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  Turkey's Role as Savior of Many Jews   
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 Turkey has had a long history of protecting Jews; precisely why the nation's Sephardic Jewish population was loyal until the end. Here are a few examples of how Turkish diplomats lent a much needed hand to Jews during the dark days of the Second World War.

 

 
Holocaust Survivor Says Turkish Muslim Saved His, Other Jews' Lives

Rudi Williams, American Forces Press Service, WASHINGTON, April 23, 2002As a child on the island of Rhodes in the Aegean Sea, Bernard Turiel remembers listening to his parents and their 
friends talk about Jews being executed in concentration camps in Germany and Europe. Turiel remembers the horror stories about Jewish people's skin being made into lampshades and their bones being used to make soap. "These kinds of discussions left a fear and horrid impression on all of us," he said. 

Turiel survived the Holocaust, he said, thanks to Turks on Rhodes and because he and his family were Turkish citizens. During "Honoring the Turkish Rescuers," a special program held recently 
at Washington's Lincoln Theater, he talked about his World War II childhood experiences and how a Muslim saved his family and many others. 

Rhodes today is Greek. From 1912 until 1945, however, the Aegean island, just off the southwestern coast of Turkey, was an Italian possession. 

Italian dictator Benito Mussolini joined Germany in the war in 1940 and invited his ally to garrison troops in Italy and its possessions, including Rhodes, Turiel said. 

He said the island in the 1920s and 30s had a flourishing Jewish community of about 5,500 Jews out of a population of about 35,000. Although many Jews fled in the 1930s, those who remained on Rhodes were harassed by the Italian administration but relatively safe until Mussolini was deposed in July 1943 and Italy's provisional government declared an armistice with the Allies. The Germans used the confusion to overwhelm their one-time allies and seize control the Italians' "empire" in September 1943, he added.

"When the Germans took over, the adult males were asked to report to the headquarters offices," Turiel said. "That created great concern as to what was going to happen." The men were told to 
register and go home. This created a sense of relief, but also one of false security. When the Germans began rounding up Rhodes' Jewish community in July 1944, the men reported to the German headquarters again, Turiel said, but this time they were immediately incarcerated. Turiel and his father and brother were among the incarcerated. Two days after being detained, the men were standing in line waiting for transport to the continent and a concentration camp, Turiel recalled.

Selahattin Ulkumen, from DESPERATE HOURS

Selahattin Ulkumen, from DESPERATE HOURS

Enter 30-year-old Turkish Consul Selahattin Ulkumen, who approached the German general in charge and demanded that all Turkish subjects be released. He went further, demanding the spouses of Turkish citizens be released, invoking Turkish law that anyone married to a Turk is a Turk. The Germans assented. 

Ulkumen was playing a dangerous game. He bluffed the Germans there was no such law. "He was fully aware of the dangers for the Jewish community in Europe and made a valiant effort to save as many Jews as possible, including non-Turkish citizens," Turiel said. "He told my mother to go home and that our father would be released. My brother and I had acquired Turkish citizenship and had dual citizenship." 

Ulkumen's bold personal action is credited with saving 42 families. But his bluff didn't go unanswered. The Germans bombed his home in retaliation. His wife, nine months' pregnant, was seriously injured and died of her wounds while giving birth to the couple's son, Mehmet. Turiel said 643 of Rhodes' Jews were deported to Auschwitz; all but 151 were exterminated or died in the labor camps.

Ulkumen left Rhodes in August 1944 when Turkey ended diplomatic relations with Germany. Again, Jewish men were ordered to report to German authorities, Turiel noted. Only a handful still lived on the island. Turiel said the island was isolated, and the Germans by this time seemed more concerned about survival than victory.

"They permitted us to eventually leave the island in January 1945," said Turiel, a lawyer, who worked for the Federal Trade Commission from 1959 to 1966. He's now an attorney in private 
practice in northern New Jersey. 

The Turiels left Rhodes for Turkey in January 1945 and emigrated to the United States in July 1946. Turiel's father joined his two brothers in their import-export business. 

Turiel told the Lincoln Theater audience that Ulkumen was a man of great determination, courage and compassion. On June 11, 1988, the Anti-Defamation League presented Ulkumen its fourth annual "Courage to Care" award. 

"He was brought to New York for the presentation and we were reunited with him," Turiel noted. "My mother maintained correspondence with him over the years." 

Selahattin Ulkumen

Selahattin Ulkumen (1914-2003)

In June 1990, Ulkumen was installed on the Avenue of the Righteous Gentiles at the Yad Vashem in Israel. "What used to be known as the Righteous Christians has been changed to the Righteous Gentiles because Mr. Ulkumen was the first non-Christian to receive the award. He is a Muslim," Turiel noted. 

"Mr. Ulkumen will always be remembered as a courageous, compassionate and righteous person," Turiel said. "Today, he's frail and living in an old age home in Turkey." 

Turiel said he and his family and other Holocaust survivors are extremely fortunate to have come to the United States.

"We're grateful to live in this wonderful country where our forefathers had the great forbearance to think of the great democratic country and the need for a Bill of Rights," he said. "The Bill of Rights 
has provided the type of government and style of life that we enjoy and cherish. We never take it for granted. Having experienced our lives in Europe, we're most grateful to be in such a wonderful 
country as the United States."

 

Web site honoring Mr. Ulkumen: www.ulkumen.net

  RESCUE OF EIGHTY JEWISH TURKS 


 

NECDET KENT’S RESCUE OF
EIGHTY TURKISH JEWS IN MARSEILLES, FRANCE
FROM HITLER’S GERMANY




(Editor’s Note: Jak Kamhi, a Turkish Jew, and prominent businessman in Istanbul located Necdet Kent [now a retired ambassador] and obtained his personal account of his rescue of some eighty Turkish Jews in Marseilles, France from Hitler’s Gestapo. This deposition has been translated by Ayhan Özer and is reprinted below as an example of the proud Turkish historical record of saving Jews from persecution and death.)



In 1941, I was assigned by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Turkey as Vice-Consul to the city of Marseilles of France. During my tenure I was promoted to the rank of Consul, and I left Marseilles in 1944. In this post I reported to three Consul Generals in the following order: Mr. Bedri Arbel, Mr. Munir Pertev Subay, and Mr. Fuat Carim (All three passed away).

Necdet Kent, from DESPERATE HOURS

Necdet Kent, from DESPERATE HOURS

 At that time in France there were two kinds of Turkish Jews. One group consisted of those Jews who came to France at the end of World War I with the French occupation forces in Turkey. Those Jews either did not have any Turkish passport, or even if they did they had expired a long lime ago. The only official document they had possessed was their birth certificate in Arabic script that they had obtained from the Ottoman State. Technically, the Turkish consulates regarded those Jews as “non-citizens”. The French governments before World War II had been lenient on this matter and condoned their situations. As a result, the Jews in this category have never bothered to apply to the Turkish consulates or Embassy to regularize their status. Those in the second category comprised the Jews who had left Turkey with a valid passport, but at the outbreak of World War II they had not returned, and stayed in France. These Jews were regarded as “regular” Turkish citizens.

When Northern France had been occupied by Nazi Germany, along with the indigenous population the Turkish Jews as well made an exodus to the South, and came within our jurisdiction. The French authorities dubbed the non-French refugees as “Repliés” (In English retreated or receded). The situation in the South was far from being comfortable at that time, but when the German troops invaded southern France as well it became oppressive.

As soon as the Nazis took control of the region they began to search for the Jews and made arrangements to transport them to Germany in trains. At this time we received occasional complaints from the Jews who were Turkish citizens, which prompted us to take some action.

We made an appeal to all the Jews to apply to the Consulate in order to legalize their status. If the status of the Jews who had applied to our Consulate was regularized, we immediately issued a certificate of citizenry. If they owned any businesses, stores, etc., we admonished them to display in a prominent place of the premises a notice that we provided. This notice stated that the owner of the establishment was a Turkish citizen, and that the premises and its contents were under the protection of the Republic of Turkey. In the cases where the status of the Jews was not regularized, we asked them to fill out an application form, and issued a temporary certificate as testimony to their Turkish citizenship, which also advised the authorities that the official documents of the person concerned were being processed, and that the permanent papers would soon be issued to replace the interim certificates. These measures proved helpful and protected several Turkish Jews against troubles.

There have been times that our Consulate staff called on the Gestapo headquarters (sometimes three or four times a day) to solicit the release of our Jewish citizens who had been detained. Most of the times these efforts entailed persuasion, but sometimes we had to utter subtle threats to take up the matter with higher authorities. To make matters worse, the Italians as well had started to emulate the Germans and applied similar practices in their regions. At times we had arguments with the Italian consul to persuade him to stop this inhuman treatment of the Jews. I later learned that my efforts had borne fruit to some extent.

In one instance the anti-Jewish obsession manifested by the Gestapo reached dimensions that defied human dignity. For a while the military patrols had started a new practice to identify the Jews. This involved stopping the men whom they had suspected to be Jews right on the street, and making them drop their pants to see whether they were circumcised. This exercise led to the arrest of several Jews, as well as Muslim Turks. Many of them indiscriminately were taken to detention centers for a summary transportation to Germany. To protest and to put a halt to this ill-advised practice, I immediately went to the Gestapo Headquarters, and explained to the commandant that being circumcised had nothing to do with being a Jew. From the empty stare in his eyes I figured that he had not understood what I meant. Thereupon, I requested that a doctor examine me to further clarify my point. This came as a revelation to him, and he agreed to release several people.

The climax of all these efforts, however, came about in a showdown with the Gestapo authorities during a period of time when the Consul General was on leave and away from the office. One night, one of our employees, Sidi Iscan, a Turkish Jew from the city of Izmir, who was at the same time a translator in the consulate came to my home unexpectedly. (Sidi Iscan also passed away). He appeared to be in fear and agitated. In tears, he told me that the Germans had rounded up some 80 Jews in the city and took them to the train. I tried to calm him down, and assured that we would do something about it. We immediately went together to the Gare Saint-Charles, the main train station of Marseilles.

We approached the train and observed the situation for a brief moment. The sight was indeed beyond any imagination. We heard crying and moaning sounds coming from inside the boxcars. Through some partly open sliding doors we saw human beings crammed in the wagons. On the side of the cars I noticed the following words:

“This car holds 20 cattle and 500 kilo of feed.” My anger and desolation were overwhelming. I requested an explanation from the responsible person, whoever he was, for this undertaking. The Gestapo officer in charge came to the scene, and in an overbearing tone he demanded to know the reason for my being there. Restraining myself to remain within the limits of diplomatic courtesy, I told him that there must have been a gross error, a misunderstanding, because those people were Turkish citizens, and I demanded that he rectify this situation immediately. The Gestapo officer told me that he was merely carrying out the order he had received. Besides, he said, he was sure that those people were not Turks, but Jews. From his tone and attitude I sensed that he was adamant and not willing to make any concession.
Necdet Kent

Necdet Kent (1911-2002)

Thereupon, I turned to Sidi Iscan and told him to follow me, and to get on the train, because we were going in that train as well. We proceeded to the train with resolve. The Gestapo chief obviously had not anticipated this move, he tried to convince us to leave the train, but I refused to listen to him. Shortly afterwards the train pulled out slowly from the station. When we arrived in Aries or Nimes the train stopped. We saw a number of German officers getting on the train. They directly came toward me. After a brief and cool exchange of salutation, the highest ranking officer said in an apologetic tone that there had been a misunderstanding when the train departed while we were still on board, and if we left the train at that time they would provide us with transportation (their own Mercedes-Benz) back to Marseilles. It was an intimation to us that we had to accept whatever they offered at that time, and any further concession was beside the point. Yet, on my part I knew that the country I represented was the only hope of those eighty some innocent Jews, and I could not bring myself to see them go to their sinister destiny without exhausting all efforts. With this conviction I maintained that his proposal was unacceptable to us, we had a mission which was to obtain the release of all those innocent Turkish citizens who had been crammed into cattle cars on the ground that they were Jews. This act was against the Turkish traditions which uphold that no humanitarian norms would justify such discrimination, and as a representative of the Turkish Republic my duty was to protect them to the end. This critical argument was carried on in an emotionally charged atmosphere, and was being followed intensely by some Jews in the vicinity. They were aware that the outcome of this crucial negotiation would determine their fate.

In the face of my intransigent attitude, perhaps considering the consequences of a possible political contre temps with neutral Turkey, the officer invited me to declare officially that all those in the train were Turkish citizens. I somehow felt a flicker of hope, perhaps a turning point in the whole episode. I readily and solemnly made the declaration he requested. Thereupon all the German officers left the train, a few minutes later we followed. When we at last saw them leaving the scene in their cars, we realized that it was freedom. I will never forget the emotional moment that followed. All of the freed passengers came to embrace me, held and shook my hands fervently with an unforgettable expression of gratefulness in their watery eyes. We immediately made arrangement for all of those people to return to their home. It was almost daybreak when I arrived at my home. It had been a grueling day but I slept with a deep contentment that I had never felt before. For years afterward, I received several cherished letters from the passengers of that fateful journey. Perhaps many of them are no longer living, but I remember them with deep affection.



Necdet Kent Ambassador (Retired)



THIS DEPOSITION
WAS RECEIVED BY:

Mr. Jak V. Kamhi
President
Profilo Holding A.S.



ATA-USA Winter 1989

Help From Turks During Desperate Hours

 

Columnist Tufan Turenc writes on the documentary recently reported on by CNN entitled 'Desperate Hours' detailing the help given by Turks during World War II. A summary of his column is as follows: "In 1933 when the Nazis came to power and Hitler assumed Germany's leadership, democrats in Germany and particularly German citizens of Jewish descent were greatly troubled. Scholars were frightened. Mustafa Kemal, who was closely following the developments in Germany, felt the coming of the tragedy Hitler was going to inflict upon the world. 

Without losing any time, he gave instructions that scholars of Jewish descent be invited to our shores. More than 200 academics came to Turkey, which welcomed them with open arms. The Turkish Republic, which faced many problems at the time, appointed these academics to universities with high salaries. Through the efforts of these gifted visitors, the quality of education in Turkey got an immediate boost. After their long stay in Turkey and with the end of Hitler's reich, these academics returned to their countries. However, none of them forgot Turkey's noble gesture, and they saw our country as their second homeland. At the beginning of the 1940s, Turkish diplomats prevented the taking of thousands of Jews to concentration camps through the exertion of great efforts. This exemplary action of the Turkish Republic and its diplomats was revealed in a documentary recently prepared by Jews living the US. This striking documentary was just promoted in CNN International. At a time when we are being suffocated with publications and programs slandering Turks and Turkey with countless lies, such a documentary makes one proud. This documentary should be a lesson in humanity to those who are trying to use history to wreak revenge and foster hostility." 


The screening of "Desperate Hours" 

Hon. Tom Lantos of CA in the House of Representatives
(Extensions of remarks, May 20, 2002) 

Mr. LANTOS. Mr. Speaker, I am honored today to mark a special occasion, the screening of the film documentary "Desperate Hours," the story of Turkish assistance to European Jews seeking 
to flee the Holocaust. Produced and directed by Victoria Barrett, the film will be shown at 7:15 p.m. in room HC-7 in the Capitol. I am proud to be a co-sponsor of this event.

Mr. Speaker, I first visited Turkey as a young man in 1956. My wife Annette and I have returned to enjoy Turkish hospitality many times since. When I first visited Turkey, it was just a few short years after Turkey had made the crucial decision to join NATO, where it has always been a loyal Western ally, first against Soviet tyranny, later against ethnic cleansing in the Balkans, and now against global terrorism. 

But what most ennobles Turkey for me is Its role as a savior of so many Jews during the two greatest Jewish tragedies of the past millennium, the Inquisition and the Holocaust. During the 
Inquisition of the late fifteenth century, the Ottoman Sultan Bayezit invited the fleeing Jews of Spain and Portugal to find comfort in his realm. The 500th anniversary of this episode--both sad and redemptive--was marked by Turkish Jews and non-Jews alike in 1992.

The documentary "Desperate Hours" commemorates Turkey's rarely cited role in that other Jewish tragedy--the greatest crime of the bloody twentieth century--the Holocaust. Turkey's efforts were as important and dramatic as they are little known. Turkey offered refuge to hundreds of Germans--non-Jews as well as Jews--during the 1930s. Its diplomats in France, often without waiting for instructions from the capital, conferred Turkish citizenship on thousands of desperate Jews trapped in Nazi-occupied and Vichy France. In some cases Turkish diplomats, at great personal risk, stared down Gestapo officers to protect their new fellow citizens, as was the case with the saintly Necdet Kent. All this, while Nazi troops stood poised on Turkey's borders. 

My wife and I were saved by Raul Wallenberg. I am pleased that the Turkish versions of Wallenberg are at last receiving their due. 
The intimate links between Turks and Jews continue, of course, to this day. A community of some 25,000 Jews thrives in contemporary Turkey. Tens of thousands of Turkish Jews living nearby in Israel cherish their links to Turkey. All of this is a testament to the Muslim-Jewish friendship that has been a hallmark of the Turkish historical experience. 

In recent times, Turkish-Jewish friendship has been enriched and deepened by the close relations Israel and Turkey have forged in recent years. Journalists have focused on the security  relationship and that indeed is important — but the non-security aspects of this relationship are growing even more rapidly: burgeoning commercial trade now worth over a billion dollars a year, Israeli tourists by the hundreds of thousands flocking annually to Turkey, and a vibrant intellectual exchange between Turkish and Israeli universities. 

No other Muslim society rivals Turkey's record regarding the Jews; in fact, few societies of any type anywhere in the world do. I congratulate my dear friend former Ambassador Baki Ilkin, who 
so strongly supported this documentary project, and my dear friend the current Turkish ambassador Faruk Logoglu. I strongly commend all those associated with the film "Desperate Hours" for helping to elucidate and publicize one of the most important chapters in the long, dramatic, and mutually rewarding history shared by the Jewish and Turkish peoples. 

 

Turkey's version of Schindler's List


Documentary brings Turkey's version of Schindler's List out into the light

Muslims, Jews and Christians work to save lives in Desperate Hours, filmmaker says

IRWIN BLOCK
The Gazette


Wednesday, February 11, 2004

Documentary filmmaker Victoria Barrett talks about her award-winning Desperate Hours, a film about Turkey's role in saving European Jews from the Holocaust. It will be shown tonight in Montreal, and broadcast for the first time in North America tomorrow.




Among acts of conviction and bravery to save imperiled Jews in German-occupied Europe, few people know of the Turkish heroes of the Second World War.

Meet Necdet Kent, the Turkish consul in Marseille, France, during the dark days of the early 1940s.

Some call him the Turkish Oskar Schindler for what he did to rescue Jews of Turkish origin.

Turkey at the time was neutral; Kent and two other Turkish diplomats are estimated to have saved 10,000 Turkish Jews by insisting the Germans respect their Turkish nationality.

Another 10,000 Jews from Romania and Hungary may also have found refuge in Turkey during that time.

And it took an Episcopalian from the Shenandoah Valley in West Virginia to record on film the saga of the Marseille rescue and similar acts of extraordinary humanitarian effort.

Victoria Barrett

Victoria Barrett

 Filmmaker Victoria Barrett produced the award-winning documentary Desperate Hours, which will be broadcast for the first time in North America tomorrow on PBS Mountain Lake at 8 p.m.

What drove her to record this chapter in history?

"Today I don't think there is any greater problem facing the world than religious intolerance," she said in an interview in Montreal.

"This movie tells stories of Muslims, Jews and Christians are working to save lives, not to kill each other."

Barrett's film will also be shown at the Musée d'Art Contemporain tonight, when Turkish ambassador Aydemir Erman will be awarded the B'nai Brith interfaith humanitarian award for Turkey's role in saving Jews.

Discussing the Marseille incident, she noted: "In the middle of the night, someone comes running into the consulate to say they've rounded up all the Turkish Jews, they're on a train and they're taking them to one of these camps.

"Necdet Kent got out of bed, he went to the train and sat there as the train left and travelled with it 60 kilometres.

"Finally the German officer said, 'OK, fine, you can take your people and go. We don't want an incident.' "

The effort is believed to have saved an estimated 50 to 70 people from certain death.

Barrett's timing was prescient, as all three diplomats, including Namik Yolga in Paris and Selehatin Vikemen on the island of Rhodes, have died since being captured on film.

"Unbelievable. I'm so glad," said Barrett, an actor who happened to be living in Turkey when she learned of these little-known deeds and decided to make them the subject of a documentary.

The film, chosen best documentary at the 2003 Washington Independent Film Festival, relate other Turkish efforts.

Turkey welcomed 200 German and Austrian academics, two-thirds of whom were Jewish or partly Jewish, and were forbidden from teaching in 1934.

"Albert Einstein was heading for Turkey, but he got a better offer in the U.S.," Barrett remarked.

A surviving professor and several descendants praise Turkey for saving their lives.

In 1941, when the Germans were 80 kilometres from Istanbul, Turkey blew up two bridges to retard possible invasion. Some Jews moved to Anatolia.


Montreal Gazette

 

 

 Namik Kemal Yolga


  

Namik Kemal Yolga (1914-2001) was a Turkish diplomat and statesman , known as the Turkish Schindler . During the WWII, Yolga was the Vice-Consul at the Turkish Embassy in Paris, France . His efforts to save the lives of Turkish Jews from the Nazi concentration camps earned him the title of "Turkish Schindler."

Namik Kemal Yolga

Yolga (1914-2001)

Namik Kemal Yolga was posted to Turkish Embassy in Paris in 1940 as the Vice-Consul, his first diplomatic post in a foreign country. Two months later Nazis invaded France and started their hunt for the Jews and sent them to a concentration camp in Drancy near Paris. Young Yolga was brave enough to save the Turkish Jews one by one from the Nazi authorities, drive them in his car and hide them in safe places. Yolga's determination resulted to save all the Turkish Jews except one who was later transferred to a concentration camp in Germany. In his autobiography, Yolga described his efforts as: "Every time we learnt that a Turkish Jew was captured and sent to Drancy , the Turkish Embassy sent an ultimatum to the German Embassy in Paris and demanded his/her release, specifically pointing out that the Turkish Constitution does not discriminate its people for their race or religion, therefore Turkish Jews are Turkish nationals and Germans have no right to arrest them as Turkey was a neutral country during the war. Then I used to go to Drancy to pick him/her up with my car and put them in a safe house. As far as I know, only one Turkish Jew from Bordeaux was sent to a camp in Germany as the Turkish Embassy was not aware of his arrest at the time."

 

The foregoing is from Wikipedia (BEWARE!)

 

"The Ambassador" Saves 18,200

  
The story of “The Ambassador” or Behiç Erkin:

Behiç Erkin's grandfather was an Ottoman Army Commander. Despite the fact that Erkin was disabled, he was accepted to the Ottoman Army because of his grandfather's position and he became the only individual to receive "special authorization" to join the Ottoman Army Corps of Officers.

Behic Erkin, from WWI days with gold cross

Erkin was appointed Thessalonica Military Railroad Commisioner and met Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, the founder of the Turkish Republic, in 1907. He became one of Atatürk's closest friends and confidants throughout his lifetime.

During the Gallipoli War, Erkin was responsible for successfully transporting logistics and military personnel to the front, for which he was awarded the German Gold Cross (First Degree), the highest award given by the Germans and French Legione D'Honneur (First Degree).

Erkin was asked by Atatürk to head the newly formed Turkish Railroad Administration during the War of Independence. It was one of the most important and vital posts for the war years as it shouldered the transportation of army and logistics to various fronts during the war.

Atatürk gave Behiç his last name, "Erkin," which means independent, on Feb. 8, 1935 and said, “When Behiç has a firm conviction, even I can't change his mind.”

After the War of Independence, Erkin was awarded the "Independence Medal." He became a member of the newly established Parliament and later the Public Works Ministery.

After the death of Atatürk in 1938, İsmet İnönü came to power and İnönü sent Erkin to France as Turkish ambassador to Paris. During his tenure, which coincided with the Nazi occupation in France, he ensured that Nazi officials did not confiscate the properties of Turkish citizens of Jewish origin living in France.

The registered number of Turkish Jews was about 10,000 but there were about 10,000 unregistered Jews, whose origin can not be identified as to whether they were Turkish or not.

He opposed the French authorities and granted Turkish citizenship to those who called themselves Turkish under the pressure of Nazi occupiers who wanted to send the Jews to concentration camps. He used his golden German medal and personal courage and knowledge to help secure the return of Turkish Jews.

In order to prevent the French security forces from apprehending the Jews of Turkish origin from their domiciles, he threatened the French by saying he would have Turkish flags hung up in front of every house therefore providing diplomatic immunity.

The ambassador provided the safe return of over 18,200 Turkish-Jewish citizens living in France out of 20,000 by train. Nowhere else did members of the Jewish community survive in such large numbers under Nazi occupation.


The above is an excerpt from the Feb. 13, 2007 issue of the Turkish Daily News, and the rest may be read here. It appears Hollywood is interested in "The Ambassador," a book written by Erkin's grandson, the product of nine years of research. George Clooney is reported to be considering the role.

Prof. Stanford Shaw, in his book "Turkey and the Holocaust," wrote of 10,000 Turkish Jews, 10,000 irregulars (possibly Turkish Jews, but maybe not), and 400 others for a total of 20,400. It's pretty remarkable the ambassador saved over 18,000. vs. (for perspective) Schindler's 1,000.








Unfortunately, many Jews are totally ignorant of the great deeds of one of their very, very few historic good friends. This is one reason why so many of the ignorant ones don't think twice before hopping in the same bed with beloved Armenians.

 



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THE PURPOSE OF TALL ARMENIAN TALE (TAT)
...Is to expose the mythological “Armenian genocide,” from the years 1915-16. A wartime tragedy involving the losses of so many has been turned into a politicized story of “exclusive victimhood,” and because of the prevailing prejudice against Turks, along with Turkish indifference, those in the world, particularly in the West, have been quick to accept these terribly defamatory claims involving the worst crime against humanity. Few stop to investigate below the surface that those regarded as the innocent victims, the Armenians, while seeking to establish an independent state, have been the ones to commit systematic ethnic cleansing against those who did not fit into their racial/religious ideal: Muslims, Jews, and even fellow Armenians who had converted to Islam. Criminals as Dro, Antranik, Keri, Armen Garo and Soghoman Tehlirian (the assassin of Talat Pasha, one of the three Young Turk leaders, along with Enver and Jemal) contributed toward the deaths (via massacres, atrocities, and forced deportation) of countless innocents, numbering over half a million. What determines genocide is not the number of casualties or the cruelty of the persecutions, but the intent to destroy a group, the members of which are guilty of nothing beyond being members of that group. The Armenians suffered their fate of resettlement not for their ethnicity, having co-existed and prospered in the Ottoman Empire for centuries, but because they rebelled against their dying Ottoman nation during WWI (World War I); a rebellion that even their leaders of the period, such as Boghos Nubar and Hovhannes Katchaznouni, have admitted. Yet the hypocritical world rarely bothers to look beneath the surface, not only because of anti-Turkish prejudice, but because of Armenian wealth and intimidation tactics. As a result, these libelous lies, sometimes belonging in the category of “genocide studies,” have become part of the school curricula of many regions. Armenian scholars such as Vahakn Dadrian, Peter Balakian, Richard Hovannisian, Dennis Papazian and Levon Marashlian have been known to dishonestly present only one side of their story, as long as their genocide becomes affirmed. They have enlisted the help of "genocide scholars," such as Roger Smith, Robert Melson, Samantha Power, and Israel Charny… and particularly  those of Turkish extraction, such as Taner Akcam and Fatma Muge Gocek, who justify their alliance with those who actively work to harm the interests of their native country, with the claim that such efforts will help make Turkey more" democratic." On the other side of this coin are genuine scholars who consider all the relevant data, as true scholars have a duty to do, such as Justin McCarthy, Bernard Lewis, Heath Lowry, Erich Feigl and Guenter Lewy. The unscrupulous genocide industry, not having the facts on its side, makes a practice of attacking the messenger instead of the message, vilifying these professors as “deniers” and "agents of the Turkish government." The truth means so little to the pro-genocide believers, some even resort to the forgeries of the Naim-Andonian telegrams or sources  based on false evidence, as Franz Werfel’s The Forty Days of Musa Dagh. Naturally, there is no end to the hearsay "evidence" of the prejudiced pro-Christian people from the period, including missionaries and Near East Relief representatives, Arnold Toynbee, Lord Bryce, Lloyd George, Woodrow Wilson, Theodore Roosevelt, and so many others. When the rare Westerner opted to look at the issues objectively, such as Admirals Mark Bristol and Colby Chester, they were quick to be branded as “Turcophiles” by the propagandists. The sad thing is, even those who don’t consider themselves as bigots are quick to accept the deceptive claims of Armenian propaganda, because deep down people feel the Turks are natural killers and during times when Turks were victims, they do not rate as equal and deserving human beings. This is the main reason why the myth of this genocide has become the common wisdom.