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In this mailing:
by Judith Bergman
• January 18, 2017 at 5:00 am
- A married
couple, Peter and Melanie M., were prosecuted and convicted in July
2016 of creating a Facebook group that criticized the government's
migration policy. Also, in July 2016, 60 people suspected of writing
"hate speech" online had their homes raided by German
police.
- None of the
above seems to be enough, however, for the president of the
Bundestag, Norbert Lammert, from Angela Merkel's CDU party, who
believes that what Facebook is already doing against "hate
speech" is not enough. According to the CDU politician, there
is a need for more legislation.
- The German
government's view of what constitutes "hate speech" is
highly selective and appears limited to protecting the government's
own policies on immigration from legitimate criticism.
- When massive
antisemitism swept large German cities in the summer of 2014, for
example, no such anti-racist zeal was manifest on the part of the
German government. On the contrary, there were instances of
authorities practically facilitating hate speech. In July 2014,
Frankfurt police let mainly Muslim "protesters" use their
van's megaphone to belt out slogans of incitement in Arabic, including
the repeated chanting of "Allahu Akbar" and that Jews are
"child murderers".
- Firebombing a
synagogue, on the other hand, is simply an "act of
protest".
Officials in Germany's Interior Ministry are urging Interior
Minister Thomas de Maizière to establish a "Defense Center against
Disinformation" (Abwehrzentrum gegen Desinformation)
to combat what they call "political disinformation," a
euphemism for "fake news."
"The acceptance of a post-truth age would amount to political
capitulation," the officials told Maizière in a memo, which also
disclosed that the bureaucrats at the Interior Ministry are eager to see
"authentic political communication" remain "defining for
the 21st century."
by Uzay Bulut
• January 18, 2017 at 4:00 am
- "In all of
these operations children were part of the general population
targeted for wholesale destruction. In many instances they were also
subjected to separate and differential forms of mass murder." —
Professor Vahakn Dadrian, in Children as Victims of Genocide: The
Armenian Case.
- These forms of
murder included methods such as mass drowning, mass burning, sexual
assaults, and mutilations.
- "In Ankara
province, near the village of Bash Ayash, two rapist-killers -- a
brigand, Deli Hasan, and a gendarme, Ibrahim -- raped twelve boys,
aged 12-14, and subsequently killed them. Those who did not die
instantly were tortured to death while crying 'Mummy, Mummy.'"
— Professor Vahakn Dadrian, in Children as Victims of Genocide:
The Armenian Case.
- "A female
survivor from Giresun relates how in Agn (Egin), Harput province,
some 500 Armenian orphans collected from all parts of that province
were poisoned through the arrangement of the local pharmacist and
physician." — Leslie A Davis, U.S. Consul at Harput.
- More than 100
years after the genocide, Turkey still denies it and Turkish history
textbooks even blame the genocide on the Armenians themselves.
- When experts
deny the Armenian genocide and even try to prevent the U.S.
government from officially recognizing it, they are killing the
victims all over again.
- "As long
as the genocide remains unrecognized, justice will not be
established. The curse of the genocide will not leave this land, and
Turkey will never see the light of day. This is not a prediction,
but a statement of fact." — Turkey's Human Rights Association,
2016.
Armenian civilians, escorted by Ottoman soldiers,
marched through Harput to a prison in nearby Mezireh (present-day
Elazig), April 1915. (Image source: American Red Cross/Wikimedia Commons)
U.S. President-Elect Donald J. Trump was recently called on to
"guarantee" to Turkey that the Armenian genocide will not
be properly acknowledged by the U.S. Congress, in a set of proposals
regarding "U.S. Policy on Turkey".
"The United States can quietly guarantee Turkey that the
Armenian Genocide resolution in Congress will not pass. This has always
been critical in the relationship, and most Turks care deeply about the
issue," reads a part of the paper issued by The Washington Institute
for Near East Policy (WINEP), and authored by former U.S. ambassador to
Ankara James F. Jeffrey and Turkish scholar Dr. Soner Cagaptay.
In the meantime, an Armenian protestant church in the Turkish city
of Elazig (historic Kharpert/Harput) has been turned into a parking lot,
the Dicle News Agency (DIHA) reported.
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