Tag: the Young Turks

  • Uygur acknowledges Armenian Genocide

    Uygur acknowledges Armenian Genocide

    The Young Turks” founder Cenk Uygur acknowledges Armenian Genocide, refuses to change the name of show.

    The Young Turks founder Cenk Uygur has recognized the Armenian Genocide. Cenk Uygur is a Turkish-born American political commentator and main host/ co-founder of the American commentary program, The Young Turks.

    He has a history of writing opinionated pieces and editorials in various columns, including university newspapers denying the Armenian Genocide. He claims that he redacted his statement and that the Armenian Genocide did in fact happen. However, he refuses to change the name of his show, “The Young Turks.

    the young turks

    Zartonk Archives (May 13, 2019)

    The Young Turks were part of the Committee for Union and Progress (Ittihadists) that overthrew the sultan in the 1913 coup d’etat. Amongst their ranks, were the nefarious triumvirate who became the masterminds behind the systematic orchestration to annihilate over 3 million Christians in the Ottoman Empire between 1915-1923. This included exterminating over 1.5 million native Armenians, ethnically cleansing them of their ancestral homeland.

    Uygur uses the excuse that he was born in Turkey as one of the reasons for his false statements at diminishing the merit of genocide, though his family moved to America when he was young.

    In 1991, while at the University of Pennsylvania, Uygur wrote an article for The Daily Pennsylvanian (the student newspaper) called “Historical Fact or Falsehood“, which imputes false claims of genocide to Armenian demands for land and money.

    An excerpt: “Hence, once you really examine the history of the time it becomes apparent that the allegations of an Armenian Genocide are unfounded. So the question arises of why the Armenians would bother to conjure up such stories, and even go as far as, committing approximately 200 acts of terrorism since 1973 to further their cause, resulting in countless deaths and injuries to government officials and civilians. The answer is that they want their demands met. Their demands are that they receive close to one-half of the land of the Republic of Turkey for a new Greater Armenia, and that every Armenian claiming to be injured by the alleged genocide be compensated with cash reparations. That is why every year they push the U.S. Congress to pass a bill declaring the Armenian Genocide a historical fact…”

    In a letter to Salon in 1999, he again argued that there was no evidence for that genocide:

    “. . . every non-Armenian scholar in the field believes it is an open question whether this event was a genocide. Is it the claim of the article that all of these people are tainted by the tentacles of the Turkish government? If not, then why is it not pointed out that no one outside of the “Armenian position” believes it is a genocide? Why is it assumed that the “Turkish studies side” has the burden of proof in overturning the verdict of Turkish guilt? It is because of the underlying assumption that despite what these people in “Turkish studies” say, there must have been a genocide.”

    “This is an embarrassing position for someone to take who’s an American progressive”

    Uygur recently lost in a congressional race for California’s 25th district, losing to Christy Smith, gaining a total of 5% of the votes. Nevertheless, Uygur did not receive the endorsement of California’s Democratic Party. Then presidential candidate, Bernie Sanders, endorsed him, then retracted his endorsement shortly thereafter.

  • Greeks, Turks and Armenians

    Greeks, Turks and Armenians

    How do Greeks, Turks and Armenians feel about each other’s countries?

    I feel sad. Deeply sad.

    We could be a great! A united superpower, if we had stood together and haven’t killed each other in hundreds of thousands.

    Yes Ottomans mistreated Armenians, mistreated Greeks but they certainly mistreated Turks too.

    In the end it was Turkish Kemalists who pulled the rug under the Ottoman Sultanate, It was us who destroyed the caliphate. We finished the work which we all Greeks, Armenians and Turks started together in the first place. I am talking about the Young Turk movement.

    young turks armenians greeks turks constitution

    Yes we forced the first constitution together. Here Turkish, Greek and Armenian leaders signing.

    young turk movement armenians greeks turks constitution

    Our great endeavor was hijacked and sabotaged. Minorities sought their own independent small and weak countries. Organizations got corrupted, people sought personal glory. We were led to slaughter each other by the imperialistic powers.

    Even after such brutality, all of us Greek, Armenian and Turk we still miss our collective songs, cuisine, our neighborhood. When outside in a mixed nationality Turks and Greeks always find each other. Its always the Greek guy who laughs when the other stare confused by the lame ass naughty joke the Turk makes.

    Greeks were the great intellectuals and traders, Armenians were the great craftsman and artisans, Turks were the farmers, herders, great soldiers.

    Divide and Conquer was at its best.

    Today we would have none of the worries, State would be much more secular with strong and healthy non-Muslim population. We would have no conflict in the Mediterranean. Caucasian region would be secure. None of the tragedies would have happened.

    Here is a song which the lyrics are adopted by Bülent Ecevit. Here the songs goes like

    Sıla derdine düşünce anlarsın (When you get home sick you understand)
    Yunanlıyla kardeş olduğunu (You are brothers with the Greek)
    Bir rum şarkısı duyunca gör (When you hear a Greek song, You will see )
    Gurbet elde İstanbul çocuğunu (A fellow child of Istanbul, alone in a foreign land)

    Türkçenin ferah gönlünce küfretmişiz (We swore in open hearted Turkish)
    Olmuşuz kanlı bıçaklı (We feuded)
    Yine de bir sevgidir içimizde (But its love that is in our hearts)
    Böyle barış günlerinde saklı (It surfaces in times of peace)

    Bir soyun kanı olmasın varsın (Let a clan not be about blood)
    Damarlarımızda akan kan (The blood that is running through our veins)
    İçimizde şu deli rüzgâr (The crazy wind blows inside)
    Bir havadan (İs of the same air)

    Bu yağmurla cömert (Generous is the rain)
    Bu güneşle sıcak (Warm is the sun)
    Gönlümüzden bahar dolusu kopan (Our hearts full of springs)
    İyilikler kucak kucak (Goodness is aplenty)

    Bu sudan bu tattandır ikimizde de günah (From this water, from this taste is the sin for both of us)
    Bütün içkiler gibi zararı kadar leziz (Tasty as sin, as all the harms of drinks)
    Bir iklimin meyvasından sızdırılmış (Distilled from the same fruit of this climate),
    Bir içkidir kötülüklerimiz (Our evils are one drinks)

    Aramızda bir mavi büyü (A blue magic between us)
    Bir sıcak deniz (A warm and gentle sea)
    Kıyılarında birbirinden güzel (With coasts as beautiful as any)
    İki milletiz (We are two peoples)

    Bizimle dirilecek bir gün (One day together we will resurrect)
    Ege’nin altın çağı (The golden age of the Aegean)
    Yanıp yarının ateşinden (Tomorrow the new fire will burn)
    Eskinin ocağı (The old oven)

    Önce bir kahkaha çalınır kulağına (First you will hear a familiar laughter)
    Sonra rum şiveli türkçeler (They you will hear Turkish in Greek accent)
    O Boğaz’dan söz eder (He or She speaks about the Bosphorus)
    Sen rakıyı hatırlarsın (And you remember the Rakı)

    Yunanlıyla kardeş olduğunu (You remember you are Brothers with the Greek)
    Sıla derdine düşünce anlarsın (When you get homesick)

  • Greek mayor to build Turkish memorial in Thessaloniki

    Greek mayor to build Turkish memorial in Thessaloniki

    greek mayor to build turkish memorial in thessaloniki
    Yiannis Boutaris. AP photo

    ATHENS – Agence France-Presse

    The mayor-elect of Thessaloniki, Greece’s second-largest city, on Friday announced plans to build a monument to the movement headed by Mustafa Kemal Atatürk.

    Yiannis Boutaris, the city’s first Socialist-backed mayor in 24 years, said he intended to build the monument on a square associated with the Young Turks, the movement that created the Turkish Republic in the early 20th century.

    “Freedom Square took its name from Kemal Atatürk; this is where the Young Turk revolution began,” Boutaris told daily Eleftherotypia.

    Atatürk was born in Thessaloniki, which until 1912 was part of the Ottoman Empire. The city had a large Jewish and Turkish population at the time but vestiges of their presence have all but disappeared since.

    “You can’t deny history, these people lived here,” Boutaris said, adding that he also intended to build a memorial to the city’s Jewish martyrs on the square. Most of Thessaloniki’s Jewish residents, some 50,000 people, were removed to concentration camps and perished when Greece was conquered by Nazi Germany in World War II.

    “We would like Turks and Jews to come to the city in a pilgrimage to their family heritage, in the same way as we go to Constantinople,” (sic.) said Boutaris, using the Greek name for Istanbul, the former capital of the Byzantine Empire.

    A 68-year-old wine producer and ecologist, Boutaris will formally assume his duties Jan. 1 after his election this month. Greece and Turkey have been rivals for centuries, fighting several wars and nearly coming to blows in 1996. Relations have since improved but remain strained over territorial and airspace disputes in the Aegean Sea.

    , November 19, 2010