“Tomorrow is worth fighting for”

On Thursday, April 24, 2025, the Armenian Youth Federation – Youth Organization of the Armenian Revolutionary Federation Washington, D.C. "Ani" Chapter led the Greater Washington community in a powerful "March for Justice," which commemorated the anniversary of the Armenian Genocide and the recent genocidal ethnic cleansing of Artsakh, emphasizing the ongoing struggle for justice and recognition. In the early hours of April 24, 1915, clergy, intellectuals, political leaders, businessmen, writers and artists were rounded up in Constantinople. Erukhan, Siamanto, Dikran Chökürian, Ardashes Harutiunian, Diran Kelekian, Ruben Sevak, Daniel Varoujan, Zabel Yesayan, Rupen Zartarian and Krikor Zohrab—these are only a handful of the nearly 250 Armenian leaders seized and targeted for torture, imprisonment or death by Turkish authorities that day. Since then, we have collectively chosen to mark every April 24 as our day of commemorating the horror that unfolded afterwards. Dissatisfied with the threats to continual dominance—over both the Armenian homeland and the whole Middle East—Talaat, Enver and Djemal Pasha took to the last resort of the depraved: fanning the flames of hate and extremism amongst the Ottoman Empire’s Turkish population. Only 20 years before, Sultan Abdul Hamid II had enabled an outbreak of massacres that took the lives of upwards of a quarter million Armenians, in an effort to scapegoat this minority for his abject failures. After all, had those Armenians with their “great impudence” and “great treachery toward religion and state” truly been loyal, it somehow would have saved an empire crumbling under the weight of Greeks, Arabs, Bulgarians, Serbs and so many more who simply wanted the dignity of self-determination, of self-government, of freedom. Still, Abdul Hamid’s example of extremism and imperialism was not enough. The “Armenian Question” was still unanswered because we still stood. Communities banded together to save children from the horrors. Political parties, dedicated to fulfilling the promise of Armenian liberation, rose up from the ashes of despair to chart a new course for a people and a land still unconquered. Modern diasporas formed from refugees—families like mine, whose story truly started when two friends named Esther and Lydia found friendship in a Paris orphanage. Our tenacity, our spirit, our grit still showed after we buried our dead, and we decided that tomorrow was something still worth living for. Make no mistake: Talaat, Enver and Jemal Pasha understood this well. These were not ignorant, nor cartoonishly foolish men. Instead, they were power-hungry imperialists— extremists out to preserve whatever small piece of chauvinistic glory they could for themselves. And in a world where the writing of their demise was on the wall, that meant the attempted annihilation of the Armenian, Greek and Assyrian people. In the days after April 24, over 1.5 million men, women and children were marched from their homelands, through the Syrian desert, and killed. The millennia-old presence of our people in Van, in Sassoun, in Baghesh, in Tigranakert, was seemingly snuffed out over the course of the following eight years. The successor state, the Republic of Turkey, has continued to vehemently deny these crimes. Even while Raphael Lemkin, the original proponent of the term ‘genocide’, noted that the example of the Armenians served as a chilling and exemplary case study of the fact, globally, still so many have continued to duck their heads in the sand. After all, it took 104 long years for our own government here in the United States to call it what it is: genocide. Political cowardice, spiritual and moral hollowness, and greed are a toxic combination. Unfortunately, we were not even afforded the luxury of cherishing that first and long overdue step towards justice here before further catastrophe befell our community. In 2020, Azerbaijan, aided directly by Turkey and enabled by our government’s complacency, began an all-out assault on one of the oldest and most resilient Armenian communities in the world: Artsakh. After standing in defiance of the overwhelming odds, the indigenous Armenians of Artsakh won their freedom from Azerbaijan and its ethnofascist regime in the 1990s. Over 120,000 people lived in a state that, alongside the Republic of Armenia, served as beacons of hope to a people who, after centuries of loss, once again saw children growing up and finally knowing what it meant to speak their language freely, to worship as Armenians and to grow up, at least for a generation, without active, overwhelming and terrific threats of subjugation or extermination. The loss in 2020 was hard. But what followed was catastrophic. In 2023, our people in Artsakh endured a 10-month blockade while the world looked away. Food, medicine, energy—all gone. In the end, against overwhelming and insurmountable odds, the Artsakh armed forces laid down their arms, and the people of Artsakh fled for their lives. Once again, hundreds of thousands of Armenians were driven from their homes. A presence of Armenians in Artsakh who survived through countless empires had seemingly vanished. Countless pieces of the Armenian nation’s cultural and historical heritage, including where our own alphabet was first put in writing, were turned over to a state once again intent on its destruction. My friends, I state the obvious when I say that we come here today at an abundantly difficult time for our people. The echoes of 1915 ring louder than ever as 25 of Artsakh’s leaders sit in prison cells in Baku, just as our community’s foremost minds sat behind bars in Constantinople. Ruben Vardanyan, Davit Ishkhanyan, Davit Babayan, Arayik Harutyunyan. Although a century apart, they are tried, guilty and sentenced, seemingly, for the simple but irredeemable crime of being Armenian by states intent on our eradication. Make no mistake: genocide denied is genocide continued. And genocide continued is genocide repeated. When President Erdogan visited Azerbaijan to celebrate their assault on Artsakh, he couldn’t help but tell the world his true motives, proclaiming, “God Bless the soul of Enver Pasha.” When schoolchildren in Azerbaijan are indoctrinated to think of Armenians as “dogs”; when Azeri state media depicts Artsakh being cleansed as akin to disinfecting a disease; when a family theme park is set up with the clothing and gear of dead Armenian soldiers; when women servicewomen are tortured and mutilated and pictures of their bodies are sent to their children—their children—we know that this is not a simple dispute between two goodwilling but misunderstood parties. The conscious and deliberate effort to deny past atrocities is done to enable further ones. Unfortunately, the lack of the word “genocide” by the president in his statement today underscores that ever so clearly. Even 110 years after the fact, we still have leaders, including in the White House and State Department, who are refusing to even acknowledge our plight, who are not willing to call it what it is. So, I thank each and every one of you for coming today. I thank you for marching. I thank you for standing up and speaking out today. But I have some unpopular news: today was the easy part. You see, we come here not just to mourn and to recognize, but to organize, because let us be crystal clear: we are not descendants of victims. We are the products of survivors, of resistors, of heroes. Our mission, as true as it is today, must be true tomorrow and the day after that. It’s not in surrender or defeatism that we will find solace. The pages of history are cold and lonely, but we are alive and well. From the children playing in Syunik, to the pensioner in Tavush, the refugee in Gyumri, the priest in Lori, and even those standing here cultivating community in Washington D.C., WE STILL STAND. WE STILL FIGHT. From Vartan to Andranik and Njdeh to Tatul, and now to us, our mission, our obligation, is to ensure that we are happy warriors, radically preserving joy, hope and the future for generations yet to come. Struggle is not a sign of death; it is a sign of life. It is a beautiful reminder that in a world all too quick to overlook us, we stand. From the structures that crumbled, the wars fought and lost, the literature unread, the music unheard, the prayers unanswered—ours is a struggle that is not over, so long as we continue apace. Ours is a story unwritten but can be, must be, will be done in our own hands. As we march down Massachusetts Avenue today, let’s reflect on our words one more time. Turkey, you failed. Together, ours is a shared purpose for a common future. It is a cause that beats in the hearts of every person, Armenian and ally, who engages with us: liberation. In the words of Lilla Watson: “If you have come here to help me, you are wasting your time, but if you have come because your liberation is bound up with mine, then let us work together.” When we say never again, we mean it not only for Western Armenians. We mean it not only for Artsakhtsis. We mean it for everyone, both in the annals of history and right now, so that never again means never again—so that our movement is recognized, not as part of an Armenian fight, but a human one. Together, we can do this. Together, we must do this. For I believe that in our lifetimes, we can not only see recognition, but we will see justice. I believe that the churches of Ani will ring forth once more on crowded Sunday mornings. I believe that the streets of Bitlis will hear mothers shouting in Armenian at children running too fast. I believe that the shores of Cilicia will teem with our scholars and workers. I believe that our future is possible. So, as the saying goes, let us honor our dead and then let us fight like hell for the living—for that is a fight worth having.

“Tomorrow is worth fighting for”

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Matthew Girardi

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This story is FREE for you...

Matthew Girardi

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