkey-jet-engine-sale/?fbclid=IwY2xjawSv6dtleHRuA2FlbQIxMQBzcnRjBmFwcF9pZBAyMjIwMzkxNzg4MjAwODkyAAEeH__3BqriSW6-z6gtk6VAhS7Pz17BktRZZwW8bJvBjsLPAaZ5J8GItZlpU6g_aem_BTmOZJWe72JbWVkhJ2m1xA

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Three Armenians in Medieval Iceland

June 29, 2026June 29, 2026 Mary Lazarian

· JUNE 29, 2026

By Edward Tashjian

Keghart

A short passage in one of Iceland’s earliest histories preserves three Armenian names: Petrus, Abraham, and Stephanus. In the early twelfth century, the Icelandic priest and historian Ari Thorgilsson listed them among foreign churchmen who had reached Iceland in the eleventh century. He called them the “three ermskir.” Later Icelandic texts identify Petrus, Abraham, and Stephanus more explicitly as coming from Armenialand. This is the starting point for the limited evidence that survives.

The reference appears in Íslendingabók, or The Book of the Icelanders, Ari’s account of Iceland’s settlement, conversion, and early church. In a section on foreign bishops, he adds five men “who claimed to be bishops.” Among them are the three Armenians: Petrus, Abraham, and Stephanus. Ari lists them without pausing to explain their presence.

The phrase “claimed to be bishops” applies to all five men, not only the Armenians. Ari may have doubted their standing, or he may simply have marked them as visitors whose authority was not fully accepted in Iceland’s developing church. Either way, it shows that episcopal authority was a live question in early Christian Iceland. The sentence separates their presence from the question of their authority.

Ari gives no further details. He does not say where the men came from, whether they travelled together, or what route brought them north. He names no church where they served and no Icelandic community attached to them. No Armenian chronicle has yet been securely connected with Petrus, Abraham, or Stephanus. Three names cannot be turned into a complete story of an Armenian mission to Iceland. That silence sets limits on what the surviving record allows us to reconstruct.

Iceland lies far from the places usually associated with Armenian medieval movement. Ari’s sentence does not establish an Armenian community on the island, but it does record Armenian clerics in Iceland. One of the natural questions that arises is: was their visit an isolated episode, or were Armenian churchmen known in Iceland more broadly?

Grágás, the medieval Icelandic law code, gives that question a sharper form. One clause deals with bishops and priests who come to Iceland without knowledge of Latin. It specifically names two groups: ermskir and girskir, meaning Armenian and Greek/Russian. The wording does not speak vaguely of foreigners: it names the two groups. Icelanders were permitted to attend their services if they wished.

The rest of the clause is more revealing still. Such clergy were not to receive payment for services, and Icelanders could not accept priestly office from them. A bishop who did not know Latin could not consecrate a church or confirm children. If he did so, the act had to be performed again by the resident bishop, and a fine followed. The provision addresses permission to worship and the limits of recognized authority.

Yet, a legal code is not a visitor’s logbook. Grágás cannot tell us how many Armenian clergy reached Iceland, whether they came before or after Petrus, Abraham, and Stephanus, or whether the clause was written because of any particular visit. Laws can preserve inherited rules and anticipated problems as well as responses to events. Still, the provision shows that Armenian and Greek/Russian clergy formed a meaningful enough category for Icelandic churchmen to regulate. The law tells people what they may do when such clergy appear and which powers they may not recognize. It shows that Icelandic churchmen thought the matter necessary enough to define in law.

That does not prove a sequence of Armenian arrivals after Ari’s three men. It does make it harder to dismiss them as a random anecdote. Ari’s account gives us three names but Grágás places Armenian clergy within a legal discussion of worship, payment, ordination, confirmation, and church consecration. The concern is practical because the law sets the terms of contact between Icelanders and such clergy, defining both the worship they could share and the authority those clergy could exercise.

The two sources should be read together, but not collapsed into one complete story. Íslendingabókrecords three named Armenians among visiting churchmen in Iceland. Grágás sets rules for Armenian and Greek/Russian clergy outside the Latin-speaking hierarchy. Neither proves an Armenian settlement or permanent Armenian church in Iceland. What they give us is concrete evidence: three Armenian names in one of Iceland’s earliest histories, followed by a medieval Icelandic law that names Armenian clergy in a rule about worship and authority. It leaves a serious historical question open: how often did Armenian churchmen reach the far North, how influential were they in Iceland, and how much of that contact has disappeared from the record?

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On June 26, 1984, Turkish Cypriot Leader admitted on British TV that the 1958

June 29, 2026June 29, 2026 David Nargizian

· JUNE 29, 2026

On 7 June 1958, a bomb exploded at the entrance of the Turkish Press Office in Nicosia. The bombing was immediately blamed on Greek Cypriots. Turkish Cypriot mobs responded by looting and burning Greek Cypriot shops and homes across the capital, marking a turning point in the ethno-sectarian violence that would scar the island for the next two decades.

Twenty-six years later, in a 1984 interview for the British ITV documentary End of Empire: Cyprus, Britain’s Grim Legacy (produced by Granada TV), Turkish Cypriot leader Rauf Denktaş admitted that the bomb had been placed by Turkish extremists.

His direct quote from the documentary:

“There was an explosion at the information bureau to the Turkish consulate. A crowd had already gathered there, a crowd of the Turkish Cypriot community. And they almost immediately decided that Greeks had done it and they were swearing vengeance against the Greeks and so on.”

And, on the same program, former Turkish diplomat Emin Dirvana confirmed what had really happened:

“A friend of mine, whose name must still be kept secret, was to confess to me that he had put this little bomb in the doorway in order to create an atmosphere of tension so that people would know that the Turkish Cypriots mattered.”

Denktaş had actually admitted the same thing earlier, in 1964, to the Turkish newspaper Milliyet. The Turkish Cypriot ambassador to Nicosia at the time, Emin Dirvana, also wrote in Milliyet on 15 June 1964:

“I was informed that on 7 June 1958 a bomb had been planted in the Turkish press office in Nicosia by persons who, as was later established, had nothing to do with the Greek Cypriots. The Turks of Nicosia were then incited to be overwhelmed by holy indignation and perpetrated acts similar to those committed on 6 and 7 September 1955 in Istanbul.”

According to a later Special Branch report of the colonial police, the bomb “was planted by the Turks as a pretext for the arson and looting” that followed.

This is widely regarded as a key piece of evidence on how the intercommunal violence that culminated in the 1974 division was deliberately inflamed from within the Turkish Cypriot side.

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CC: Turkey denies independent Turkish media access to NATO meeting

June 29, 2026June 29, 2026 Hagop Kamalian

· JUNE 29, 2026

ANKARA, Turkey (AP) — Several independent Turkish media outlets were denied accreditation to cover an upcoming NATO summit in Ankara, journalism groups said Thursday, calling the decision an affront to media freedoms.

U.S. President Donald Trump is expected to join other leaders from the 32-member alliance for the July 7-8 summit in the Turkish capital, during which allies will, among other issues, debate defense spending and attempt to project unity.

Turkish journalists from news organizations viewed as opposition‑leaning or independent — including Halk TV, Sozcu TV, Cumhuriyet newspaper, T24 news website and ANKA news agency — have been excluded from covering the summit, the Turkish Journalists’ Association and other media solidarity groups said.Heat dome coming to US

The journalists were neither given a reason for the rejection nor offered the opportunity to appeal the decision, the association said.

“Preventing certain media outlets from covering events of public importance undermines freedom of information and reporting,” the association said. “International organizations must act in line with the democratic values they claim to uphold.”

NATO spokeswoman Allison Hart said in a statement posted on X that for summits held outside of its Brussels headquarters, the trans-Atlantic alliance relies on the host country to assess and approve journalists from that country.

“We are in contact with Turkish authorities on accreditation for the NATO Summit in Ankara. It is very important for NATO that media can attend major events in person,” she said.

Turkish officials haven’t commented on the accreditation issue.

Turkey is implementing wide‑ranging precautions in the lead‑up to the summit. Earlier this week, security forces detained more than 200 people suspected of links to extremist groups, the Ankara chief prosecutor’s office said.

But opposition parties and media reports said that a politician, an academic, a journalist and prominent LGBTQ activist, and lawyers were among those detained, calling for their release.

In a statement on Thursday, Human Rights Watch also criticized the detentions and urged NATO to ensure that basic democratic rights are respected during the summit.

“The misuse of terrorism laws to conduct mass arrests and silence people in the run-up to a NATO summit flies in the face of the founding values of the alliance,” said Benjamin Ward, the group’s deputy director for Europe and Central Asia. “The authorities should immediately release those detained, and NATO should insist that peaceful _expression_ and assembly must be permitted around the summit.”

The Turkish government’s Communications Directorate insisted on Thursday that those who were detained “were assessed to have been involved in activities connected to various terrorist organizations.”

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168: Ruben Hayrapetyan’s representative Vahagn Dallakyan submitted a motion

June 29, 2026June 29, 2026 Emil Lazarian

June: 29, 2026

Today, the Anti-Corruption Court, presided over by Judge Rudolph Avagyan, begins the investigation of the case concerning the “Harsnakar” hotel complex in Sevan, owned by businessman Ruben Hayrapetyan, former president of the Football Federation of Armenia (FFA).

During this trial, the interests of Ruben Hayrapetyan are represented by lawyer Vahagn Dallakyan, the representative of the interests of the Prosecutor’s Office is Liana Beloyan. The other defendant is the lawyer of “Sevan National Park” SNOC.

At the beginning of the court session, Vahagn Dallakyan said that they will submit a motion to apply statute of limitations, then the public prosecutor presented the content of the lawsuit, after which Ruben Hayrapetyan’s representative asked him questions.

Next, Vahagn Dallakyan presented the petition, the signed written version of which was provided to the parties, after which the prosecutor’s office requested a two-week period to present a position.

Ruben Hayrapetyan’s representative did not object. The court granted the motion.

The court session was adjourned. The next court session in this case will be held on July 15 at 5:30 p.m.

Let’s remind that on March 11 of this year, the General Prosecutor’s Office of the Republic of Armenia issued a message, according to which the Prosecutor’s Office filed lawsuits regarding a number of properties, among which were the administrative complex of the “Harsnakar” hotel (50 Yerevanyan highway, Sevan city), the cottages of the “Harsnakar” hotel (48/6 Yerevanyan highway, Sevan city), built by Ruben Hayrapetyan, former president of the Football Federation of Armenia, former deputy of the RA National Assembly. The Sevan mansion (38, 3rd Street, Leisure Zone, Sevan City).

The above three claims have been admitted to court proceedings.

In the claim of the cottages of the “Harsnakar” hotel, which refers to the claim to invalidate the land lease agreement signed between “Harsnakar” LLC and “Sevan National Park” SNOC on February 3, 2003 and to return the buildings and structures built on the land to the Republic of Armenia, a means of securing the claim was applied. the defendant is forbidden to perform such actions that will lead to the change of the owner of the buildings and structures mentioned in the claim.

As a result of the study carried out by the Prosecutor’s Office in the field of protection of state interests, it was found that there was no basis for signing the lease agreement. In particular, no tender was actually conducted before the signing of the lease agreement, and there were also no grounds for providing the land with the right to lease without a tender, as defined by Clause 36 of the Government’s decision N 286 of April 12, 2001.

Let us also inform you that from December 2025 until today, as a result of the implementation of the petitions of the Prosecutor’s Office, 83 buildings, main and non-main, illegally built by different people were dismantled (demolished) on 33 plots of land on the shore of Lake Sevan, below the absolute mark, and 2 contracts were resolved (terminated) by the “Sevan National Park” SNOC. in

[SEE VIDEO]

Details in the video.

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What will happen if Israel recognizes the Genocide, will it radically change it?

June 29, 2026June 29, 2026 Baghdasarian Karlen

June: 29, 2026

Israel and the recognition of the Armenian Genocide. In a post titled “Between Realpolitik and Moral Considerations”, Russian analyst Sergey Markedonov referred to the issue of Israel’s recognition of the Armenian Genocide, which has been actively discussed in the press and on the Internet in recent days.

Markedonov first informed that Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar took the initiative to recognize the tragedy of the Armenians in the Ottoman Empire at the beginning of the 20th century as genocide, one of the leading Israeli periodicals, “The Jerusalem Post”, dedicated a special article to this topic, and the minister himself wrote the following on his X social network page on June 25: “The recognition of the genocide committed against the Armenian people in the last years of the Ottoman Empire’s existence is both a moral and a historical duty.” Therefore, he also made it clear that if Saar’s initiative is approved at the session of the Israeli government, it will be put to the vote of the Knesset.

Markedonov presented a remarkable detail. the Israeli political discourse is built on the principles of the exclusivity of the Jewish historical experience.

According to him, as a rule, justifying this or that ideas and decisions, Israeli politicians refrain from referring to other cases. However, the above article in The Jerusalem Post has a striking sub-headline announcing that as of 2026, 32 countries, including the US, Canada, Russia and Germany, have recognized the Armenian Genocide in the Ottoman Empire.

The topic of recognizing the Armenian Genocide is not new for Israel. According to Eldad Ben Aharon, a well-known expert on this issue, this issue came to the fore in 1982, when Turkey pressured the Jewish state to cancel a conference dedicated to the Holocaust and Genocide. At the time, Israel agreed to demand that the organizers cancel the event in order to ensure the safe exit of Jews from Iran and Syria across the Turkish border. It was then that the Israeli unofficial approach was formed. in society and in the academic environment about the topic, the possibility of wide discussions without official recognition of the Armenian Genocide.

Even before the establishment of Erdogan’s “Justice and Development” party (which ideologically represents a combination of “democratic Islamism”, neo-Ottomanism with shades of imperial resentment and the principles of Turkish solidarity) in the Turkish political Olympus, the Ankara-Tel Aviv strategic axis had cracked. During the last quarter of a century, relations between Turkey and Israel have experienced ups and downs. But every time the curve went down, the politicization of the Armenian question rose in the Jewish state. Relevant bills have been submitted to the Knesset several times. In this context, the initiatives of deputies Tamar Zandberg, Yair Lapid and Gideon Saar can be mentioned.

In 2025, the “heavy artillery” of Israeli politics went into action. Benjamin Netanyahu himself announced during an interview with the famous American businessman and podcaster Patrick Bet-David that he recognizes the events of the 20th century in the Ottoman Empire as the Armenian Genocide. However, words are not state-formulated decisions. In any case, today, when the relations between Ankara and Tel Aviv have descended into another sharp decline, there are more opportunities for new words in Israeli politics.

Nevertheless, it would be obvious simplistic to reduce everything to exclusively cynical calculations, although it would certainly be foolish to deny them. But in the Israeli human rights and academic community, an opinion has long been formed in favor of the recognition of the Armenian Genocide and the condemnation of the practices of the Ottoman authorities towards the various peoples of the empire. Let’s take even the scientific works and public activities of Professor Yair Auron. The authorities also have to take into account the moral aspects of the problem,” Markedonov elaborated.

He emphasizes that if Israel becomes the 33rd state to recognize the Armenian Genocide, will it radically change the situation in the Caucasus and the Middle East?

“The answer is negative. Such recognition will not destroy the Azerbaijani-Israeli strategic relationship. And the United States will do everything to put out the fire in the relations between Ankara and Tel Aviv. However, the most important thing is that the concept of “Real Armenia” of Nikol Pashinyan and his supporters does not focus on the traumas of the past, and the struggle for the recognition of the genocide is not Yerevan’s foreign policy priority today, Markedonov believes.

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Armavir Regional State College in political tides. what?

June 29, 2026June 29, 2026 Emil Lazarian

June: 29, 2026

Armenia Hakobyan, the organizer of Armavir Regional State College, who was a candidate for parliament on the electoral list of the “Strong Armenia” alliance, today informed: he was fired from his position on grounds of no confidence for his political views.

“A job to which I have dedicated myself for 31 years, I have loved my students and my students, brought up children worthy of the motherland, which is evidenced by the letter of thanks from the minister of KGSMS, the letters of thanks from the directors, and most importantly the appreciation of my students, parents and colleagues,” wrote Hakobyan, noting that being a candidate for the “Strong Armenia” bloc’s deputy is a great honor for him, because the interest of the motherland is paramount.

168․am contacted Armenia with Hakobyan to learn about the details.

“On June 24, my director called me, said that my conversation will be unpleasant, then he gave me a notice, where he presented 4 points, none of which corresponded to reality. Երեք օրում ինձնից բացատրագիր էր ուզում, ես հիմքերով բացատրագիրն ուղարկել եմ։

He tells me that I entered the college during vacation, preached to the students, which is an outright lie, claimed that I did not report for work on the 23rd of the month, but I reported for work and took a tour of the students with his permission, that I went on vacation, citing family reasons that arose at that time…

I presented the explanation letter to him, gave reasons, claiming that his accusations are not true at all, but on Monday, through the inspector, he sends the paper, where it is written that he is dismissing me on the basis of lack of trust,” said Armenia Hakobyan.

Our interlocutor stressed that a legal process will be launched.

«Ամեն ինչ արվում է անհիմն․ it is clear that it is political, well, naturally, what is happening in the country, the same should happen here,” he added.

Նա նշեց նաև, որ լավ հարաբերություններ է ունեցել տնօրենի հետ, ենթադրում է, որ նա գուցե մարզպետարանի ճնշման ներքո է գործել։

168․amtried to get in touch with Gemma Sargsyan, director of Armavir State Regional College. our phone calls remained unanswered.

To remind, during the pre-election period, Armavir State Regional College was at the center of a political scandal. Arman Tatoyan published a recording during the press conference, where you can hear how the lecturer (or director) of the Armavir Regional State College instructs the students to be in the square at 17:00 to participate in Nikol Pashinyan’s campaign. According to the recording, when the student named Arsen resists, the professor demands to do the assigned thing.

By the way, Armenia Hakobyan informed that the lecturer involved in the recording case, who is also a member of the “Civil Contract” faction of the Armavir Council of Elders, received only a reprimand at the college, while he was dismissed without clear grounds.

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Not a Glitch

Incentive Driven

Stealth Suppression

High Stakes

Bot Business

Algorithms Win

The massive, 3,050-square-meter pop-up with large, red signs and balloons was visible from the sky when NewChopper4 was overhead.

By Helen Jeong, nbclosangeles.com

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