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  • Dissecting Kessab: What Is (And Isn't) Happening In The Historical A

    DISSECTING KESSAB: WHAT IS (AND ISN'T) HAPPENING IN THE HISTORICAL ARMENIAN TOWN

    ianyan Magazine
    April 2 2014

    Posted by Liana Aghajanian

    The heartbreaking news came quickly - the ethnic Armenian town of
    Kessab in Syria, one of immense historic significance to Armenians
    had been taken over by hardline Islamists as residents were forced
    to flee. Rebels advanced to Bashar Al Assad's hometown province, but
    there was more disturbing news - the Turkish air force shot down a
    regime war plane trying to bombard the rebel advancement by al Nusra
    Front, al Qaeda's offshoot in Syria, reported the Wall Street Journal.

    The civil war that had plagued the Middle Eastern country for three
    years had finally caught up to the border. Since it began, over 140,000
    civilians have lost their lives, 4 million refugees have emptied the
    country now enveloped by rubble and death.

    The mayors of various villages in the area told CivilNet that the
    city had been destroyed and was now "gone."

    But the tragedy of Kessab has also fallen to another tragedy of sorts -
    one of the digital world, where misinformation, unverified sources and
    fake photos have been used to create hysteria and have unfortunately
    gone viral, under the hashtag "SaveKessab."

    Eager to participate and help spread the word, the worldwide Armenian
    Diaspora has employed the hashtag, furiously tweeting, changing their
    FB profile photos and urging others to sign petitions to help stop
    "history repeating itself," referencing the 1.5 million Armenians who
    perished in the Ottoman-era slaughter known as the Armenian Genocide.

    Kim Kardashian, Cher and even random celebrities like Blink 182â~@²s
    Travis Barker got involved in the "SaveKessab" movement, too, which
    elevated the hashtag to their large worldwide audiences.

    But in the process, the hashtag became a tool for spreading
    misinformation, as Armenia-based journalist Gegham Vardanyan summarized
    in his post on the topic, both in English and Armenian:

    Those disseminating this type of false information are often ordinary
    users who simply want to use social media to show their patriotism
    or to help resolve the Kessab Armenians' problem however way they can.

    The problem is that information from Kessab, as such, is very scarce.

    There is practically no first-hand information. And when there's no
    information, it's quite easy to replace it with misinformation.

    Here is a primer on what is happening in Kessab, why it's so important
    and how to separate fact from fiction.

    An important note: Clarifying these facts does not undermine the story:
    The Syrian Civil War has reached an important, historical Armenian
    populated city. Kessab has been left in ruins. The entire population
    has had to flee as refugees in their own country. But along the way,
    issues have arisen that need to be addressed. Journalism is based
    in facts and verified information from first-hand sources. There
    is a reason why news stations independently verify reports, and
    fact-checkers are employed at magazines. Things need to check out,
    and check out again before being disseminated to the public. Not
    doing so is irresponsible, harmful and frankly, not journalism.

    Clarification makes stories stronger. Here is an attempt to do
    just that:

    What is Kessab?

    Kessab is an Armenian populated town that sits near the border
    of Turkey, in the province of Latakia. There are several Armenian
    churches in the city, and according to various reports about 2,000
    residents live in the town. In the 19th century, Kessab's population
    numbered around 6,000 with more than 20 schools.

    Kessab was made famous by Franz Werfel's novel, "The Forty Days of
    Musa Dagh," based on true events surrounding World War I, the Armenian
    Genocide and the Armenians' resistance efforts against deportation.

    A report on meeting Millennium Development goals sponsored by the
    Canadian International Development Agency mentions an innovative soap
    factory in Kessab, with products made using local laurel oil. The
    factory provided income for 20 families, "with a further 150 benefiting
    from the market for the berries they collect and process."

    Diasporan descendants often visit the town, many of whom had relatives
    still living there. One diasporan writes eloquently about going to
    Kessab to celebrate her grandmother's 100th birthday.

    Why is it so important?

    Kessab was the last surviving city in the historical Armenian kingdom
    of Cilicia, which was formed during the Middle Ages by Armenian
    refugees who were fleeing the Seljuk invasion of Armenia. It extended
    from what is now southeastern modern day Turkey to Cyprus and Syria.

    According to Kessabtsiner.com, "The region of Antioch was emptied
    of its Armenian, Greek and Syriac inhabitants, due to intense
    persecution. In an attempt to avoid persecution, the Armenians of
    the flat lands of Antioch took refuge in more mountainous regions,
    such as Kessab and Mousa Dag."

    In "The Armenians: From Kings and Priests to Merchants and Commissars,"
    Razmik Panossian highlights the importance of Kessab:

    Even the Armenian born generation felt very strongly about Kessab-
    without ever seeing it. There was much pride in the (most uneventful)
    history of the village. It was a strange type of longing for a
    diasporan community - albeit a very old one - as a 'homeland,' while
    living in the real 'fatherland.' The important dimensions of this
    regional identity is how it is connected to nationalism.

    The ancient Armenian town of Kessab in Syria/ Creative Commons

    What is happening in Kessab?

    On Saturday, March 22, the Syrian war advanced to Kessab, and the
    town was thrown under siege. One of the village mayors of Kessab told
    CivilNet in a telephone conversation that "rockets from the Turkish
    border were launched at the village and that the leaders made a
    decision to evacuate the Armenian population to avoid human losses."

    The residents were evacuated to Latakia, with no time to take
    anything with them. They are being sheltered and fed as Kessab has
    been overrun by rebels and they cannot return. They also cite the
    city being destroyed. They report no casualties, although Armenian
    member of parliament Tevan Poghosyan, who visited the residents on a
    personal trip reports that there were initially 20 people who remained
    unaccounted for, with seven who have been recovered.

    The U.S. State Department announced that it was "deeply troubled"
    by the violence in Kessab, but as the Armenian National Committee of
    America points out, "stopped short of criticizing Turkey's role."

    The Wall Street Journal reported that Armenian-Syrians are blaming
    Turkey for the advances in Kessab as "Ankara has long turned a blind
    eye to rebels crossing their borers and weapons flow."

    Why are Armenians so upset about it?

    In the last 100 years, this is the third time that the Armenian
    community has been forced to flee their homes in Kessab. In 1909,
    Turkish armed forces entered and pillaged the city. Almost 200
    deaths were reported. In 1915, during the Ottoman-era slaughter of
    1.5 million Armenians known as the Armenian Genocide, the entire
    population of Kessab was deported, thousands were killed and only a
    fraction survived to make their way back to the historical city again.

    The events that have recently taken place have rattled the Armenian
    Diaspora, who has long fought for recognition of a genocide which
    Turkey denies. It has opened unhealed wounds and brought memories back
    of dark and defining times in Armenian history, which is made all the
    more shocking and emotional with reports of Turkish involvement. What
    is happening in Syria cannot be categorically referred to as
    "genocide," but because of the emotional toll and trauma, what is
    happening now is easily being associated with the events of 1915.

    The Union of Armenian Evangelical Churches in the Near East has
    distributed a letter which describes the residents of Kessab as being
    "caught between two fighting forces," though it also stresses that
    the land is being held by rebels "backed by Turkey and helped by its
    military forces."

    Since the start of the Syrian war, minorities like Armenians have been
    caught in the crossfires. Over 6,000 Syrian-Armenian have escaped along
    with the millions of ethnic Syrians that have fled out of the country,
    many of them forced into an unexpected repatriation back to Armenia.

    The Wall Street Journal reports that many Syrian-Armenians support
    President Bashar al Assad's forces - an alliance which is a "safer
    bet to protect their interests" because Assad's Alawite roots also
    make him a religious minority.

    What kind of misinformation has spread through social media about
    the Kessab Crisis?

    â~@¢ Reports of Civilian Casualties:

    Armenian diaspora newspaper Asbarez was the first to report 80 deaths
    in the scramble out of Kessab, but that information has to date,
    not been confirmed. CivilNet cites no civilian deaths, although
    mentions there are missing persons. TIME quotes a rebel videographer
    who narrated a video tour of the city's churches:

    "Islam, he declared proudly, teaches respect for all religions,
    including Christianity. "The jihadist brothers do not harm anyone.

    This is our religion and this is our Islam."

    The BBC has the only first-hand published interview with a
    Syrian-Armenian farmer who is actually a resident of Kessab. He
    relayed in a radio interview that trucks carrying armed militants
    began coming from the Turkish side and attacking Syrian government
    police posts. "We heard lots of explosions near the villages close
    to the Turkish border." He mentions no civilian deaths but does say
    about 50 elderly people stayed behind and when he tried to contact
    neighbors, the phones were answered by people who did not speak local
    Arabic. Epress has the transcript if you can't listen to the audio.

    Tevan Poghosyan, an Armenian Member of Parliament who visited Latakia
    last week on a personal trip reports no civilian casualties after
    speaking to the mayor and residents.

    â~@¢ The Spread of False Photos

    This graphic image was widely distributed but is not related to news
    events out of Kessab. According to the Daily Mail it is the Islamic
    State in Iraq and the Levant shooting members of Ghurabaa al-Sham
    brigade, a moderate Islamist group in the head in 2013.

    Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant shooting members of Ghurabaa
    al-Sham brigade, a moderate Islamist group in the head in 2013.

    1. A Save Kessab Facebook page disseminated photos of Christian church
    in ruins on their page. "Hate Crimes, and the world is silent," they
    wrote, insinuating that the desecration took place in Kessab. The
    photos actually turned out to be from St. Mary's Greek Catholic Church
    in Yabrud, Syria.

    2. This article from a "former Muslim Brotherhood Member Now Peace
    Activist" references the "brutal massacre" in Kessab and was using
    a gruesome image of armed gunmen standing over the severed heads of
    several men in a grassy field. The image was actually from a 2012
    video, showing armed Taliban militants standing over the heads of
    Pakistani 'soldiers.'

    3. This layered image was widely spread on Twitter and Instagram. The
    graphic photo of the woman with a crucifix down her throat is a still
    shot from the horror film "Inner Depravity," the child behind held
    up is an image of Fatima Meghlaj, 2, decapitated when a bomb fell on
    her house in Idlib in Sept. 2012. The other image of a decapitated
    man is from Syria and completely unrelated to Kessab.

    â~@¢ The Misuse of the Word "Genocide" and more.

    Here is the textbook definition of what genocide means: the deliberate
    and systematic extermination of a national, racial, political, or
    cultural group.

    The country of Syria is caught in a bloody, ongoing war that has
    unfortunately advanced to an Armenian stronghold. Tragically, Kessab
    has been caught in the middle of it, too. This is not a systematic
    attempt to wipe out Armenians. This is the byproduct of a war that
    has killed over 140,000 victims.

    Furthermore, as Sako Arian on Hetq, Armenia's investigative journalism
    outlet, points out, Turkey's involvement in aiding rebels is not new:

    The fact that Turkey is assisting the rebels in Syria isn't a recent
    development. The Turkish Air Force has not only shot down Syrian planes
    but has installed Patriot type missile systems on its southern border.

    These are the facts.

    What is sad is that we Armenians have again fallen in the old trap
    of enemy hating creating by Turkey itself. Statements and posts of
    pain, sorrow and lament appear everywhere. In the midst of all these
    emotional outbursts, no one is thinking of real exit strategies.

    So what do we take away from all of this? The facts are that something
    very terrible happened in Kessab - but something very terrible has
    been happening in Syria for years, and everyone - regardless of ethnic
    background or religion- is a victim. For an Armenian diaspora spread
    across the world partly due to the first what is widely acknowledged
    as the first modern genocide, this stirs deep, painful memories. This
    is especially compounded by Turkey's continuous, almost 100 year
    denial of this pain and the historical significance Kessab holds
    for Armenians. However, pointing out facts and separating them from
    fiction is not just important, it is crucial. It is also very difficult
    during a time when getting information out of a particular country
    is near impossible. But highly emotionally charged hysteria prompted
    by incorrect news and photos is harmful. Before you post something,
    double check to make sure where it's coming from. Before you share
    a photo, ask yourself what the origin of it might be. It's pretty
    simple: Google Images allows you to backtrack the source of a photo
    by uploading it using the little camera icon. Use it. Think like a
    journalist, not a bystander, and question everything.

    http://www.ianyanmag.com/2014/04/02/dissecting-kessab-what-is-and-isnt-happening-in-the-historical-armenian-town/

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