Posted on 10/24/2007 11:42:45 AM PDT by SJackson
When a US Congressional committee approved a resolution recognizing the World War I-era massacre of Armenians by the Ottoman Empire as genocide, Turkey's reaction was swift and harsh: Blame the Jews.
Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Photo: AP In an interview with the liberal Islamic Zaman newspaper on the eve of the resolution's approval October 10 by the US House Committee on Foreign Affairs, Turkish Foreign Minister Ali Babacan said he had told American Jewish leaders that a genocide bill would strengthen the public perception in Turkey that "Armenian and Jewish lobbies unite forces against Turks." Babacan added, "We have told them that we cannot explain it to the public in Turkey if a road accident happens. We have told them that we cannot keep the Jewish people out of this."
The Turkish public seems to have absorbed that message.
An on-line survey by Zaman's English-language edition asking why Turks believed the bill succeeded showed that 22 percent of respondents chose "Jews' having legitimized the genocide claims" - second only to "Turkey's negligence."
US Jewish community leaders reject that argument and privately say Ankara has only itself to blame for its failure to muster the support necessary to derail the resolution, which is seen in Turkey as anti-Turkish.
Resentment lingers in Washington over the Turkish Parliament's failure to approve a March 2003 motion to allow US troops to use Turkish soil as a staging ground for an invasion of Iraq.
And an official visit to Ankara in early 2006 by Hamas leader Khaled Mashaal angered many of Israel's supporters on Capitol Hill, who have been among Turkey's most vocal proponents as part of a strategy of developing strong ties between Turkey and Israel.
"The Hamas thing was really serious," said an official from a large Jewish organization. "There is less sympathy for Turkey because of what some see as an anti-American, anti-Israel, anti-Jewish policy that is there."
The official added, "I think there's a sense on the Hill that Turkey is less of an ally. There is a sense that it's a different Turkey."
Soner Cagaptay, coordinator of the Turkish research program at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, echoed that thinking.
"The lingering effects of 2003 resonate," Cagaptay said. "Some people are still angry with Turkey."
Malcolm Hoenlein, executive vice chairman of the Conference of Presidents of Major American Jewish Organizations, said the Jews should not be blamed for the Armenia genocide bill, particularly not by Turkish officialdom.
"We regret that some officials there are trying to lay the onus of what's happened on the Jewish community," Hoenlein told JTA. "They shouldn't allow some people to manipulate this initiative in Congress to the detriment of this relationship, which is beneficial for both sides."
Hoenlein, who met with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan during last month's UN General Assembly, said, "There is the same commitment on the part of the organized community to support Turkey."
Observers in Turkey say the public perception of the Jews' outsized role in the resolution's passage is based on an element of fact mixed with a greater amount of fiction.
In August, the Jewish-run Anti-Defamation League, facing pressure from grassroots activists, reversed its long-held policy of not recognizing the Armenian genocide when ADL National Director Abraham Foxman declared that what happened to the Armenians was "indeed tantamount to genocide."
But Foxman maintained the ADL's position, opposing a congressional resolution on the matter. Such a resolution would strain US-Turkey ties and jeopardize ties between Israel and Turkey, Israel's main Middle Eastern ally.
Nevertheless, the ADL's reversal was seen in Turkey as a major blow to the country's diplomatic and public-relations campaign against Armenian efforts to get a genocide resolution passed in Washington.
"Obviously the ADL's switch was not good news," said Suat Kiniklioglu, a member of the ruling Justice and Development Party and spokesman for the Turkish Parliament's foreign affairs committee.
Mustafa Akyol, an Istanbul-based political commentator who frequently writes about religious issues, said the strong reaction to the ADL's policy switch and the perception that it somehow legitimized the Armenians' claims were based on an "inflated sense" of American Jewish power among the Turkish public.
"There is a belief that [the resolution] couldn't have happened without Jewish support," Akyol said.
The House bill passed the committee by a 27-21 vote, with seven of the committee's eight Jewish members voting in favor of Resolution 106. The full House of Representatives has yet to vote on the resolution.
Yet despite the vote, US Jewish groups said they lobbied against the bill - just as they have done in the past.
"Behind-the-scenes support [from US Jewish groups] has been quite powerful" in persuading congressmen to oppose the bill, said Cagaptay. It may yet help prevent the bill from being brought to a vote in the full House.
Turkish Jewish community leaders declined to be interviewed for this story, but Turkey's Jewish leaders published a full-page advertisement in the Washington Times on the day of the vote voicing their opposition to the House bill.
"We believe this issue should be decided first and foremost on the basis of evidence adduced by historians, not on the basis of judgments by parliamentarians or Congressmen, who naturally (and understandably) may be influenced by concerns other than historical facts," the statement said. "There have been insinuations that our security and well-being in Turkey is linked to the fate of Resolution 106. We are deeply perturbed by any such allegations."
According to Cagaptay, "there is a trilateral relationship, which is Turkey, Israel and the American Jews. The relationship is about good ties between Turkey and Israel, and good ties between Turkey and the American Jewish community, which makes up for the fact that Turkey has not had, historically, a strong presence on the Hill."
This time, however, it seems Jewish opposition to the bill was not enough to overcome support by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), a longtime supporter of Armenian-American issues, who has vowed to bring the bill to a full House vote.
If you recall Turkish officials implied there might be reprecussions for Turkish Jews if the resolution passed. As though that should be a consideration. They really believe the Jews control the west stuff.
The most vitriolic, nasty anti-semites that I’ve ever conversed with (via message boards) are all leftists. Disgusting.
Paradox is...pacifists and anti-war types actually end up causing wars.
I understand. Jews like Reid, Pelosi, Kennedy, Murtha, Kerry, etc., are always stirring-up trouble.
95% of my fellow US Jews are stupid enough to vote Democratic, robot-like, feeling so good about their superior intellects. Feh.
Oh no! Not the JOOOOOOOOOOO....
....OOOOOOOOOS!
. . . "There is the same commitment on the part of the organized community to support Turkey."
Long before I read Prof. Huntington's "Who Are We?" I became disgusted and outraged at the various diasporas, their advocacy groups, and their Congressional caucuses. Prof. Huntington discussed how this has too often screwed up our foreign affairs. (I will add that it has also screwed Americans as often the diasporas lobby for their countries' advantages over America. China, India, and Mexico are the worst offenders IMO.)
Country A's citizens living here lobby and advocate publicly for penalties against country B. B fights back the same way using its citizens living here.
Enough already! Go home and fight!
Honestly i think this is just a small piece of coordinated foreign infiltration of our political system. If the blatant chinese money in the 1996 election wasn’t enough of a warning flag, the Hsu affair should convince even some more naive observers that our government is spectacularly corrupted not only by business, but by foreign interests as well.
“American Jews are largely pacifist...probably because of what they suffered in the holocaust.”
As I understand it, the vast majority of american jews are from families that immigrated well before the persecutions in Germany in the 1930’s started, much less the full-blown genocide and organized persecutions throughout german-controlled europe in WWII.
Nancy Pelosi is Jewish?
And here I’ve always thought she was just a very nice dressed beeyatch.....
We do better — we just blame the Democrats.
Yup, but ironically, this is something the Turks and the nutroots who support the Democraps can agree about, namely it's all the Jooooos fault. (If you don't know what I'm talking about, just wade over into the nutroots and you'll see how much anti-Semetism and anti-Israel rhetoric is rampant over there.)
And yes, I’m conflating the Democraps and the nutroots: The one is wholly dependent upon the other for its current existence.
PS To any Democrap voting Jews out there, I REALLY recommend wading over into the nutroots — bring your barf bags — to see exactly what your fellow Democrap supporters believe.
Pretty much, yup. But don't think for an instance that it was an accident. She needed SOMETHING bad to happen to Iraq because the news has been too good from there post-surge (which is bad, neh AWFUL, for the Democraps), and this was an easy one for her to pull off...
Oh brother ditto
Muzzies can’t “argument” without blaming the JOOOOOS.
who is ghost writing for the turkish muzzies....herr pat buchanan???
Wasn’t the Armenian Genocide a pogrom against the jews?
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