Shameless Wall Street Journal Ad Denies Ottoman Turkish Armenian Genocide

Saturday, 23 April 2016

Shameless Wall Street Journal Ad Denies Ottoman Turkish Armenian Genocide

Ottoman Empire 1915 – 1922 genocide against Armenians in their historic homeland massacred around 1.5 million victims.

Turkey remains in denial of an indisputable historic fact. Journal management disgracefully published a full-page ad, intended to deceive, sponsored by FactCheckArmenia, a shameless genocide denial group.

Its web site airbrushes disturbing facts from history, twisting and reinventing them, claiming no genocide occurred, at the same time accusing Armenians during WW I of treason against the Ottoman Empire – blaming their victimized people for war waged by the great powers.

A WSJ spokesman’s explanation of why the publication ran the ad fell flat, saying:

“We accept a wide range of advertisements, including those with provocative viewpoints. While we review ad copy for issues of taste, the varied and divergent views expressed belong to the advertisers.”

On May 28, 1948, the UN War Crimes Commission prepared a report on “The Massacres of the Armenians in Turkey,” saying:

On May 28, 1915, France, Britain and Russia denounced Turkey’s “crimes against humanity and civilization.” A key passage reads:

“In the presence of these new crimes of Turkey against humanity and the civilization, the allied Governments (know) that they will be held personally responsible for the so-called crimes of all members of the Ottoman Government as well as those of the officers who would be involved in such massacres.”

The never ratified 1920 peace Treaty of Sevres with Turkey required it “hand over to the Allied Powers the persons responsible for the massacres committed during the continuance of the state of war on territory which formed part of the Turkish Empire on the 1st August 1914.”

The Treaty of Lausanne (July 23, 1923) replaced it. Genocidal crimes were excluded. A “Declaration of Amnesty” was declared for all offenses committed from August 1, 1914 – November 20, 1922.

In 1914, over 2.5 million Armenians lived in Ottoman Turkey. Today 75,000 at most remain, mostly in Istanbul and Western areas. The Eastern Armenian heartland was decimated.

In April 1915, hundreds of Armenian religious, political and intellectual leaders were arrested, detained or exiled. Most were systematically murdered.

By summer, about 250,000 Ottoman army Armenians were placed in forced labor battalions. They were over-worked, starved, or executed.

Without leaders or able-bodied youths, ethnic cleansing occurred throughout Ottoman Turkey and Asia Minor.

Death marches followed. Men and older boys were separated and executed, women and children force-marched, raped, tortured, and otherwise abused. Most deportees died of starvation, disease, or massacres.

About 500,000 escaped to Russia, Arab countries, Europe or America. Ottoman Armenia was virtually eliminated.

Turkey’s denial of cold, hard facts can’t refute one of history’s great crimes – slow-motion genocide against its Kurdish population ongoing under Erdogan.