Cérémonie d’Antoura (Liban) – 22 septembre 2010

Discours d’AlikKandaharian

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By Maurice MissakKelechian mailto:

My Journey Of Love

My journey of love started in 2005 with a single photo in Stanley Kerr’s book, “Lions of Marach” that showed a group picture of Jemal Pasha with a footnote that read: “ Jemal Pasha commander of the Turkish Fourth Army together with Halide Edib, on the steps of French College at Antoura, Lebanon.”

My passion for the Armenian modern history had just started to take off and finding a piece of that history in my own backyard was surreal! Little did I know that I was embarking on an incredible untold story.

I jumped into my car eager to identify the location of the orphanage shown in the picture. Antoura, for many Lebanese families, is a beautiful place to take their kids for a drive and some fresh air. They had no idea that soon, it was going to take their breath away!

Apprehensive at first and then excited, I approached the French college. Careful not to disturb what I didn’t know, I started taking pictures of the college from afar and as I came closer to the building, my story started to unfold.

The college was established by the Jesuits brotherhood in 1656. Lazarist priesthood took over the college in 1834 and when the WWI broke out, the Ottoman Turks confiscated the college, dismissed all the priests and converted the building into a Turkish orphanage. Between1915-1918, 1200 young orphans were kept in Antoura of whom 1000 were Armenians and the remaining 200 consisted of Turks and Kurds.

In 1916, Jamal Pasha visited Antoura together with 40 elite Turkish teachers, headed by Halide Edib, the new director of the college; prepared to teach the orphans the “Ottoman Turkish culture”; hence the photo in Kerr’s book.

I finally took the courage to enter the college. Pretty soon, I was guided to see the college’s archivist, Mr. Sebastian Arhan, who welcomed my curiosity and very gracefully supported my pursuit. As we started walking around the college trying to trace the location of the photo, an employee of the college, Mr. DoumitHayfa, told us that in 1993, the remains (bones) of some of the young orphans were found and were collectively buried under an unmarked mass grave next to high ranking Lazarist priests.

In 2006, when my initial findings about the Antoura orphanage were published in Aztak, an Armenian newspaper in Lebanon, I found out that Mr. KarnigPanian, previously the deputy dean of Jemaran high school in Beirut, was one of the survivors of the Antoura orphanage. In 1992, he had published his experiences as an orphan in a two-volume memoir.

I stayed up all night reading the memoirs in owe and disbelief! While the Antoura building looked like an orphanage on the outside, on the inside, the young orphans were going through a systematic Turkification executed through most heinous tactics; changing the Armenian names of the orphans into Turkish names, luring the orphans into believing that the Turkish culture is a better culture than the Armenian, and, gradually, if the orphans spoke, prayed or sung in Armenian, punishing them by Falakha(Hitting of the soles of the feet with iron rods). “The sessions of Falakhausuallyended up with bleeding kids sent to the infirmary to be treated for fractured bones.”

In Halide Edib’s own words: “One felt that these children, whatever happened, would carry something crippled, something mutilated in them.”

I was appalled and revolted by the realization that the Genocide did not stop with the killings, the drowning, the burning and the rapes, it rather continued to crawl beyond the deserts, the rivers and the caves; the final frontier of the Genocide aimed at annihilating the memory of what constituted “Armenian culture.”

Here, I would like to add that according to the UN definition of Genocide, the 5th point specifically stipulates that "Forcibly transferring children of a group to another group" is an act of Genocide (Article II of the 1951 UN Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide).

From that day on, I was haunted by the souls of these orphans 300 of whom lost their lives between 1915-1918 as a result of abuse, famine and illness. In his memoires, Mr. Panian wrote: “The available hospitals were merely a sleeping hall. There were no skilled doctors to provide the proper medication. The dead orphans, who were buried in a hole and covered with dirt, were attacked, the same night, by the hungry jackals, ripping off the little bodies and scattering their bones all over the place.” “The only thought on the orphans’ minds was food. In desperation, they would often collect the bones of their dead friends, grind them and use them in soups as food to survive.”

Later, when I returned to Antoura and I watched the college through the eyes of a 6 year old Karnig who experienced the pain of abandonment, famine and Turkification and who saw his friends lose their identity and vanish to be forever forgotten. As I sat on the mass grave bewildered, I promised to tell the story of the unsung heroes until they were truly laid in peace.

Towards the end of 1918, Halide Edib asked Dr. Bliss, then the dean of American University of Beirut, to take Antoura under the protection of the American Red Cross.

I expressed my gratitude to the Near East Relief and Red Cross organizations and several official representatives of foreign governments for actively taking part in saving Armenian lives and selflessly caring for over 130,000 Armenian orphans.

I did tell the story of my heroes to Armenian communities in Lebanon, Syria and United States through presentations, TV, Radio and digital media interviews.

I did tell the story of the young orphans to thousands of high-school kids through film footages, researched data and archived photos. These students now recognize the face of the Genocide and are able to relay to the pain of the stories told to them by their parents and grandparents.

On March 7, 2010, Together with Mr. Robert Fisk, the internationally renowned Middle East Correspondent for “The Independent” newspaper in London, I revisited the Antoura mass grave. He then went on to write and publish a powerful article under the title of “Living Proof of the Armenian Genocide” that covered the story of my heroes which was translated into several languages and replicated by the thousands on web pages all over the world.

Even Turkish writers and journalists who heard the story of the young orphans visited Antoura and the mass grave.

Five years ago, I pleaded to the Armenian community and its leaders to initiate a memorial to mark the grave of the forgotten heroes.

Fortunately, Mr. HarutKhatchadourian immediately responded to my pleas with utmost humility and generosity. He understood the urgency of the work that needed to be done and gave me the Green light to do whatever was deemed necessary to pay the respect due to the orphans.

KOHAR Symphony Orchestra & Choir generously funded the creation of the Khatchkar by ZavenKoshtoyan, a symbol of the Armenian culture, as well as the bronze sculpture of a young boy holding the globe by RaffiTokatlian, symbolizing the young ambassador to the world to raise awareness to protect and treat orphans around the world with passion, compassion and utter respect.

To top it all, KOHAR made sure its symphony and choir is present here today to give the orphans a true Armenian burial blessed with their angelic voices and the beauty of the Armenian hymns.

Today’s memorial would not have been possible without the patience and the understanding of Father Antoine Nakad, the Superior of the Antoura College. He became my angel throughout the unfolding of the story and the preparation of the grounds.

Today’s memorial will make the world aware of the impact of the irreversible pain and suffering inflicted by human beings onto others. It will also tell the world that it is impossible for the Armenian people to heal and go on living with their heads held high when their colossal losses are categorically denied by the Turkish government.

Today’s memorial will also remind us, the Armenians to respect those Turks who risked their lives to save Armenian families during the Genocide and who, today, risk their lives by openly apologizing on behalf of their old and new governments.

The flowers that I will place on the mass grave of the orphans today will be in memoriam of all the Antoura orphans; Armenians, Turks and Kurds.

I am grateful for the perfect conclusion of my journey of love and I am deeply honored for the trust vested in me to help my heroes to finally rest in peace.

Thank you for your presence.

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22/9/2010

The miracle of rebirth

The Armenian Genocide is something we Armenians commemorate –some of us once a year others, feel it in their bones all year long. In any case if (and this is a big IF) no one remembers, and no speaks “the stones will”. And that is one stone more today.

Yes, with the laying down of a cross-stone today we add a loud voice –a story teller—of not just the massacred, but of the survivors whose voices were silenced (or so they thought they did). In fact our cause, as a people and nation, goes far beyond that of land and blood. What the genocide did cannot be by retrieved by money or land.

We have always known, but are becoming more and more aware that the ripples left by this horrendous act, goes beyond measurable numbers.

Today, we still struggle to teach our young about where they have come from and where they need to go –not to lose more. And that is exactly why we are here.

We thank those who have and still do help us in this endeavor. Yes, we thank God for his providence which came to us through many –the people of Lebanon and all great and small Armenians who have and still bring their part in the miracle of rebirth.

Pastor HrayrCholakian

Principal of the Armenian Evangelical Secondary School (Shamlian-Tatikian) – BourjHammoud

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Now I know!By ArmenKelechianHaigazian University Student

Until now, it was difficult for me to relate to the stories of the Armenian Genocide; the killings, the deportation, the rapes and the fear, told to us by white haired, teary eyed, and sometimes, fragile people who walked around like shadows, invisible to my generation.

Until now, my participation in the April 24 memorial march, leading the crowd, proud and tall, carrying the Armenian flag was merely a symbolic gesture to remember the victims of a horrific yet faceless Genocide. The real exciting part for me was to reconnect with my old friends.

Until now, the idea of the Stolen Generations for me meant the 230 intellectuals, writers, activists, artists and politicians, who were captured during the night of 1915 and executed ripping the Armenian people off of their leaders and leaving them dysfunctional and confused for generations to come.

Until now, the 130,000 Armenian orphans who survived the Euphrates, the famine and the killing fields of the mirage-less deserts, abandoned by their parents and siblings, homeless and terrified had remained largely an untold story, buried along with those who died between 1915 and 1918.

Now, thanks to my father’s and many others’ stubborn efforts, I recognize the sad, yet kind, fragile yet strong faces of the Armenian Genocide and what I see are not faces of victims and survivors who gave up easily and faced death graciously.

Now I know that the act of Genocide was not limited to just mass killings and executions, that the silent version of the Genocide beyond the mass marches in the deserts and the burning bodies in the caves was continued in orphanages through the campaigns of Turkification

Now I know, that the social fabric of our society; the will to survive, create and construct, comes from the beautiful, fragile souls of orphans like the ones who were housed in the Aintoura orphanage who did the unthinkable to give us life.

Now I know that their courageous faces, intelligent eyes and the determination to make it better are a new source of courage and dignity for my generation. April 24 and the Armenian Genocide has a new face; a face of inspiration to achieve the impossible.

I am forever grateful to the selfless workers of the Near East Relief and the Red Cross organizations who not only cared for the Armenian orphans but empowered them to be able to survive and create.

But most of all, I want to express my gratitude, on behalf of my friends and generation, toFather Antoine Nakad for honoring the memory of the young orphans and giving us a Lebanese “Dzidzernagapert”, a memorial nesting in the heart of a beautiful college, surrounded by dedicated priests who care for kids, and kids who are of the same age as the orphans were during their stay at Aintoura.

I am grateful for a memorial that me and my generation can understand and relate to.