Abstract
Rıfat N. Bali analyses the perceptions of the Holocaust in Turkey. Generally, the history of the Holocaust is largely ignored in Turkey and rarely part of any school curriculum. Nevertheless, Bali shows that the Holocaust is frequently used as a reference point and in a context unique to Turkey – without a deeper understanding or interest in its history. Commentators in Turkey often insist on the uniqueness of the genocide of the Jews primarily in order to reject dealing with the Armenian genocide. The Holocaust is generally accepted as an historical truth and Holocaust denial (namely, the framing of the Holocaust as an alleged lie fabricated by “the Jews” or “the Zionists”) is rather confined to Islamists but rarely challenged. However, a common trope in Turkey is the accusation that the alleged preoccupation with the Holocaust in the West is a result of propaganda by the Jewish lobby on behalf of Israel, which is allegedly committing genocide against the Palestinian people.
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Notes
- 1.
According to data given by Süzet M. Sidi, who oversees the Turkish Chief Rabbinate’s Holocaust Commission, between the years 2001 and 2006 only the Üsküdar American Girls College, Robert College, the Istanbul German School (Deutsche Schule Istanbul), the St. George Austrian Lycée and Trade School (Österreichisches St. Georgs-Kolleg İstanbul) teach students about the Holocaust.
- 2.
International Holocaust Remembrance Day is observed annually on January 27, the date upon which the Soviet Army liberated the largest German death camp Auschwitz-Birkenau in 1945. This date was made an official date of commemoration by the U.N. General Assembly through UN Resolution 60/7, passed on November 1, 2005. The decision encourages every member state to observe this date by remembering the victims of the Holocaust and to develop educational curriculum pertaining thereto.
- 3.
- 4.
For instance, see Prof. Türkkaya Ataöv’s series of articles from January 4–February 15, 2010, in the journal Türk Solu. In this series, Ataöv, who is well-known in Turkey for his publications from the 1980s countering the Armenian charges of genocide, writes that, after a visit to the Mauthausen and Dachau concentration camps, the “real genocide” was the one perpetrated by the Nazis.
- 5.
- 6.
- 7.
Paris Consul-General Namık Kemal Yolga (1914–2001), Ambassador to France Behiç Erkin (1876–1961), Marseilles Consul-General Necdet Kent (1911–2002).
- 8.
For a research on this subject see Frantz and Collins (2003).
- 9.
The author makes reference here to the arson attack on May 29, 1993 on the house of a Turkish family. Two Turkish women and three girls died in the attack. The fire was set by local followers of neo-Nazism. Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/solingen.
- 10.
“İsrail soykırım yapıyor”, Radikal, 5 April 2002.
- 11.
After September 11, Oktar would change his tack, now declaring that the Holocaust was a horror. He subsequently founded the website www.islamdenouncesantisemitism.com, adorning it with photographs of himself posing with various Israeli and Jewish religious figures.
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Bali, R.N. (2013). Perceptions of the Holocaust in Turkey. In: Jikeli, G., Allouche-Benayoun, J. (eds) Perceptions of the Holocaust in Europe and Muslim Communities. Muslims in Global Societies Series, vol 5. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-007-5307-5_6
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