Sassounian: Turkish Denialists Fail to Block Genocide Speech at Australian Parliament

The Armenian Genocide Centennial Committee of Australia had invited this writer to speak at commemorative events in Sydney and Melbourne, and to deliver a formal address at the New South Wales Parliament during the week of April 24.

On April 27, the Australian Turkish Advocacy Alliance sent a three-page letter to all parliament members urging them to boycott my presentation. A parliament member forwarded a copy of the letter to the Armenian National Committee (ANC) of Australia in advance of my talk on April 29. The cleverly worded letter, most likely written by the Turkish Embassy’s professional lobbyists, made several false claims and defamatory accusations.

The Turkish denialist group sought to import Ankara’s human rights restrictions to a democratic country like Australia by trying to muzzle not only this speaker’s right to free speech, but also the parliament’s right to invite whomever it chose. Calling me a “propagandist” who “benefits from conflict and hatred,” the Turkish letter “strongly” advised parliament members not to attend my talk.

Gunes Gungor, the executive director of the Australian Turkish Alliance, falsely reported that I am “related” to Hampig Sassounian, simply because I shared his last name. Hampig was convicted of assassinating the consul general of Turkey in Los Angeles in 1982. While the life of any human being is precious, Gungor sheds crocodile tears over the death of a single Turkish diplomat, ignoring the wholesale killings of 1.5 million innocent Armenians! How would Gunes Gungor like it if I were to accuse him of being related to several criminals I found on the internet, just because they shared the same last name?

Gungor in his letter also badmouthed the distinguished jurist Raphael Lemkin who coined the term “genocide” based on his detailed studies of the extermination of Armenians by the Ottoman-Turkish government. In a desperate search for any reason to tarnish Lemkin’s impeccable reputation, Gungor claimed that “towards the end of the meetings because of his aggressive comments he [Lemkin] was asked to leave the room.” Gungor did not even know how to spell Lemkin’s first name.

The Turkish propagandist finally attempted to draw a distinction between the Armenian Genocide and the Jewish Holocaust. After pretending to be an expert on the Armenian Genocide, Gungor confessed his ignorance by stating that “much about the late Ottoman Empire has yet to be learned and many conclusions have yet to be drawn.”

Despite Gungor’s attempts to undermine my address, parliament members and guests, including scholars, elected officials, and Jewish community leaders, gave me a standing ovation. Surprisingly, Gungor showed up at the parliament to hear me speak, not trusting his own ability to have the event canceled. While members of the audience were given ample time to ask any question they wished, Gungor and his two Turkish colleagues did not ask a single question. More surprisingly, as the three Turks were leaving the parliament hall, one of Gungor’s colleagues was overheard saying, “On nights like these, I wonder what we are doing here!”

My other talks took place with packed audiences without disruption. According to the ANC of Australia, more than 1,100 people attended my first talk on April 24 in Sydney. I gave a second talk the next night in the same city. I then spoke at a similar event on April 27 in Melbourne in the presence of around 500 guests.

The only sour note during my journey was Prime Minister Tony Abbott’s message to the Sydney commemoration. Taking a page from President Obama’s playbook, Abbott used every other word (horror, tragedy, terrible events, lost lives) except for genocide in his brief message. Vache Kahramanian, the executive director of the ANC of Australia, wrote to the prime minister, telling him that his message would not be read to the audience because it is “of great insult to the Armenian-Australian community with its blatant omission of the Genocide word.” Kahramanian reminded the prime minister of his previous year’s message while he was the opposition leader, in which he had properly characterized the Armenian Genocide. In contrast to the prime minister, Australia’s treasurer, Joe Hockey, the country’s most senior government minister, issued a formal statement clearly acknowledging the Armenian Genocide.

I left Australia greatly impressed with the political activism of the Armenian community of 50,000, which runs circles around the much larger Turkish community of over 200,000.

Harut Sassounian

Harut Sassounian

California Courier Editor
Harut Sassounian is the publisher of The California Courier, a weekly newspaper based in Glendale, Calif. He is the president of the Armenia Artsakh Fund, a non-profit organization that has donated to Armenia and Artsakh one billion dollars of humanitarian aid, mostly medicines, since 1989 (including its predecessor, the United Armenian Fund). He has been decorated by the presidents of Armenia and Artsakh and the heads of the Armenian Apostolic and Catholic churches. He is also the recipient of the Ellis Island Medal of Honor.

110 Comments

  1. No professional hack would advise the governmental client to make these strenuous and usually unsuccessful efforts, which only underscore the Genocidal mindset of the client.

    These efforts to drown out truth and the Armenian voice come from the Turkish approach to politics and speech and the view of the Armenian as dhimmi.

    Turks do not understand free speech, because their political climate is so different than that of any western or English speaking society. Another reason they are a tough fit for the EU.

  2. Have no fears and keep the faith for sooner or later Turkey will pay for its crimes….nobody ever gets away with murder.

  3. It appears Gunes Gungor is not alone in making factual errors. Check your facts as well Harut, the Turkish speaking population of Australia is only 59,623 according to the 2011 Australian Census and not 200,000 as erroneously stated by you.

    • I am sure I make my share of errors. Nobody’s perfect, but what you point out is NOT an error on my part! The figure of 200,000 Australian Turks is taken from the website of the Australian Turkish Advocacy Alliance. I could not make up a number from thin air. I had to base it on a source. I have no way of knowing independently if this number is exaggerated. However, you should know that census figures almost always underestimate minority numbers, because they rely on self-identification and require extra steps to add ethnic origin. Just look at by how much the US census underestimates the number of Armenian-Americans.

    • Harut, while census figures may generally underestimate minority numbers, keep in mind Australia has a relatively small total population (22.6 million) with a sophisticated and well organized public service. Accordingly, it is highly implausible that the deviation could be so wrong as to be a multiple of four times your quoted figure. Perhaps you should have checked with your host Vache instead, an accountant by profession that presumably knows how to count numbers.

      But no real harm or foul. The only point to be made is your jibe against the Turkish Australian community was unnecessary and unwarranted. They are a relatively small and well behaved community of working class migrants from the 70s & 80s compared to the well integrated Armenian community who have resided in Australia for decades longer. It would disappointing if these two peacefully co-existing communities engaged in political activism for the purposes of resolving a century old dispute which is what you appear to be inviting in your concluding comments.

    • Zeki,

      Harut speaking the truth in a nation that already has a memory of that truth is not disappointing to anyone except an official Turkish shill. That would be you.

      What is disappointing is that the Turkish government, Kemalist or Jihadi-lite, is able to get its denialist point of view portrayed as the voice of your Diaspora.

      Where are the silent and brave Turks in your Diaspora who know exactly what their grandparents did to Christian women, forced to become the slaves of rapists and murderers, who know that your nation stole Armenian wealth, and murdered the men while they wore the uniform of the Ottoman army? Where are their publications, and public Diaspora voices?

      We know these voices exist because we hear them coming from Turkey, but we rarely hear your Diaspora ever acknowledge the truth, or extend unqualified respect to us. Instead, your Embassies host Genocide Dance Parties in Washington each April 24.

      It is your Diaspora which is shameful.

  4. While I appreciate Harut’s efforts in genocide recognition and the struggle with its denial, I wish he would stop saying Lemkin coined the word “genocide” based on the Armenian case. He introduced the term in 1944 in his work describing Nazi use of laws as part of the Holocaust. The way Harut describes it, the reader is given the impression that Lemkin coined it before WWII. It’s not accurate and anyone who looks up the history of he word genocide would look at Harut’s arguments with skepticism. We need to be as accurate as possible in our arguments and expose the denier’s lies and inaccuracies.

    Lemkin created the word “genocide” to describe *all* such crimes, and stated that the Armenian case was an example of genocide. But the *final* motivation to create a new word to describe these crimes was the Holocaust and not the Armenian genocide. Harut’s wording leaves a different impression.

    • Harut does not need my defense, but you are wrong.

      Lemkin’s interest in Genocide arose while he was a young lawyer in Poland, directly as a result of the AG and the Tehlirian trial, in 1921. He posed the question: why does a man who murders face justice, and a state which murders a race able to act with impunity?

      Harut printed in 2005 the CBS newsclip in which Lemkin identifies the AG as the fiorst example, followed by Hitler:

      http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uCebMq-GmH4

    • Jda: the Armenian case may have first sparked Lemkin’s interest in the issue but that’s not really a relevant point to what Random is saying. Lemkin created the word precisely in response to what the Nazis were doing to the Jews (though its language gave a general explanation to what genocide is). He wanted to give a name to it. And he of course knew and cited that it was first done to the Armenians- of which Hitler apparently drew inspiration.

    • If you don’t believe me, I hope you believe Lemkin himself. See the video below and read my column of 2005 in which I published the transcript of Lemkin’s interview.
      I hope the “Random Armenian” will come forward and sign his real name like I do. Why hide behind a fake name?

    • jda,

      I’m actually quite aware of of Lemkin and his connection with the Armenian genocide and how the Tehlirian trial got his attention and his interest in mass crimes against civilians. Lemkin also tried to get an international treaty like the post WWII UN genocide convention, in the 1930s. I’ve read about Lemkin.

      My issue is with the wording itself when it comes to describing Lemkin’s connection with the Armenian genocide. The word “genocide” itself was created by Lemkin in 1943 and published in 1944. I’ve even heard a few Armenians says that Lemkin created the word first to describe the Armenian case. This makes no sense since he created it in the middle of the Holocaust. This is a subtle confusion that could have a big impact, since people might not take you seriously if they know even a little about how the word came about.

      Also, Lemkin studying other cases of mass murder against civilians, including the case of the Assyrians in Iraq in 1930s and the case of German atrocities against the Herero and Namaqua in what is today Namibia, in 1904. The latter would make it the first genocide of the 20th century.

    • Mr Sassounian

      I have no problems in general with your work and goals because we share the fight. And it’s not an easy job what you’re doing.

      But since you’re speaking for all of us, including me and my family who lost people in the genocide, I have a stake in what you’re doing.

      “… jurist Raphael Lemkin who coined the term “genocide” based on his detailed studies of the extermination of Armenians by the Ottoman-Turkish government.”

      His studies of large scale crimes and massacres were wider than just the Armenian case and it was the Holocaust which *finally* compelled him to come up with a name to the crime in 1943. My concern is that the wording of what I quoted, leaves the impression that Lemkin created the word first based on the Armenian case.

    • “I hope the ‘Random Armenian’ will come forward and sign his real name like I do. Why hide behind a fake name?” [by Harut Sassounian]

      Simple: to avoid being bullied by those who cannot take criticism. Sir, having done work for the Armenian cause does not justify attacking a poster with a cheap shot just because he criticized you. Nor does it help your credibility.

    • “Random Armenian” who does not have the courage to identify himself or herself, you are wrong in claiming that I am speaking “for all of us.” No one has elected be to speak for anyone else but myself. I have no right to speak for anyone else. I have been writing a weekly column for 31 years, exclusively presenting my own personal opinion and analysis. Secondly, regarding Lemkin, do you know better than Lemkin as to why he coined term genocide? Lemkin himself says in his famous CBS interview that he coined the term genocide based on the Armenian Genocide. That’s good enough for me and should be good enough for you and everyone else.
      Regarding another comment posted by someone under the name of Vahagn and claiming that “Random Armenian” is hiding behind a fake name in order to avoid being criticized, makes no sense. How come it’s OK to criticize me using my real name, but you don’t want others to criticize you using your real name. I smell a double standard.
      Secondly,

    • Lemkin: “I became interested in genocide because it happened to the Armenians; and after[wards] the Armenians got a very rough deal at the Versailles Conference because their criminals were guilty of genocide and were not punished. You know that they [the Ottoman Turks] were organized in a terroristic organization which took justice into its own hands. The trial of Talaat Pasha in 1921 in Berlin is very instructive. A man (Soghomon Tehlirian), whose mother was killed in the genocide, killed Talaat Pasha. And he told the court that he did it because his mother came in his sleep … many times. Here, …the murder of your mother, you would do something about it! So he committed a crime. So, you see, as a lawyer, I thought that a crime should not be punished by the victims, but should be punished by a court, by a national law.”

      Sassounian (from the 2005 article): “for example, as we speak about the Armenian Genocide of 1915, not everyone realizes that “genocide” is a word that was not coined until 1943 by Raphael Lemkin, a Polish-Jewish jurist.”

      Sassounian (from this article): “Lemkin himself says in his famous CBS interview that he coined the term genocide based on the Armenian Genocide.”

      The word first appears in a book called “Axis Rule in Occupied Europe: Laws of Occupation – Analysis of Government – Proposals for Redress” written in 1944. It’s clear he finally creates a word for this unnamed crime in RESPONSE to the Holocaust.

      In Lemkin’s quote he mentions injustice following the Armenian genocide and how victims can’t be the one’s handing out justice/punishment, courts need to do that. I imagine he didn’t want the same fate to befall the Jews after WWII so he made the word, gave name to it, and hoped to make it punishable this time.

      To say that “Lemkin himself says in his famous CBS interview that he coined the term genocide based on the Armenian Genocide” is inaccurate. He just doesn’t say that in that interview. But he does say that the Armenian case sparked his interest in genocide. (And there was apparently an incident in Iraq in the 1930s during which he almost coined the term). With that in mind, I also don’t think he based the word genocide purely on the Holocaust either. It seems a number of events added up over time, culminating in the most inhumane of them all, led Lemkin coin the term precisely as a RESPONSE to the Nazis actions.

      Armenian genocide ended around 1918-1922, depending on your source. He coined the term in 1944. He had 2 decades to come up with the word to describe the Armenian case. But he didn’t until the Holocaust. That would seem to suggest that he wouldn’t have coined the term without the Holocaust.

      I might be dead wrong on that, but then again I’m not the one calling posters cowards and insulting them based on the premise that Lemkin undeniably said something which he didn’t (at least in that interview and transcript).

    • Mr. Sassounian,

      My identity has no bearing on my arguments. I’m making my arguments as best as my writing skills allow and they stand for themselves. Adding my name will not change anything.

      We may not have voted for you to speak on our behalf but you do it publicly and in front of crowds. Therefore your work and what you say has an impact on all of us, including my family’s history. I am free to express any disagreement I may have with you.

    • “How come it’s OK to criticize me using my real name, but you don’t want others to criticize you using your real name.” [by Harut Sassounian]

      Because, unlike Random, you are not criticizing his opinion but are making a personal attack on him. That is called “bullying.” Surely, we expect more from someone acting as the face of the Armenian Cause. I would suggest refraining from responding to posters before reducing your credibility even further.

  5. Instead of finding small mistakes to critisize in Sassounians speech, would be better if everyone did their share in fighting injustice. Thanks to Harut Sassounian for his divoted work throughout years. I had the pleasure of meeting him recently in Armenia.

    • Haikuhi Olsen

      Because we’re fighting denialism and PR from the Turkish side and their friends not facts or evidence. This PR is directed at the rest of the world to make it forget 1915. Impressions and small mistakes can make a difference. We need to be as accurate as possible when we talk about the genocide to the public.

      It doesn’t take much to introduce uncertainty and doubt by the Turkish side which is a win for them. They present us as liers and exaggerators and things like this plays into it.

  6. Vartsked gadar, sireli paregam.Gardones che?vor kezi paregam gochem, hagarag vor ctsart chenk hantibadz irarou.

  7. Random,

    As the video above pointed out, unfortunately your sick and twisted fantasy cannot be satisfied here in spreading your disinformation effectively.

    What I’m interested in knowing is, what on Earth motivates you to write what you wrote? I can understand why a genocide denying Turk would say it, because the thought of the word ‘genocide’ with connections to the Armenian Genocide as a large, if not main motivation behind the term is devastating for its denial, but why would an ‘Armenian’ take that route of trying to sanitizing the creation of the word ‘genocide’ from the word ‘Armenian’ when there is direct evidence to the contrary?

    Please don’t tell me your mission is to be “scholarly”. Because if it is, you failed miserably. If you were actually correct and had done your research, there could be no arguing with your point. But you make an accusation, then make an outlandish statement yourself which there is no proof of and can’t back up.

    You state: “Lemkin created the word “genocide” to describe *all* such crimes, and stated that the Armenian case was an example of genocide. But the *final* motivation to create a new word to describe these crimes was the Holocaust and not the Armenian genocide. Harut’s wording leaves a different impression.”

    Not only is this statement silly, lacking in any kind of logic, and downright juvenile, but it shows the level of desperation on your part in trying to distance the Armenian Genocide from the creation of the term ‘genocide’. You are here conveniently ignoring Lemkin’s mentioning of the word ‘Armenian’, AND WITH THE LACK OF MENTIONING OTHER PEOPLES SPECIFICALLY and yet have the audacity to claim shamelessly that the creation of the word ‘genocide’ was not motivated by the Armenian.

    Here is Lemkin’s direct quote: “I became interested in ‘genocide’ because it happened so many times, it happened to the Armenians, and after Armenians, Hitler took action”.

    So show us exactly where, video or print, Lemkin said something to the effect of “I created the word ‘genocide’ because of what happened in the Holocaust and the Armenian is but one example”.

    And if the Armenian Genocide was not the driving force, why was it mentioned at all?

    Meanwhile back on planet Earth…

    REGARDLESS OF HOW BIG A PART THE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE CONTRIBUTED TO THE CREATION OF THE WORD GENOCIDE, NEVERTHELESS IT MADE ITS MARK AS THE INITIAL DRIVING FORCE AND CANNOT BE FACTORED OUT OF THE EQUATION.

    AT THE MINIMUM we know this to be true, while Lemkin mentioned no other people in the interview specifically, a significant point. Thus the word ‘genocide’ can be reasonably attributed to the Armenian Genocide as the driving force behind the term even if that was not the “final motivation” (whatever that means).

    Analogously, just like the person who invented the jet airplane cannot be credited with the invention of the non-jet airplane that came before, your logic in this matter is twisted and in reverse, similar to how an average Genocide denying Turk would try to argue…

    As for your posts and the pattern I am noticing: somehow, it seems that you are eager to place Armenian issues to the highest most impeccable standards with no wiggle room at all, but don’t display the same passion, in fact you are absent altogether, when it comes to questionable and sometimes even blatant lies by others who post regarding their own ethnicities and cultures. Take for example your question in the other thread, “what do you mean by western values?”, it has dawned on me, what ‘Armenian’ who knows anything about being Armenian at all or who has grown up as one, would ask such an odd question? And when it is answered effectively, proceeds to change the subject by going off on a tangent. It just doesn’t make sense to me, and I doubt your claimed sincerity here, and I think your posts are disingenuous with suspicious motives behind them. But of course, this is just my opinion and not Lemkin’s.

    • “REGARDLESS OF HOW BIG A PART THE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE CONTRIBUTED TO THE CREATION OF THE WORD GENOCIDE, NEVERTHELESS IT MADE ITS MARK AS THE INITIAL DRIVING FORCE AND CANNOT BE FACTORED OUT OF THE EQUATION.”

      I was not trying to force it out of the equation.

      I have been reading about Lemkin and his connection with the Armenian genocide for several years now. There has been new research about him lately, including the publication of his autobiography. There is no question about the importance of the genocide sparking his commitment to international laws on genocide. As I mentioned earlier he called for the passage of such laws in the 30’s!

      And as you also see my words which you quoted, I say that the Holocaust was the *final* motivation in him creating the word. If I understand correctly, he had tried to come up with such a word before WWII but could not settle on anything satisfactory.

      My constructive criticism is about how we Armenians explain the connection between Lemkin’s work and the Armenian genocide, and that’s because it’s important. Most people know that the word genocide entered the vocabulary because of the Holocaust. Saying that “it’s because of the Armenian genocide”, will come across as contradictory to what they know and we will not be taken seriously. That’s all I’m saying.

      The wording and phrasing is more important than you realize.

    • Lemkin first introduced the word genocide in his 1944 book “Axis Rule in Occupied Europe”. It’s in chapter IX

      http://books.google.com/books?id=y0in2wOY-W0C&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=snippet&q=genocide&f=false

      In 1944. In a book about titled “Axis Rule in Occupied Europe”

      Also

      http://www.preventgenocide.org/genocide/crimewithoutaname.htm
      http://ejil.oxfordjournals.org/content/20/4/1157.full

      Lemkin was finally motivated to create the word genocide because of a Churchill speech in which he said “We are in the presence of a crime without a name.”

      And here’s an article mentioning Lemkin and his connection with the Armenian genocide.
      http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php?ModuleId=10007050

      Everything I’ve said is consistent with the facts.

  8. {“ I wish he would stop saying Lemkin coined the word “genocide” based on the Armenian case. “}
    {“ Harut’s wording leaves a different impression.”}
    (Random Armenian // June 19, 2014 at 11:32 am //)

    You seem to be the only one on these pages (and @Asbarez) who finds issue with this:

    {…distinguished jurist Raphael Lemkin who coined the term “genocide” based on his detailed studies of the extermination of Armenians by the Ottoman-Turkish government} (Sassounian).
    Where in that sentence or in his article does Mr. Sansounian claim that Dr. Lemkin did not also study other Genocides ?

    What do you expect Mr. Sassounian to do, list all the cases Dr. Lemkin studied ?
    This is an article about Turk AG denialists in Australia: not a bio of Dr. Lemkin or his intellectual journey coining the word.
    People familiar with Dr. Lemkin’s work know he was a Polish Jew who studied many atrocities, besides AG, to see if they fit the new definition he was attempting to crystallize: Genocide.

    Here is the relevant paragraph from Mr. Sassounian’s “transcript” article in 2005.

    {Raphael Lemkin then explains to the moderator how his interest in genocide began: “I became interested in genocide because it happened to the Armenians; and after[wards] the Armenians got a very rough deal at the Versailles Conference because their criminals were guilty of genocide and were not punished……The trial of Talaat Pasha in 1921 in Berlin is very instructive. A man (Soghomon Tehlirian), whose mother was killed in the genocide, killed Talaat Pasha. And he told the court that he did it because his mother came in his sleep … many times. Here, …the murder of your mother, you would do something about it! So he committed a crime. So, you see, as a lawyer, I thought that a crime should not be punished by the victims, but should be punished by a court, by a national law.”}

    ““I became interested in genocide because it happened to the Armenians.”
    “…became interested in genocide….”

    As in, the basis for Dr. Lemkin’s interest in the phenomenon that later became known as ‘Genocide’ was triggered by his study of the AG.
    Do you have any evidence to the contrary ?
    Do you question the authenticity of the transcript provided by Mr. Sassounian ?

    Isn’t it curious that in the entire article written by Mr. Sassounian, you object only to that ?
    How is it that someone posting under the moniker ‘Random Armenian’ does not deign to find anything objectionable in the denialist Gunes Gungor’s libeling Mr. Sassounian, or his badmouthing Dr. Lemkin, or quite a lot of other objectionable actions by denialist Turks in Australia – but finds something advocating _for_ AG objectionable, for example ?
    Why is that ?

    Very Truly,
    Avery _the_ Online Bully.

    • “Isn’t it curious that in the entire article written by Mr. Sassounian, you object only to that ?”

      No it’s not. Not to a non-paranoid mind. People are free to choose to point to whatever they find objectionable. Being Armenian does not require one to write a treatise discussing *everything* objectionable in an article. Thinking that what doing otherwise is “suspect” or “curious,” on the other hand, is paranoid.

      “How is it that someone posting under the moniker ‘Random Armenian’ does not deign to find anything objectionable in the denialist Gunes Gungor’s libeling Mr. Sassounian, or his badmouthing Dr. Lemkin, or quite a lot of other objectionable actions by denialist Turks in Australia – but finds something advocating _for_ AG objectionable, for example ?”

      Did Random say that he did not find Turks’ acts objectionable? No. Finding something objectionable does not mean he is required to point it out. There are plenty of people who point out the wrongs of the denialists. Random does not have to repeat their efforts. He can choose to point out something that others missed – i.e. a mistake (perceived by him) by our side.

  9. Zeki writes: …compared to the well integrated Armenian community who have resided in Australia for decades longer.

    Recognize how it is and why the armenains have been there ‘decades longer’ and try to be honest with your answer.

  10. Dear Mr. Harut Sassounian,

    As you can see, there are quite a few Turks and Azeris on here (some who fake being Armenian) who are throwing cheap shots at you and attempting to accuse you of being a “bully.” And the reason why they do this, is because they’re desperate to minimize the despicable crimes their forefathers have committed against the Armenian people. By doing this, it only shows how ignorant and uneducated they are.

    Anyway, it’s always a pleasure and honor for me to have the opportunity to read your articles. Truthfully speaking, I’ve been reading your highly educational articles for several years now and as a result, I’ve learned a great deal about the various issues facing our Armenian people. I would also like to tell you that you’re one of the reasons why I’ve devoted my life to the Armenian Cause. You’ve done enormously for the Armenian people and are truly an inspiration to young Armenian men like myself.

  11. (RVDV // June 20, 2014 at 7:30 pm //)

    RVDV:

    Please read [HagopD]’s reply above to Random, in particular this sentence:

    {“… Lemkin’s mentioning of the word ‘Armenian’, AND WITH THE LACK OF MENTIONING OTHER PEOPLES SPECIFICALLY….”}

    Lemkin coined the word in 1944.
    UN adopted the Genocide convention in 1948.
    Lemkin CBS interview was recorded in 1949, some 5 years after he coined the word.
    Yet Dr. Lemkin chose to use the word ‘Armenian’, and no other ethnos in this sentence: “I became interested in genocide because it happened to the Armenians”.
    Full stop.

    Now, clearly, being a Jew himself, the Jewish Holocaust would have had a profound effect on him personally: particularly since he was a WW2 contemporary, and was literally ‘watching’ his people being exterminated. Actually Nazis accelerated the mass murders of Jews (and other ‘undesirables’) as they became convinced they were going to lose the war around 1944.
    So I don’t doubt that JH gave Dr. Lemkin the final impetus to achieve closure with the new descriptor, and bring it to the world’s attention as soon as possible
    The urgency must have been overwhelming in 1944.

    So, I understand since you are studying to become a genocide scholar (…if memory serves), you need to be as accurate as possible related to these matters.
    But, sorry friend: in this case, I think you are reaching.

    • Avery,

      You’re conflating the creation of the word with his interest in the field of genocide itself. Yes, Lemkin became interested in genocide because of our case. I’ve known that for years. It’s about when the coinage of the word. And RVDV was very clear about this.

      And you can’t just stick to his CBS interview video. He has a ton of written work that’s still being studied.

      In fact, in his book “Axis Rule in Occupied Europe”, where in chapter IX, he introduces the word, he makes no mention of Armenians. But we know based on his words, written and spoken, that he included 1915 and other cases, past and present, when he created the word.

    • I am conflating nothing: there is nothing to conflate.
      You, on the other hand, are desperately trying to disassociate Lemkin’s coinage of the word ‘Genocide’ from the Armenian Genocide.

      Astonishingly, you are actually trying to convince people here@AW that what they heard Dr. Lemkin say on video is not actually what he said.
      Any day now, you will next try to convince people that the man in the video is not Dr. Lemkin himself, but an imposter.

    • Yes, he became interested in genocide because it happened first to the Armenians. I’m guessing he doesn’t mention any other events or possible cases because those didn’t spark his interest. But here’s a point to consider. Lemkin was born in 1900. In the period between 1915-22 he became an adult, began to form a worldview, and received his education. It’s no surprise to me that the Armenian genocide impacted him so much (given that he was clearly interested in these issues). But nothing happened, no one was punished.

      Then it happened again, this time to the Jews. Only at this point is the word created. It was in response to the Nazis (pretty obvious considering the title of the book he first mentions it in).On what did he base it on? The Holocaust. The Armenian genocide. Other cases that he studied. A culmination of events over decades, in which his interest was initially sparked by what befell the Armenians. A culmination of events which led him to believe that these actions must be criminalized, that the state must pay for its crimes so these type of events stop happening. And btw it would have be unscholarly on his part had he based his definition of genocide on one event.

    • Avery,

      I don’t understand why you’re having such a problem with this. This is what I wrote in my first post.

      “Lemkin created the word “genocide” to describe *all* such crimes, and stated that the Armenian case was an example of genocide. But the *final* motivation to create a new word to describe these crimes was the Holocaust and not the Armenian genocide. Harut’s wording leaves a different impression.”

      This is in line with everything you and Hagop have said. As I mentioned in other posts, it’s the wording and phrasing when someone says “The word ‘genocide’ was coined by Lemking based on the Armenian genocide.” To an odar, who you may be trying to educate about the Armenian genocide, this will sound like “Lemkin created the word based on the Armenian case first, and not the Holocaust or other cases.” And everyone knows the word genocide came into wide use and was created during the Holocaust.

      Granted my opening sentence in my first post started harshly and not-so diplomatically. I apologize for that.

      But my issue here is how we phrase Lemkin’s connection with the Armenian genocide and the word. I stand by what I’ve said.

      And RVDV has described what I wanted to say better.

      I really have nothing else to say on this subject because you’re refusing understand what I’m saying.

    • Not quite so, RVDV. Then it happened again, this time to the Assyrians in 1933, and only then to the Jews. It was in the early 1930s, i.e. BEFORE the Holocaust, when Lemkin, as a state prosecutor in Poland, began lobbying for an international legislation–not just a term–to criminalize the destruction of people based on his study, at the time, of the Armenian experience at the hands of the Turks. Therefore, it might not be “in response to the Nazis”, but, as Lemkin said in the book where he introduced the term, in order to “denote an old practice [of] destruction of a nation or of an ethnic group in its modern development”. An old practice… On what did he base it on? First and foremost, on the Armenian genocide and other cases that he had studied. Definition of “to be based on” by Oxford English Dictionary: 1 have as the foundation for (something); use as a point from which (something) can develop. Should be self-explanatory.

    • John: I’ve mentioned the Assyrian case in Iraq several times. I also mentioned that he almost coined the term around the same as the Assyrian case.

      “…but, as Lemkin said in the book where he introduced the term, in order to “denote an old practice [of] destruction of a nation or of an ethnic group in its modern development”. An old practice… On what did he base it on? First and foremost, on the Armenian genocide and other cases that he had studied.”

      It’s hard to debate based on one man’s word because it can interpreted in different ways, and only he knows how he meant it. “Old practice”- well to me 1915 wasn’t so “long ago” in 1944. But maybe by “old practice” he was referencing the Armenian genocide.

      What you said: “First and foremost, on the Armenian genocide and other cases that he had studied.”

      What I said: “On what did he base it on? The Holocaust. The Armenian genocide. Other cases that he studied.”

      So we actually don’t really disagree on much. By basing it on the Holocaust I merely meant that it was the case that made him say enough is enough. It was the final nudge. The foundation of the word was set in his research that stretched far before the Holocaust- which started with the Armenian case. But I still think the *final* motivation for coining term was the Holocaust- just as Random says. And I still think that point is irrefutable. Because as you said:

      “It was in the early 1930s, i.e. BEFORE the Holocaust, when Lemkin, as a state prosecutor in Poland, began lobbying for an international legislation–not just a term–to criminalize the destruction of people based on his study, at the time, of the Armenian experience at the hands of the Turks”

      But he didn’t coin the term in the 1930s did he? He had enough research and information to be able to do so. But he didn’t. WHY? He only coined it in 1944. In a book called “Axis Rule in Occupied Europe: Laws of Occupation – Analysis of Government – Proposals for Redress”. This suggests that while the Holocaust wasn’t what he case he based the word “genocide” on, it was the *final* motivation in him coining the word. Which is significant, just as the cases he based the word on are as well. I don’t think this viewpoint diminishes the Armenian genocide in any way, and if you or anyone else feels that it does then I’m sorry, it was never my intention.

    • RVDV,

      Older practices that Lemkin has studied were, going backwards from the Holocaust, the Assyrian massacre and the mass murder of the Armenians. 1915 is almost 30 years behind year 1944. To me, it qualifies perfectly for an “old practice”.

      “I said: First and foremost, on the Armenian genocide and other cases that he had studied. You said: On what did he base it on? The Holocaust. The Armenian genocide. Other cases that he studied. So we actually don’t really disagree on much.” -We disagree on chronology and prioritization.

      “The foundation of the word was set in his research that stretched far before the Holocaust- which started with the Armenian case. But I still think the *final* motivation for coining term was the Holocaust.” –I disagree, because before coining the term, Lemkin, in the course of many years before the Holocaust, was motivated in lobbying for an international law criminalizing the destruction of people, a motivation that had derived from the Armenian experience. To leave this lengthy period of his professional life aside and concentrate solely on the Holocaust as “final” motivation is, to me, undeserving.

      “But he didn’t coin the term in the 1930s did he? He had enough research and information to be able to do so. But he didn’t. WHY?” -I believe Lemkin answered your question better than anyone else: “To denote an old practice [of] destruction of a nation or of an ethnic group in its modern development”. In other words, as I understand his words, an old practice is primary, and its modern development [in 1944] is only auxiliary.

      Whatever our interpretations are, I think that given what we know about Lemkin’s interest and motivation in the AG, it is not incorrect to say that the term “genocide” was based on his studies of the extermination of Armenians.

    • “We disagree on chronology and prioritization.”

      How? Armenian genocide came first, and Lemkin studied it first. That’s what first shaped his opinion on genocide, and the word itself is surely based more on the Armenian case than any other (other case mainly being the Simele case, not so much, if at all the Holocaust).

      “To leave this lengthy period of his professional life aside and concentrate solely on the Holocaust as “final” motivation is, to me, undeserving.”

      I understand that he spent many years lobbying for criminalizing what we now call genocide. But I have to keep bringing this same point up: he didn’t coin the term at that time even though he could have. It only happens in 1944. Now if he published a general book in 1944 that wasn’t necessarily about the crimes of the Nazis I’d agree with you that the emphasis on the Holocaust is undeserving. But when you take into consideration the date it was published and the title of the book, it causes me to question whether he would’ve ever coined the term if the Holocaust never happened. Another point to consider- especially given the 100 years of AG denial and general indifference of the international community when push comes to shove on this issue- is whether genocide even becomes a punishable crime if the Holocaust never happens. All the genocide, human rights conventions, etc., came in response to the Holocaust. Does the international community at the time care so much about those things if the Holocaust never happened? So the word itself may not have been based IN ANY WAY on the Holocaust, but other factors make it impossible to detach the word from the Holocaust. Because by saying the word is based on the Armenian genocide- period, end of story, it almost seems as though you’re trying to detach the word from the Holocaust as much as possible. Which I can understand btw, given the seemingly endless attention, documentation, commemoration, and education worldwide about the Holocaust compared to the Armenian genocide which there has still been no justice or reparations for (also because its largely ignored, and met often by sharp denial or denial based on state interests).

      “Whatever our interpretations are, I think that given what we know about Lemkin’s interest and motivation in the AG, it is not incorrect to say that the term “genocide” was based on his studies of the extermination of Armenians.”

      If the international community at large can be convinced of that, it would certainly help the Armenian cause. I don’t think its completely true, but I’ll take “mostly true and factual” over lies, denial, and more damn lies any time.

    • “We disagree on chronology and prioritization. How?” -Because you said: “On what did he base it on? The Holocaust. The Armenian genocide.” It is (a) chronologically incorrect, and (b) does not reflect on Lemkin’s interest and the consequent statement ([…] happened to the Armenians and THEN Hitler took over”).

      “He didn’t coin the term at that time even though he could have. It only happens in 1944.” -How do we know that he could have? He coined it when a thought had struck him after his research. This is how most of the discoveries are made in the scientific world. Pardon my trivial comparison, but Newton was working on the force of gravity for many years, but only after an apple fell on his head has he come up with “the law of universal gravitation”. Should we, therefore, discard his hard preparatory work and concentrate instead on a damned apple?

      “If the international community at large can be convinced of that, it would certainly help the Armenian cause.” -International community? Convinced? I know you can do much better than that. All I can say is there is a number of genocide scholars and international layers who admit that Lemkin based the term on the AG. Again, if we replace the word “based” in the clause “Raphael Lemkin coined the term ‘genocide’ based on his detailed studies of the extermination of Armenians” by a definition of “based on” given by reputable dictionaries [=have as the foundation for (something); use as a point from which (something) can develop], we will see that Sassounian’s clause is not incorrect.

  12. Is the full Lemkin CBS interview somewhere on the net? I can’t find it. The only thing I can find is the abridged one where he mentions Armenians.

  13. I realize the 100 year commemoration of the Armenian genocide is coming up; after having read several of your interesting articles, I looked up the Herrero genocide in wikipedia and found out that in 2004, 100 years after colonial imperialist Germany genocided the Herrero people in Namibia, the German govt. apologized and gave the people $14M a year in economic aid. There is also a new book “Mama Namibia” that tells the story of a Namibian girl who spends two years in the desert, where her people were sent to starve and die of thirst, who encounters a Jewish doctor, who is serving in the German army and saves her, at the same time doubting his loyalty to the Fatherland. Jews and Germans lived as equals at this time, but the seeds of Goring and Josef Mengele were being planted in colonial German African colonies (pseudo science and racist laws-the Aryan race); and the Holocaust happened later, when 6M Jews were murdered. The point is that ater 100 years, Turkey owes it to the Armenians to apologize and make some kind of reconciliation. Germany has already apologized to the Herrero people and made reparations to the Jews. Also, I read that Germany is undergoing a sea of change, according to the Weisenthal Institute and putting out warrants to arrest more Nazi war criminals than before.

  14. {“ I can’t find it….. only…. one where he mentions Armenians”}
    (Random Armenian // June 22, 2014 at 1:03 am // )

    Must have been very disappointing for you, No ?
    I am sure now that you have admitted, in a roundabout way, that you in fact have been looking for something, anything, to cast doubt on Dr Lemkin mentioning the Armenian Genocide specifically, and only the Armenian Genocide, in that CBS clip – Armenian readers and posters @AW will spare no effort in helping you.

    btw: as a side observation to abundantly reinforce, here and now, what [HagopD] wrote above: {“you are eager to place Armenian issues to the highest most impeccable standards with no wiggle room at all, but don’t display the same passion, in fact you are absent altogether, when it comes to questionable and sometimes even blatant lies by others….”}
    To wit, why is it that you have apparently spared no effort (in this thread) to try to muddy what Dr Lemkin said , but find no time to counter the scurrilous allegation against the decorated Captain posted by a Turk who honestly* posts under the moniker ‘John the Turk’ ? (Gallipoli thread)

    —-
    * well, didn’t used to be very honest. Used to post under ‘John’, attempting to pass himself off as a ‘neutral’ Anglo poster. But we figured out he was a Turk rather quickly and bestowed the accurate, albeit unsolicited, moniker ‘John the Turk’ on him. He liked it so much, he enthusiastically adopted the new, improved handle.
    He is a denialist bloke, but at least he is a bloke who knows when the jig is up.

    • “To wit, why is it that you have apparently spared no effort (in this thread) to try to muddy what Dr Lemkin said , but find no time to counter the scurrilous allegation against the decorated Captain posted by a Turk who honestly* posts under the moniker ‘John the Turk’ ? (Gallipoli thread)”

      I don’t have to address every single Turkish denialism on AW in order to be allowed to make constructive criticism towards our camp. This is a silly argument Avery. Besides, you’re busy doing this yourself and don’t want to step on your toes ;-)

    • “Must have been very disappointing for you, No ?
      I am sure now that you have admitted, in a roundabout way, that you in fact have been looking for something, anything, to cast doubt on Dr Lemkin mentioning the Armenian Genocide specifically, and only the Armenian Genocide, in that CBS clip – Armenian readers and posters @AW will spare no effort in helping you.”

      I think given that the interview mentions the Armenian genocide, and also given the relevant quotes are actually longer than the abridged clip, it would be interesting to see the entire interview. If you think I’m trying to see if he never said anything about Armenians in the interview, then your suggestion has a disgusting insinuation. It is out of intellectual interest that I want to see the entire interview. Based on the extended quotes I’ve read, the interview looks even more interesting than the clip.

      Not only that, it would be great to provide a link to the entire interview when countering denialism online as you so often do.

  15. “You’re conflating the creation of the word with his interest in the field of genocide itself.”

    In my opinion that is a moot point, as the two are correlated. The evidence of this is even in the video itself, as the interview introduces a “new word” and talks about why it came about as an idea, meaning “the idea” (eventually) prompted the “new word”. It is like saying the creation of the word ‘selfie’ was not inspired by people who kept taking photos of themselves.

    “Yes, Lemkin became interested in genocide because of our case.”

    It’s good that you acknowledge this, and this should be your starting point in accepting that the AG played a role in creation of the word and not deviating from its implications.

    “And you can’t just stick to his CBS interview video. He has a ton of written work that’s still being studied.”

    Why not, so that you could make your theory work? And since Lemkin has a ton of work being studied, why don’t you study it first yourself, find credible sources for your argument and then present it, instead of irresponsibly making claims and accusations, supposedly for “integrity” which it seems in your view applies only to Armenians. “Constructive criticism” is good, but that’s not how you approached this. You started off by accusing Mr Sassounian of being deceptive.

    As it stands, Lemkin’s own words in the video interview have significant meaning. If his interest in genocide was sparked by the Armenian Genocide, then it played a part in the creation of the word genocide by default, although how big a part, I don’t claim to know, but nevertheless significant because Lemkin cited the AG specifically.

    As RVDV claims: “Lemkin created the word precisely in response to what the Nazis were doing to the Jews”.

    I would put doubt on this and consider this to be debatable as well. As I said, both of you need to bring your evidence first why Lemkin created the word ‘genocide’. Until then the interview is what we have as the closest thing why he created the word ‘genocide’ and that was based on both the Armenian case which sparked his interest as well as what the Nazis did.

    I did find one source that supports this idea…
    From Dan Stone, “Raphael Lemkin on the Holocaust”:
    “The most significant aspect of his analysis of Nazi genocide is the fact that at every turn Lemkin does not distinguish between the fate of the Jews (“the Holocaust”) and that of other victims of Nazism”

    and

    “Lemkin does not see the fate of the Jews as somehow “special” or separate from broader Nazi ambitions of reshaping Europe’s demography through radical measures of extermination, expulsion
    and forced resettlement. Similarly, Lemkin devotes considerable space to the fate of Soviet POWs under the Third Reich (TNG, pp 99–102) and civilians (TNG, pp 102–110).”

    This may be confusing at first if we consider that Lemkin was Jewish, and we could ask, didn’t he know what was going on with his own people? But then there are misconceptions here about the Holocaust and the origin of the word ‘genocide’.

    In 1943 (the year the word genocide was put together), the extent of the Holocaust was not yet known as it would be after the war was finished. So to say that it was the Holocaust specifically that caused the creation of the word ‘genocide’ would create a discontinuity. The knowledge of Holocaust, especially during the war, was not limited to Jews and its real research actually started in the 1960s. The victims also included Poles, Czechs, Slavs, Bolsheviks, POWs, Gays, Jehovah’s Witnesses, Masons, Gypsies, and any other groups Nazi Germany deemed undesirable for their territories.

    All of this casts doubt on the notion that the Armenian Genocide played no role in the creation of the word ‘genocide’ and that it was because of the Holocaust specifically. I am convinced it was both with perhaps more weight given to the Armenian Genocide. That is why Lemkin said “after the Armenians, Hitler took action” without mentioning other peoples or groups specifically.

    So: perhaps when “Hitler took action” there was a necessity for finally creating a ‘legal’ term by which to charge genocide perpetrators, but let’s not lose sight of the fact that the Armenian Genocide started it all, and ultimately cannot be factored out of the creation of the word of ‘genocide’.

    • “I would put doubt on this and consider this to be debatable as well. As I said, both of you need to bring your evidence first why Lemkin created the word ‘genocide’. Until then the interview is what we have as the closest thing why he created the word ‘genocide’ and that was based on both the Armenian case which sparked his interest as well as what the Nazis did.”

      We have more than the interview. I have linked to the book where Lemkin first introduced the word genocide: “Axis Rule in Occupied Europe”

      In chapter IX of that book, published in 1944, he introduces the word for the first time. Please read it. There is a ton of his other work in publication and has been studied. Not just the CBS video.

      Avery at al.
      “that was based on both the Armenian case which sparked his interest as well as what the Nazis did.”

      This! This is a much better sentence. This is what I’m talking about!

    • “I am convinced it was both with perhaps more weight given to the Armenian Genocide. ”

      Then why did Lemkin wait until 1943 to coin the term when his interest began in the 1920s and publicly pushed for international treaties on the subject in 1933?

      Lemkin knew what the Nazis were up to. He was studying the laws they used as part of their persecution.

      Read chapter IX of “Axis Rule in Occupied Europe”.

  16. Let’s again take a moment to go over what Raphael Lemkin stated in that interview: “I became interested in genocide, because it happened so many times. It happened to the Armenians and after the Armenians, Hitler took action.” This by itself shows that the Armenian Genocide played a significant part in Lemkin’s coining of the term, “genocide.” Therefore, Mr. Sassounian is not wrong in any particular way by saying that Lemkin’s coining of the term, “genocide,” is based on his research of the extermination of Armenians by the Ottoman-Turkish government. As a matter of fact, on page 378 in the book, The Burning Tigris, the distinguished Armenian Genocide historian, Peter Balakian, states “The 1948 UN Genocide Convention had already codified a definition of genocide, a word that Raphael Lemkin had coined in 1944, using the Armenian massacres as a primary example of what he meant.” This runs parallel with what Mr. Sassounian stated earlier.

    In regard to the Holocaust, there’s absolutely no doubt that it also played a significant part in Lemkin’s coining of the term, “genocide.” After all, he coined this particular term during the period of time in which the Jews were being exterminated in Europe.

    How many of you have read the AW article, “Perincek vs. Switzerland: Freedom of Expression Distorted”? Make sure to read the part where it says, “The Armenian Genocide led the international law expert, Raphael Lemkin, to call for the establishment and stimulation of such a category in international law; the Holocaust led to this being implemented in 1948 with the UN Genocide Convention.”

    • Yerevanian,

      My issue is not about the the influence of the Armenian genocide on Lemkin and the role it played in his interest in genocide and coinage of the word.

      The problem I have is that when someone says “Lemkin coined the term genocide based on the Armenian genocide.”, people are going to think that you’re saying, Lemkin coined it based on AG and not others, including the Holocaust. And they will not take what you have to say about the Armenian genocide seriously. That’s what I’m concerned with. You have to put yourself in the shoes of an odar who is not familiar with the AG in order to explain it to them.

      To say that I’m suggesting Lemkin did not know or study the AG, or his interest in genocide did not start with the AG is an outright lie. I’ve known about Lemkin and the AG for years.

  17. After Lemkin moved to Washington in 1942 to join the War Department, he went on to document Nazi atrocities in his book “Axis Rule in Occupied Europe”. In it, he introduced the word “genocide.” Here’s what Lemkin himself wrote on p. 80:

    “By ‘genocide’ we mean the destruction of a nation or of an ethnic group. This new word, COINED BY THE AUTHOR (capitalization mine – j) to denote an old practice in its modern development, is made from the ancient Greek word genos (race, tribe) and the Latin cide (killing)…. Generally speaking, genocide does not necessarily mean the immediate destruction of a nation, except when accomplished by mass killings of all members of a nation. It is intended rather to signify a coordinated plan of different actions aiming at the destruction of essential foundations of the life of national groups, with the aim of annihilating the groups themselves. Genocide is directed against the national group as an entity, and the actions involved are directed against individuals, not in their individual capacity, but as members of the national group”.

  18. Today is Lemkin’s birthday; and Haaretz had an article: for your interest:
    “Lemkin, a polyglot, studied linguistics, philosophy and law at John Casimir, Heidelberg and Lwow (now Lviv) universities, and received his law degree from the latter at the end of the 1920s. From an early age, he had been fascinated by tales of human cruelty throughout history, and it was the Turkish massacres of Armenians in 1915 that provided much of the impetus for him to enter law school.

    “From 1929 to 1934, Lemkin served as a public prosecutor, first in Berezhany (in Galicia) and then in Warsaw, and also had his own private legal practice. He also helped to codify the Polish penal codes, as all the while he studied the ability of international law to act against crimes against ethnic and cultural collectives. In this regard, Lemkin came up with two new concepts: “barbarity,” which is the term he used for the destruction of groups, and “vandalism,” which is the word he proposed to refer to the destruction of cultural heritage.”

    There is more in the article about his work at the UN, about the word
    “genocide,” etc.

  19. FYI, I will add some more of the article in Haaretz today:
    “With the help of Malcolm McDermott, a law professor at Duke University in North Carolina, Lemkin took up a position there in 1941, while traveling around the United States lecturing about the crimes being committed by Germany. He had acquired copies of the laws introduced in the lands occupied by the Germans, material that served as the basis for his groundbreaking 1944 book, “Axis Rule in Occupied Europe.” It was there that Lemkin first used the term “genocide,” a neologism based on the Greek for “race” or “tribe,” and the Latin suffix for “killing.” He defined it as “the destruction of a nation or an ethnic group.”

    “For the rest of his life, Lemkin was obsessed with introducing into international law the prohibition of genocide, which Winston Churchill referred to in 1941 as “the crime without a name.” He assisted the American prosecution in the 1946 Nazi war crimes trials in Nuremberg, succeeding in having the crime of genocide entered into the indictments, and devoted his final years to the goal of having the UN draft an anti-genocide convention.”

  20. “this should be your starting point in accepting that the AG played a role in creation of the word and not deviating from its implications.”

    Noone claimed that the Armenian Genocide did not play a role in creating the word “genocide.” The point that Random and RVDV are making, quite correctly, is that it does not mean that Lemkin coined the word “genocide” based on the Armenian Genocide, as claimed by one of our “leaders.” Nowhere does Lemkin state that. Sure, Lemkin’s interest in genocides started with the Armenian Genocide. To claim that this means that he based the word “genocide” on the Armenian Genocide is to suggest that Armenians are the center of the universe, something that our “leaders” tend to suggest sometimes. Needless to say, it does not put us Armenians in the most favorable light.

    In his famous Manifesto, Armenia’s first prime-minister Hovhannes Kachaznouni refers precisely to this phenomenon when he discusses the shortsightedness of our leaders just before the Genocide, and the resulting tragedy. In his words: “we drew such conclusions as though our Cause was the center of gravity of the Great War, its cause and its purpose.” Within a year, there were virtually no Armenians left in Western Armenia.
    http://louisville.edu/a-s/history/turks/Katchaznouni.pdf

    If we are to avoid further reverses, we may want to avoid convenient myths and try to assess facts objectively. And we may want to hold our “leaders” to that standard.

  21. To Random,

    No one finds your criticism of Mr. Sassiunian’s
    Column even vaguely persuasive so far as the comments can show.

    I am not political, and I don’t know his politics.
    But I want to tell you why your tone shocks me.

    Harut Sassounian has spent his adult life serving Armenia and Armenians. You know he publishes and speaks publicly.

    About 8 years ago, a woman from my Church fell I’ll in Armenia. I called him to see if he could help arrange an air ambulance. He took my call.

    Did you know he was UAF President?

    Did you know that he helped bring 550M in aid to Armenia following the Earthquake?

    Talk is cheap. You and I multiplied by 1,000 will not have served Armenia as much as he.
    Be respectful.

    • jda,

      My issue was about how he phrased a sentence and the importance and implications of it. I was not attacking Mr Sassounian as a person or the work he has done in the past. You’re delving into hyperbole here.

      The other reason I came on rather strongly with this is that I’ve heard some other fellow Armenians say “Lemkin coined the word ‘genocide’ for the Armenian genocide *first*.” Which is an even more inaccurate statement to make.

    • RA,

      So now you pestered a pillar of the community about a non-issue because a third party erred? Amot.

    • “So now you pestered a pillar of the community about a non-issue because a third party erred?”

      If he is so easily pestered by a simple criticism, then perhaps he should not be a “pillar” of the community.

  22. It’s quite hilarious how that very same Turkbaijani guest is still continuing to make a desperate attempt to discredit Mr. Sassounian. However, this particular guest is failing in its mission the same way that he/she has failed in all its missions up to now. This particular neurotic guest, even goes so far as telling Mr. Sassounian, “I would suggest refraining from responding to posters before reducing your credibility even further.” What a huge cheap shot that is! But then again, what else could you possibly expect from a Turkbaijani sore loser? Anyway, this extremely low-class, ignorant person is in no position to suggest anything to Mr. Sassounian or anyone else for that matter.

  23. “We have more than the interview. I have linked to the book where Lemkin first introduced the word genocide”

    1. No we don’t.
    2. “providing links” means nothing when you can’t prove your claims with them. If it means something, then you can satisfy my request using your own “links”: SHOW ME EXACTLY WHERE LEMKIN SAID HE –COINED THE TERM GENOCIDE– NOT BASED ON THE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE BUT THE HOLOCAUST AND THAT THE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE WAS JUST AN EXAMPLE AMONG MANY (this is what you are claiming, remember?).
    3. Assuming “we have more than the interview” – so!? That does not change the fact that the Armenian Genocide played a role by one iota based on Lemkin’s own testimony.

    ” “that was based on both the Armenian case which sparked his interest as well as what the Nazis did”… This! This is a much better sentence. This is what I’m talking about!”

    No I don’t think this is what you’re talking about. That sentence you refer to and are trying to spin in your favor is a direct result of the interview, which you are trying to find ways of rejecting, but are unable to do so in your desperate quest for alternate sources. It is not an opinion. It is what was stated by Lemkin, nothing more, nothing less. But it seems your mission here is to downplay the fact that the Armenians were mentioned specifically without the mentioning of anyone else.

    “why did Lemkin wait until 1943 to coin the term when his interest began in the 1920s and publicly pushed for international treaties on the subject in 1933?”

    As if Lemkin didn’t have a right to search for a word until he found it after 20+ years? More importantly, the idea of Genocide and the creation of the word to describe it cannot be divorced like you are trying to do, even given a time lapse. There is also no law, rule or convention stating that someone can come up with an idea but must immediately “give it a name or else”. You could write a piece of private music and not give it a name in perpetuity, yet it does not change the fact that when and if you decide to give it a name because you decide to go public with it, that the music is not a result of it. This is a similar concept.

    No one is doubting that “when Hitler took action” it played a role in creating the word, but you are doubting that when “it happened to the Armenians” it did not play a role, or it was somehow miniscule, which is contradicted by Lemkin’s own testimony, and which is why you failed in your objective here. You came here with a mission and still cannot complete it. Your claims and accusations got you nowhere, and after all these comments still failed to deliver the goods. Nothing more to say.

    • “SHOW ME EXACTLY WHERE LEMKIN SAID HE –COINED THE TERM GENOCIDE– NOT BASED ON THE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE BUT THE HOLOCAUST AND THAT THE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE WAS JUST AN EXAMPLE AMONG MANY”

      I have a better suggestion. Show us where exactly Lemkin said that he coined the word “genocide” based on the Armenian Genocide. Writing in CAPS does not prove your wrong point, it merely shows desperation.

      “There is also no law, rule or convention stating that someone can come up with an idea but must immediately ‘give it a name or else’.”

      Nor is there law that mentioning something means you base all future decisions on that thing. Once again, you have failed in your objective of ascribing to Lemkin something that he never said.

    • Hagop,

      I linked to the book where he Lemkin first introduced the word! In a book devoted to Nazi laws used in their atrocities! That screams that the Holocaust was the *final* impetus to come up with a word for this type of crime. The very book that introduced the word is not good enough for you?

      What do you mean “no we don’t”? Lemkin left a large trail of published works that are actively being studied. Here’s one place where it’s being done.
      http://www.ncas.rutgers.edu/raphael-lemkin-and-critical-genocide-studies-2013-2014-speaker-series

      You keep insisting that I’m somehow trying to separate the Armenian genocide with the creation of the word. I’m not.

      Btw, here’s a Lemkin quote that you yourself quoted:
      “I became interested in ‘genocide’ because it happened so many times, it happened to the Armenians, and after Armenians, Hitler took action”

      He said “it happened so many times,”. Meaning not just the Armenian genocide but other cases throughout history. He had studied many other cases.

      You’re refusing to get what I’m trying to say. You want to stick to just his interview. I have nothing more to say to you.

      Good day Hagop.

  24. {“ Btw, here’s a Lemkin quote that you yourself quoted:”}
    {“ He said “it happened so many times,”. Meaning not just the Armenian genocide but other cases throughout history. He had studied many other cases.”}

    (Random Armenian // June 25, 2014 at 4:29 pm //)

    Indeed: that is quite a leap to assume he meant other cases _before_ the AG. How did you arrive at that ?
    In Chapter IX that you yourself quoted, Dr. Lemkin talks about mass killings by Nazis of not only Jews, but Poles, Russians, Gypsies, etc.
    So please show us where Dr. Lemkin lists “many other cases” _before_ the AG.

    So, yes, _after_ the Armenian Genocide “it happened so many times”.
    Only someone whose agenda is to disassociate the coining of the Genocide from the Armenian Genocide would make the fantastic mental leap that Dr. Lemkin was talking about genocides _before_ AG. (!!)

    ps: I just looove exclamation marks, don’t you ? They say so much with so little.

  25. {“This! This is a much better sentence. This is what I’m talking about!”}
    (Random Armenian // June 23, 2014 at 3:40 pm //)

    Oh, wow (!!).

    The internationally recognized Genocide scholar finally, magnanimously approves what the mere hoi polloi have been writing here @AW (!!).
    Mr. Sassounian, Sir: please make sure next time you write anything remotely related to the Armenian Genocide, to first get the approval of Dr. Random Armenian, internationally recognized Genocide scholar and acknowledged expert on what Dr. Lemkin was thinking when he coined the word ‘Genocide’ (1944), which clearly had nothing to do with the Armenian Genocide (1915).

    • Avery,

      I never said the Armenian genocide had nothing to do with the word. I said the Holocaust was the *final* motivation for the creation of the word. Your accusation is a lie.

  26. {“ I don’t have to address every single Turkish denialism on AW…”}
    (Random Armenian // June 23, 2014 at 3:57 pm //)

    No you don’t have to
    Nobody does.
    But the point of the preposition was to shine a light on your motives.

    Is this the best you could do in the Gallipoli thread ?
    John the Turk: “I am convinced that Toros sarkisian wrote his fantasies rather than the realities”
    Random Armenian: “And which parts did you find so fantastical?” (full stop: that’s the entire retort to a Denialist Turk)
    Such forceful repudiation, with several reference links, quoting chapter and verse from many books.

    While at the same time-frame writing several long posts in two threads: this thread and the Domestic Violence thread.
    In fact, when you wrote several long posts at the DV thread, the article had already been pulled from the AW front page, while the Sassounian and Gallipoli articles where trending. So you deliberately ignored the insult against a decorated Armenian OT captain by a Turk in order to spend your available time pursuing your agenda. And those same posts clearly take positions detrimental to Armenians.

    At the outset you launched an entirely gratuitous and disrespectful diatribe against Mr. Sassounian.
    Again, what are the motives of someone who posts under the handle ‘Random Armenian’, emphasis on ‘Armenian’, and proceeds to undermine Armenians, Armenia, and Armenia related causes, e.g. your attempts to disassociated the coining of ‘genocide’ from AG.

    You are acting like a bully* against honorable Mr. Sassounian who has done so much for Armenians throughout the world and for the Cause.
    Your arguments against him and his article are nothing more than red herrings*.
    You, in a knee-jerk reaction*, cherry pick* words out of context to construct strawman arguments* in support of your vile goal of disassociating the coining of the word ‘Genocide’ by Dr. Lemkin from the Armenian Genocide.

    What moral right do you have to speak (write) to Mr. Sassounian with such disdain ?
    I expect Turks, Turkbaijanis, and their agents to attack a man like Mr. Sassounian, a tireless advocate for the Cause: it’s their dirty deed.
    But someone posting under the handle ‘Random Armenian’ bullying Mr. Sassounian stinks on ice.
    What have you done for Armenians to give yourself the license to lecture someone like Mr. Sassounian with such contempt ?

    Here are just two examples of what Mr. Sassounian has done:

    #1 http://articles.latimes.com/1993-03-25/news/gl-15086_1_harut-sassounian
    [He’s a Lifeline for Armenia Quake Victims : Charities: Harut Sassounian has directed the airlifting of $39 million in supplies to that beleaguered nation. His work has not gone unnoticed locally.](March 25, 1993|VIKEN BERBERIAN | SPECIAL TO THE TIMES)
    {GLENDALE — Within a year after a devastating earthquake rocked Armenia in December, 1988, Harut Sassounian’s tiny newspaper office on Jackson Street became the epicenter of an ambitious global relief effort to help his beleaguered country……}

    #2 http://news.am/eng/news/17963.html
    {March 31, 2010 | 08:03
    March 30, NKR President Bako Sahakyan signed a decree awarding the President of the United Armenian Fund, Vice-Chairman of the Lincy Foundation Harut Sassounian with Medal of Gratitude for considerable philanthropic activities, NKR Presidential Information NKR Presidential Information department informs NEWS.am.}

    I could fill pages and pages of Comments of how much of his life Mr. Sassounian has devoted to Armenian people and Armenian causes.
    What have you done for Armenians, other than this:
    {“…you are eager to place Armenian issues to the highest most impeccable standards with no wiggle room at all, but don’t display the same passion, in fact you are absent altogether, when it comes to questionable and sometimes even blatant lies by others….”}**

    Very Truly,
    Avery the Online Bully***.
    —-
    * I seem to recall having read those words written by someone on the pages of AW, but can’t remember who. Does anyone ?

    ** Like that sentence [HagopD] wrote so much, that I am going to use it over, and over, and over again,…, and again, anytime I have a discussion with you: it fits you to a T.

    *** An accolade bestowed upon yours truly by none other than the inimitable Random Armenian, a badge thy humble servant wears proudly.

    • Avery,

      You are being too sensitive about this. And yes, you are being a bully when you say the way I post on AW is undermining Armenian causes and efforts. I have every right to pick and choose which topic I discuss and it is disgusting of you to infer that because I did not address a specific denilist attack I am somehow undermining Armenian causes. This is bullying through emotional and patriotic appeals.

      And I don’t respond to everything because people such as Sassounian and Taner Akcam (re Galipolli) are usually properly addressed.

      I have no problems with Sassounian’s efforts in helping Armenian causes. That does not mean he cannot make mistakes and that he’s beyond criticism. And that goes for everyone here, including you and me.

      As for my posts on the domestic violence thread, I was posting because I care about what’s going on in Armenia and some of the attitudes expressed by fellow Armenian males regarding the problems women in Armenia are having really ticked me off.

      Having debates online with people such as you and Hagop and Yerevanian who internalize what they see as slights and insults as on the good name of us Armenians is a waste of time.

    • Avery,

      You’re absolutely correct in saying that Random continuously attempts to undermine causes related to Armenia and Armenians. This is quite evident in his/her numerous comments. It’s also rather hilarious how he/she proceeds to accuse you of being a “bully,” when it happened to be him/her who was bullying Mr. Sassounian in its opening comment. What a sore loser! And then on top of that, this hypocrite goes on to say that having debates with you, I, and Hagop, is a waste of time; but yet, he/she is still finding plenty of time to respond to our comments.

  27. Something which hasn’t been mentioned up to now is that there are very few Jewish historians who have actually stated that the Armenian Genocide played a significant part in Lemkin’s coining of the term, “genocide.” As far as they’re concerned, they claim it was only the Holocaust which contributed to the invention of that term. Therefore, Armenian historians of the Armenian Genocide, such as Mr. Sassounian and Mr. Balakian, are not obligated in any way to mention that the Holocaust also contributed to Lemkin’s coining of the term, “genocide.”

    • Mr. Sassounian and Mr. Balakian are not historians. Neither have the academic background in that area.

    • Correction, Peter Balakian has a Ph.D. in American Civilization. I thought his main background was in literature.

    • Random,

      For your own information, a historian is one who possesses a lot of knowledge about a particular area of history and writes about it.

      Mr. Sassounian and Mr. Balakian are indeed historians of the Armenian Genocide, unlike you who knows very little about the Armenian Genocide. As a matter of fact, they’ve both written books in regard to the Armenian Genocide. You’re in no position to compare your extremely limited knowledge of the Armenian Genocide to those two people.

  28. Lemkin indeed said “it happened so many times”, but “many times” refer to the cases he had studied and not the “cases throughout history”. The cases he studied were: (1) the Armenian experience at the hands of the Turks, (2) the experience of Assyrians murdered by the Iraqis during the 1933 Simele massacre, and (3) the Jewish Holocaust. US Holocaust Memorial Museum’s website has “The Story of Raphael Lemkin” which starts with “Lemkin’s memoirs detail his early exposure to the history of Ottoman attacks against Armenians (which most scholars believe constitute genocide) […]”

    Several genocide scholars and international lawyers suggest that his idea of genocide was based on the Armenian experience. Yair Auron in “The Banality of Denial: Israel and the Armenian Genocide”, p. 9: “[…] when Raphael Lemkin coined the word genocide in 1944 he cited the 1915 annihilation of Armenians as a seminal example of genocide.” William Schabas in “Genocide in International Law: The Crime of Crimes”, p. 25: “Lemkin’s interest in the subject dates to his days as a student at Lvov University, when he intently followed attempts to prosecute the perpetration of the massacres of the Armenians.” Dirk Moses in “Genocide and Settler Society: Frontier Violence and Stolen Indigenous Children in Australian History”, p. 21: “Indignant that the perpetrators of the Armenian genocide had largely escaped prosecution, Lemkin, who was a young state prosecutor in Poland, began lobbying in the early 1930s for international law to criminalize the destruction of such groups.”

    • john,

      Lemkin also studied the German atrocities against the Herero and Namaqua in Namibia, which happened in 1904.

    • I’m not sure if he actually “studied” the German-Herero military conflict in relation to finding a common label for atrocities that he later coined as “genocide”. What’s your source? Whereas the Simele and Holocaust events are mentioned in his Memoirs, as is the Armenian experience, noted first. I think it’s not incorrect to say that the need of a common label was felt by Lemkin in relation to or based on the Armenian experience. Several Lemkin-researchers attribute to this.

    • john,

      When you say “based on the Armenian experience”, and no other events, it will imply you’re saying solely or only on the Armenian experience. That’s what an odar might think you’re saying. And I see that as a problem because you might not come across as credible, given that it was because of the Nazis the word and concept of the idea of genocide came into the world conciseness. For the majority of the people we want to educate about the Armenian genocide, their understanding of genocide is from WWII not WWI.

      If the world was a more proactive and just place, the world would have accepted the idea of genocide based on our case. And Lemkin would have succeeded seeing an international treaty before the Holocaust and not after.

  29. Random,

    Nowhere in the relevant literature or online have I found that Lemkin had stated or written that “the Holocaust was the final motivation for the creation of the word [genocide]”, as you maintain. Again, what are your sources?

    • Nowhere in the relevant or irrelevant literature does Lemkin state that he based the word “genocide” on the Armenian Genocide, as some “Armenians” maintain. Again, what is your source?

    • Seriously?

      He coined the term in 1943 and introduced in the book titled “Axis Rule in Occupied Europe: Laws of Occupation – Analysis of Government – Proposals for Redress”, discussing what the Nazis were doing, in the middle of the Holocaust. At that point, he doesn’t have to explicitly say “what the Nazis did to my people was the final motivation for the word.” He introduced it within the context of Nazi atrocities. He didn’t one day just throw out the word saying “Oh hey, here’s a new word I just came up with. I’m not going to tell you why I created it. Enjoy.”

    • “At that point, he (Lemkin) doesn’t have to explicitly say what the Nazis did to his people is the final motivation for the word.” On the reverse of that, he (Lemkin) also doesn’t have to explicitly say that the Armenian Genocide happened to be one of the reasons for his creation of the word, “genocide.”

    • There’s no need to twist my words, Random. Did I ever say “based on the Armenian experience, AND NO OTHER EVENTS”? Did I not mention the Simele and Holocaust events while stating that the need of a common label for atrocities was felt by Lemkin in relation to the Armenian experience, as he admitted in his Memoirs?

      From your response I understand that you have no conclusive proof that Lemkin also studied the 1904 German-Herero military conflict in relation to coining the term.

      I also understand that you failed to submit any statement made by Lemkin to support your hypothesis that “the Holocaust was the final motivation for the creation of the word”. That he coined the term in 1943 and introduced it in “Axis Rule in Occupied Europe” is just an idle attempt to support your point. In fact, on p. 80 in the very book, where Lemkin defines the new term, he particularly states that it was coined “to denote an old practice (the destruction of a nation or of an ethnic group) in its modern development”. Do you think the Holocaust happening at the time of Lemkin’s writing was “an old practice”? Or maybe earlier such practices were meant?

      As for those who perhaps suffer from biliary attacks when confronted with anything Armenian, several posters have already brought up Lemkin’s statement to the effect that he became interested in genocide because “[…] it happened to the Armenians, and after Armenians, Hitler took action”. Several excerpts from scholarly publications were also brought up by this poster in the June 26, 2014 at 9:28 am post, all supporting the notion that it is safe to say that Lemkin’s initial interest and subsequent idea of genocide was based on the Armenian experience.

    • First you say his “final motivation” was the source then say he doesn’t need to say it was his “final motivation”, in other words we the readers should just accept claims as facts merely because ‘Random Armenian’ said so.

      To sum up your newly modified theory from your original: “if he created the word ‘genocide’ based on the Armenian Genocide then he needs to explicitly state it. But if he created it without mentioning the Armenians, then it means it was based on other genocides and he doesn’t need to say anything at all or which ones it was” – nice double standard you got going there, which again brings me to say, you are eager to place the Armenian Genocide to the highest most extreme scrutiny, but not anything else.

      But since Lemkin’s interest in the topic of genocide was sparked by the Armenian Genocide to begin with, we know that it played a role in creating the word in part at least, so your theory can’t work.

    • john,

      “There’s no need to twist my words, Random. Did I ever say “based on the Armenian experience, AND NO OTHER EVENTS”?”

      Sorry. My sentence was poorly worded. I meant that that’s what the other person is going to think you’re saying, even though that not what you meant.

  30. “[…] the distinguished jurist Raphael Lemkin who coined the term ‘genocide’ based on his detailed studies of the extermination of Armenians by the Ottoman-Turkish government.”

    Oxford English Dictionary: ‘based on’, verb [with object]
    1 Have as the foundation for (something); use as a point from which (something) can develop.

    • “Oxford English Dictionary: ‘based on’, verb [with object]
      “1 Have as the foundation for (something); use as a point from which (something) can develop.”

      Ok, where does Lemkin state that he used the Armenian Genocide to develop the word “genocide”? Random Armenian and some other rational folks here state that Lemkin used all genocides (including the Holocaust) to develop the word, which is the more reasonable approach, since the Armenian Genocide is not the only genocide. Just because his interest developed from the Armenian Genocide does not mean that he used that one single event to develop the word, since, again, it was not the sole genocide of human history.

    • “Just because his interest developed from the Armenian Genocide does not mean that he used that one single event to develop the word, since it was not the sole genocide of human history.”

      Don’t spray spit, it wasn’t. But it was the primary case, first of the three cases that the author had studied in order to come up with the term. Chronologically first. One that sparked his professional interest, therefore motivationally significant. Seminal, that is, a case used as a point from which the term has subsequently developed, read: as a basis. Therefore, to state that “Raphael Lemkin coined the term ‘genocide’ based on his detailed studies of the extermination of Armenians by the Ottoman-Turkish government” is not incorrect.

    • “Therefore, to state that “Raphael Lemkin coined the term ‘genocide’ based on his detailed studies of the extermination of Armenians by the Ottoman-Turkish government” is not incorrect.”

      That’s right. It’s not incorrect. But it is an incomplete summary of Lemkin’s motivations and work.

      My concern is that if you say that sentence to others, they will think you’re saying the word was coined solely based on the Armenian genocide. Can you at least think about how others are going to perceive that sentence if we Armenians state it as written above?

  31. “I have a better suggestion. Show us where exactly Lemkin said that he coined the word “genocide” based on the Armenian Genocide. Writing in CAPS does not prove your wrong point, it merely shows desperation.”

    No you don’t have a “better suggestion” – I don’t need to show you anything you can’t see and hear in the video, and I am not the one making claims contrary to what is reality, so it is not up to me to show you anything.

    AND WRITING IN CAPS MEANS I HAVE NOT RECEIVED MY ANSWER DESPITE SEVERAL REQUESTS THEREFORE REFRAIN FROM REPEATING THE SAME THINGS OVER AND OVER.

    “Noone claimed that the Armenian Genocide did not play a role in creating the word “genocide.” The point that Random and RVDV are making, quite correctly, is that it does not mean that Lemkin coined the word “genocide” based on the Armenian Genocide, as claimed by one of our “leaders.” Nowhere does Lemkin state that.”

    “Nowhere in the relevant or irrelevant literature does Lemkin state that he based the word “genocide” on the Armenian Genocide, as some “Armenians” maintain.”

    Yes, Lemkin coined the word ‘genocide’ based on the Armenian Genocide because that is what sparked his interest. It is THAT simple. You’re trying to argue “he did not explicitly state” for the Armenian Genocide, but ignoring that he did not explicitly state for any specific other people and for the Holocaust either. In short, typically placing anything Armenian to a higher standard and giving everything else the benefit of the doubt. Except the video testimony somehow spoils your motives in downplaying the role of the Armenian Genocide in creating the word. And there is NOTHING you can do about it.

    Here is more bad news for you: the video is even a lot more important than what was published about the word since what was published does not state what the specific reason of creating the word was, and because when it is spoken in an interview it is coming directly from the mouth of the person who created the word, and the bottom line: the Armenian Genocide was mentioned specifically.

    Also, you need to put those quotes on “Armenian” on yourself, you are nowhere near being an Armenian.

    • “The point that Random and RVDV are making, quite correctly, is that it does not mean that Lemkin coined the word “genocide” based on the Armenian Genocide, as claimed by one of our “leaders.” Nowhere does Lemkin state that.”

      So just to be clear that’s actually not what I’m saying. I’m just saying the Armenian genocide most likely wasn’t the ONLY case he based it on, but one of a few cases (1930s Iraq, Holocaust).

    • “I don’t need to show you anything”

      Sure you do. When you make a claim, you need to prove it to be taken seriously. Such is the nature of rational debate. Sorry, more bad news for you.

      “Yes, Lemkin coined the word ‘genocide’ based on the Armenian Genocide because that is what sparked his interest. It is THAT simple.”

      No it’s not. It’s simplistic. It does not mean that it’s simple. Just because something sparks one’s interest does not mean that all his future decisions are based on that thing. A lot of important things happened since Lemkin’s initial “spark.” Such as the Holocaust. And the World War II, with all its horrors. And all the horrors leading up to World War II. And Lemkin’s learning of these and other genocides. Once again, Armenians are not the center of the universe, as warned by our first prime- minister Kachaznouni. Really, really sorry for more bad news for you.

      “the video is even a lot more important than what was published about the word”

      Ok, I will give you another chance. Show us where in the video Lemkin states that he coined the word “genocide” based on the Armenian Genocide. Transcribe the relevant part and show.

    • Correction, RVDV. The AG wasn’t the only case Lemkin had STUDIED, but one of a few cases (1930s Iraq, Holocaust). However, it is safe to say, as Israeli historian specializing on Holocaust and Genocide Yair Auron suggests, that “Lemkin cited the 1915 annihilation of Armenians as a SEMINAL example of genocide”, that is, based on that particular example of genocide.

      Oxford English Dictionary. seminal (adjective): 1 (of a work, event, moment, or figure) strongly influencing later developments.

  32. Besides the claims presented here by one who pretends to be a “democracy loving Armenian”, here is some more info the reader might be interested in. From having the experience of reading comments from our enemies regarding Armenian issues, one can start seeing a pattern, and in this thread it has revealed itself too.

    What they have in common is, 1) their hatred of Mr Sassounian, because Mr Sassounian does such important work for our community as well as the world community in exposing these genocidal fanatic extremists. And 2) quoting and skewing the writings of Kachaznouni.

    The ones typically engaged in these:
    1. Genocide-denying, deranged, brainwashed Turks.
    2. Your average run-of-the-mill Azeri.

    And their favorite source for their self-inflicted lunacy is “tallarmeniantale”. And if its not found there, they go edit the wikipedia page then use it as a “source”.

    • Let’s debunk our “Armenian” guest again (since we are at it).

      Show us where anyone on this thread quoted tallarmeniantale. Also, show us where Kachaznouni’s statement was skewed (as in, changed/falsified).

      Because, I can only find here one quote from our respectable first prime-minister, quoted by yours truly, in a truthful, authentic, unchanging manner:

      Kachaznouni (first prime-minister of Armenia): “we drew such conclusions as though our Cause was the center of gravity of the Great War, its cause and its purpose.”
      Source:
      http://louisville.edu/a-s/history/turks/Katchaznouni.pdf

      Our main enemies are those “Armenians” trying to silence honest, free exchange of ideas for the sole purpose of pretending to be “Armenians.”

    • The purpose of my post is: only an Azeri starts blabbering about “Kachaznouni” which has nothing to do with anything here, and you fit the bill perfectly. I don’t need to enter your delusional world of nonsense and debate irrelevant topics.

      You Azeris are easy to predict after a while… bash anything Sassounian writes, obsessively “research” about Armenian prostitution, and bring up Kachaznouni whenever you can (as if it is anything so important).

      Oh and by the way, I forgot… can you also remind us again “what Pushkin said about Armenians”? Every good little Azeri schoolboy learns that like their cultural prayer their first year of school (despite it being the prayer of lunatics) so you can tell us here without linking wikipedia I’m sure.

  33. Random,

    Did you read carefully what Dirk Moses, Professor of Global and Colonial History in 19th-20th centuries, wrote on Lemkin and the Armenian genocide in his monograph “Genocide and Settler Society”? I quote again.
    “Indignant that the perpetrators of the Armenian genocide had largely escaped prosecution, Lemkin, who was a young state prosecutor in Poland, began lobbying in the early 1930s for international law to criminalize the destruction of such groups.” May I repeat a part of this excerpt? “[…]began lobbying in the early 1930s[…]”

    I guess my question is if Lemkin’s “final motivation” was the Jewish Holocaust which, as we all know, started with Kristallnacht in 1938, what event(s), then, could motivate him in the early 1930s?

    • john,

      You are so confused about what I’m saying that you’re beyond help at this point. Please see Yeretsgin’s post. This person got what I have been saying all this time!

  34. I have come to this discussion late, but find the debate disappointing regarding Random Armenian’s criticism of Sassounian’s statement: “… the distinguished jurist Raphael Lemkin who coined the term “genocide” based on his detailed studies of the extermination of Armenians by the Ottoman-Turkish government.”

    As I read it, Random Armenian is not disputing the Armenian tragedy as an impetus in the creation of the term genocide, but cautioning against ‘overstating’ the connection out of fear that ‘overstating’ might negatively affect the credibility of our campaign for genocide recognition. This is a benign critique which seems sensible to me. Why should it generate so much dissent? RA doesn’t diminish the Armenian connection to the creation of the term genocide, he simply advocates for it to be given its proportional placement.

    I have no problem with this concept. Lemkin has made it clear that he became interested in the concept of race destruction and its lack of punishment in large part due to what he observed happen in the case of the Armenians and others that he studied. As an early law student, he objected to the idea that state sovereignty could shield a state from punishment for such acts of barbarism and vandalism against ‘ethnic, religious and social collectivities.’ As early as 1933, he petitioned the International Criminal Law Conference in Madrid to pass a bill outlawing such state sponsored acts. He dedicated his life to accomplishing the goal of naming, defining, and encouraging the creation of sanctions against such acts. Contrary to some opinions expressed here, I would not say that the Holocaust was the final impetus for the coining of the term—this was a work in progress for the majority of Lemkin’s adult life. A fitting analogy might be to the concept of pregnancy. One could say that ‘conception’ occurred with the Armenian massacres but that the ‘baby’ took years to fully develop and Lemkin didn’t ‘birth’ the term until after the Holocaust. I would say that the Holocaust was the impetus that finally moved the world to recognize the need to criminalize such acts—and allowed Lemkin to finally name his ‘baby’.

    Check out this video for some more background on Lemkin:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LG_0qIeRQEA

    • Really, seriously, where are our rational Armenians (like Yeretsgin) hiding? We need to be more outspoken. For the sake of our nation.

    • This stopped being a debate a few days ago. I still don’t think there’s even that much that either side really even disagrees about. Like you said, no one is denying the Armenian genocide or saying it didn’t factor into the creation of the word.

    • On the contrary, Random is indeed disputing the Armenian Genocide as being an impetus in the creation of the term, “genocide.” He/she instead places the heaviest amount of emphasis on the Holocaust. He/she has repeatedly emphasized that Raphael Lemkin did not explicitly say that the Armenian Genocide was one of the reasons for his creation of the word, “genocide.” But yet, he/she emphasizes that Lemkin did not have to explicitly say that the Holocaust was the final motivation for creating the word, “genocide.” This shows that he/she is attempting to remove the Armenian Genocide from being one of the reasons for Lemkin’s invention of the “genocide” word. Random’s foul critique is therefore adverse and unsensible.

      “I would say that the Holocaust was the impetus that finally moved the world to recognize the need to criminalize such acts and allowed Lemkin to finally name his “baby.” Actually, Lemkin named his “baby” five years before the world recognized the need to criminalize such acts.

    • Yerevanian, can you clarify the dates you are referencing when you say “Actually, Lemkin named his “baby” five years before the world recognized the need to criminalize such acts.” When did Lemkin first come up with the term ‘genocide’ and when did the world ‘criminalize such acts’?

    • Raphael Lemkin first came up with the term, “genocide,” in 1943, which he introduced the following year in his book, Axis Rule in Occupied Europe: Laws of Occupation-Analysis of Government-Proposals for Redress. And, it was on December 9, 1948, that the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide happened to be adopted by the United Nations General Assembly. Therefore, it was five years after Lemkin first came up with the term “genocide,” that the world recognized the need to criminalize this act. However, this did not go into effect until January 12, 1951.

  35. I found some of the sources I had read a few years ago regarding Lemkin and the chronology of the creation of the word.

    http://www.preventgenocide.org/genocide/crimewithoutaname.htm
    This articles talks about how Churchill, in 1941, speaking in code about the Nazi atrocities, said “We are in the presence of a crime without a name.”

    http://www.preventgenocide.org/lemkin/americanscholar1946.htm
    In this article, Lemkin discusses his creation of the word ‘genocide’ while referencing Churchill’s “a crime without a name.”

    “While society sought protection against individual crimes, or rather crimes directed against individuals, there has been no serious endeavor hitherto to prevent and punish the murder and destruction of millions. Apparently, there was not even an adequate name for such a phenomenon. Referring to the Nazi butchery in the present war, Winston Churchill said in his broadcast of August, 1941, “We are in the presence of a crime without a name.””

    He mentions our case as well as cases further back in history in that article. These are Lemkin’s words. I hope this satisfies the requests made by some people on this very emotional and heated and ultimately unnecessary discussion.

    • “He mentions our case as well as cases further back in history in that article. These are Lemkin’s words. I hope this satisfies the requests made by some people on this very emotional and heated and ultimately unnecessary discussion.”

      I’m sorry to disappoint, Random. In one of the articles Lemkin does mention our case, as well as cases further back in history, but it is known that for a relevant international law and, consequently, the term denoting the crimes, only our case and the other two have been studied.

      I still see nothing in support of your hypothesis that “the Holocaust was the final motivation for the creation of the word ‘genocide’”. While Lemkin does state in one of the articles that “the German experience is the most striking and the most deliberate and thorough […], he does so to elaborate on the preceding sentence, that “Nazi leaders had stated very bluntly their intent to wipe out the Poles, the Russians; to destroy demographically and culturally the French element in Alsace-Lorraine, the Slavonians in Carniola and Carinthia” and that “they almost achieved their goal in exterminating the Jews and Gypsies in Europe.” The passage you’ve inserted in your post, likewise, deals mainly with the fact that as of 1941 there was not an adequate name for a particular crime against individuals.

      And until now we haven’t gotten any evidence from you to the effect that Lemkin also studied the German-Herero colonial war to coin the term “genocide”. Need more time?

    • John,

      We’re not in disagreement on the importance of the Armenian genocide in Lemkin’s work including the creation of the word. For some reason, you’re stuck with the idea that it wasn’t.

      I think you’re confused by what I mean as the “final motivation”. And it seems I will not be able to explain it to you.

      What’s confusing is Yeretsgin understood what I’m saying and you didn’t.

    • Random,

      We’re in disagreement on the SEMINAL importance of the Armenian genocide in Lemkin’s life-long advocacy for an international legislation, including the creation of the word.

      I don’t think I’m confused by what you mean by “final motivation”, because, in contrast to a person posting under the pen name “Yeretsgin”, I’ve been following this discussion from the outset and I’ve read your comments in other threads.

      And you don’t have to explain anything to me. All you have to do is support your points with evidence. May I, therefore, conclude that (a) you failed to present evidence that “the Holocaust was the final motivation for the creation of the word” and (b) you failed to present evidence that “Lemkin also studied the German atrocities against the Herero and Namaqua in Namibia, which happened in 1904”?

      If we replace the word “based” in Sassounian’s clause “Raphael Lemkin coined the term ‘genocide’ based on his detailed studies of the extermination of Armenians” by a definition of “based on” given by reputable dictionaries [based on = have as the foundation for (something); use as a point from which (something) can develop], there’ll be not much there to debate. Sassounian’s clause is not incorrect.

  36. One of the sources I have used in understanding Lemkin and the Armenian connection has been a brief book by Facing History and Ourselves National Foundation. It has a yellow cover, it’s on Amazon and it’s titled:

    Totally Unofficial: Raphael Lemkin and the Genocide Convention

    It’s about 50 pages and begins with the Armenian genocide and Tehlirian, Lemkin’s personal history, Churchill’s speech and Lemkin’s motivations to find the right word, and it ends with Senator Proxmire’s long running campaign for the US to sign the genocide convention. Which the US did not do until 1988!

    I highly recommend it to everyone on this thread. It appears to be a very good summary of Lemkin and the how the genocide convention came to be.

  37. It appears that this time of the year (June/July) is a ripe time on AW for sparking an engaging discussion of unprecedented success. Last year this time, on another article, I started such debate on the origins of the word “ojakh.” It reached 300+ posts:
    http://armenianweekly.com/2013/06/20/rendahl-vay-vay-vay/

    This time, Random Armenian has sparked another such debate. While it may not reach the same explosive number of posts, it too challenges outdated assumptions, exposes weaknesses in the traditional thinking of some of us, and helps move our national conversation forward. We need more of that.

    Good job, Random. I couldn’t have done a better one. Keep up the good work.

    • Astonishing how for those who suffer from biliary attacks when confronted with anything Armenian, the time of the year and the number of posts are more important than the substance and quality of an intellectual debate. Yes, those who debated in the “Vay, Vay, Vay” thread remember vividly that all this poster could do is copy-paste from Wikipedia and Wiktionary — the most unreliable online databases.

    • Can’t see any reason to applaud such a debate simply on the basis of number of posts. What have we actually learned about Lemkin and the impetus for his life’s work? It seems many contributors here don’t bother to become informed before posting accusatory and inflammatory remarks. I don’t feel this serves the Armenian Cause and it makes the Armenian Weekly a less credible source of information. What a waste of our precious collective energy! I also wonder how many fair-minded people refrain from commenting simply because they don’t want to enter into the fray with self-appointed spy-hunters who produce specious accusations.

    • “Can’t see any reason to applaud such a debate simply on the basis of number of posts”

      True. But there is a reason to applaud the fact that there are fair-minded Armenians among us who will confront the witch-hunters. The primary value of this thread is not what we have learned about Lemkin, but what we have learned about ourselves, including some of our “leaders,” who, contrary to the dignity associated with the label of a “leader,” will stoop down to a level of online sparring and throw personal attacks when faced with a simple criticism.

  38. jda,

    Did you actually think that Mr. Sassounian felt pestered by Random’s impolite original comment? Not a chance! After all, since Mr. Sassounian happens to be such a prominent figure in the Armenian Cause, he surely receives these kinds of impolite comments on a habitual basis, as well as those customary “cheap shots” thrown by ignorant, uneducated Turks and Azeris, such as those thrown by that desperate Turkbaijani sore loser whom you’re familiar with by now. Anyway, by being the recipient of all these “cheap shots,” what does it mean? It obviously means that Mr. Sassounian is doing a very good job in his field of work.

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