Israeli students are planning a “peace flotilla” to Turkey with humanitarian aid for two nations that have suffered under Turkish imperialism—Kurds and Armenians. The initiative comes in response to the world’s sharp criticism of Israel’s lethal raid on the Gaza flotilla, which left nine activists dead and many wounded, reported ynetnews.com.
The organizers are currently seeking a suitable vessel and are trying to recruit other students to the cause. No date has yet been set, but a skipper has been found: Arik Ofir, a member of the navy veteran’s union and owner of a private business. They have also obtained medical supplies, and hope that by the end of the week they will be able to set out.
“The whole world saw the flotilla and thought Israel is a terrible state, which comes to shoot people who call themselves peace activists,” said chairman of the National Students Union Boaz Torporovsky, who is also involved. “It’s absurd that they always put the Israeli occupation in the headlines and don’t talk about extreme Islamic terror. There’s a lot of hypocrisy in the world.
“Turkey, which leads the campaign against Israel and makes all sorts of threats, is the same Turkey that carried out a holocaust and murdered an entire nation of Armenians, and oppresses a minority larger than the Palestinians—the Kurds—who deserve a state, who have demanded a state for longer than the state of Israel has existed.”
“For this reason,” he continued, “we have decided to help that minority and show up the hypocrisy of the Turkish government. We are sure that they won’t care if we send humanitarian aid. It’ll be a peace flotilla without the knives or stones that hurt IDF soldiers, without violence, which is intended for all those oppressed by the Turkish government.”
“If [Prime Minister Recep Tayyip] Erdogan’s heart is where his mouth is, which we all know isn’t so, he has no reason to prevent the flotilla from arriving.”
And what about the practicalities? “For the flotilla to work, we need three elements: money, logistics and balls,” he said. “We’re bringing the balls and some of the logistics, but we need lots of money.”
This is great! I love it. I hope it happens.
Only one problem… where are they going to find Armenians in Turkey, except Constantinople.
Garen says “only one problem…where are they going to find any Armenians”? Surely the real problem, assuming these brave Israeli students succeed in getting their aid to Turkey, will be that they, along with any Armenian or Kurd that agree to receive the aid will get a bullet in the back of their head, like Hrant Dink, or hanged, like his solicitor who was “found hung” in his own residence a few days ago!
By the way it is not only the Armenians that can be found in Constantinople only since the Genocide. The bulk of the Kurdish population (20,000 Kurdish villages have been razed to the ground by the Turkish military since mid 1980s – up to 3 million Kurds driven to large cities or abroad as refugees) has been “deported” Turkish style from their homeland in Kurdistan up to an estimated 20,000 murdered in mass bombings and military attacks on unarmed villages.
Turkey is racist nationalist genocidal state ruled essentially by a terrorist Deep State accountable to no one. The AKP party, when it comes to Turkish nationalism, as we have seen in their attitude towards the Armenians (genocide denial and hostility towards Armenia, Arstakh and Armenians in general) and Kurds (genocide ‘in progress’!) and other minorities, is no better than the worst secularist racist nationalist elements in the country.
As such Turkey cannot be a true friend of any oppressed nation Muslim or otherwise. The Palestianian people, like other people fighting for their sovereignty, have the right to follow their own path to liberation. However they should not fall for Turkish hypocrisy – let them ask the Kurds and the Armenians, or indeed their other fellow Arabs who had to pay dearly to free themselves from centuries of Ottoman oppression. They have unfortunately been manipulated, deceived and disappointed by various Arab demagogues and tyrants in the past half a century. They should allow themselves to be used by the neo-Ottomanist but equally fake and oppressive government in Ankara who will sell them out for the right price.
Hye, and now, the Armenians… sought, conveniently to be used – again, – or, are we to be thankful that we are being recognized now – at all… Manooshag
This is totally awesome.
Everyone is seeing the true colors of Turkey, they have played games like this throughout history, they are very sneaky and Israel is seeing their true faces LOLLL
The sad part is, are the Israeli students really concerned about Kurds and Armenians, or are they using them as tools to defend the imperialist actions of their own state?
Unfortunately I think it’s the obvious that their intention is the latter.
As much as I would want the Armenian genocide to be recognized by the Israeli parliament as a result of their compassion towards the archetype tragedy and earlier holocaust of the Armenians, if this stand-off produces greater understanding with the Israelis of who the Turks are, then be it. It is discreditable that the Israelis, a genocide-survived nation, deny acknowledgment of similar tragedy with other nations and obstruct US congressional resolutions recognizing the Turkish crime. They should be ashamed of their behavior!
We are ashamed! Our government’s traditional non-recognition of the Armenian Genocide (for the sake of appeasing Turkey) is completely opposite to the general public’s opinion in Israel. I truely hope it’s going to change.
Israel has no imperialist actions (calling such a tiny state “imperialist” is not less than cynical and mean). We do care about the Armenians and Kurds, but excuse us for concerning our own problems first – fighting the attempts to deport us from our own homeland!
Thanks Liad for sharing your shame. Sincerely. I truly hope Israel’s decision not to recognize the Armenian Genocide changes. It appears that Turkey and Israel have some thing in common that has kept them allies all these years: they both have governments which take actions that presumably conflict with the majority opinion of their citizens. I hope Israeli citizens are paying attention and will take advantage of their democracy to voice their objections.
By the way, there are a lot of people named Boyajian. The person who is posting under that last name here is not me.
Our decorative icons even have different designs and colors! Sorry if there was confusion. I am not David Boyajian. Good name, though.
So-called ‘conspiracy theories,’ which in many historical instances are proven to be right, suggest that members of the highest echelons of power in Turkey, especially in the military, are crypto-Jews, the Dönmeh. If it’s true, then it explains it all…
Paul – yes, that explains all, including the genocide.
Actually, Karekin, I think genocide was perpetrated by orders of the CUP leadership, whoever their affiliations might be, but who, nevertheless, represented central authorities of the Ottoman state. Genocide was actually committed by a multitude of Turkish provincial and municipal circles, military units, criminal elements, as well as ordinary citizenry.
No Paul…that’s where you are wrong. The CUP leadership actually hijacked the inner workings of the Ottoman Empire, and used their secret committees to do the dirty work. They were not elected by anyone…they took over in a revolution and carried out their plans in secret…even the sultan didn’t know what kinds of horrible things they were doing. Their goal was to benefit themselves, not the empire and certainly not the ordinary citizens, let alone the Armenians – who they squarely had in their sights for elimination. When the Armenian leadership called them on their refusal to uphold agreements they had previously made regarding land rights, they broke off all contact with the Armenian political parties and began their plans in earnest. It was all a set-up….they had no true intentions of cooperating with the Armenians or doing anything to benefit them. Once the Armenians shared their goals, the CUP knew exactly how to decimate the Armenians, who by the way, represented fully 25% of the population of Anatolia at the time and owned vast amounts of property across the country. How best to transfer it into the hands of those close to the CUP? Blame the Armenians for traitorous activities and then eliminate them. This trick is old, and had been used before…and has been used again since then…but the CUP was particularly effective, as we all know. All those Armenian properties, homes and businesses ended up in the hands of the descendants, friends and associates of the CUP crowd. Do you think that was an accident, that a small group of non-Turks from Salonika ended up owning and running Turkey? Let’s not kid ourselves or be willfully blind.