In modern Turkey, Hrant Dink's killer is treated like a hero, and those guilty of his assassination are let free.

On the surface, this explanation might have some superficial appeal.

But upon any meaningful examination, this formulation falls apart. It dramatically oversimplifies the complex reality on the ground in Turkey, at so many levels, and ignores the deep historical and societal roots of anti-Armenian racism and violence in modern Turkish culture.

An imperfect (but perhaps useful) analogy may help shed some light on this issue: America’s brutal treatment of African Americans and Native Americans was not simply the function of governmental policy driven from above, but rather a reflection and a direct result, sadly, of very toxic and hateful cultural attitudes on race. Attitudes that created the very basis for the horrors of slavery and the genocidal massacres and ethnic-cleansing of American Indian tribes from their ancient homelands. Reading our Declaration of Independence (and its reference to “merciless Indian Savages”) or our Constitution (and its inhuman description of African Americans as three-fifths of a human being) just scratches the surface of the untold terror visited upon these peoples.

Add to this intolerance the vast American wealth drawn from centuries of slave labor and the massive theft of native lands—a parallel to the foundation of the modern Turkish economy, built upon the wealth and properties of literally hundreds of thousands of Armenian families and businesses stolen during the Armenian Genocide era—and you compound racial discrimination with deeply rooted and highly influential economic interests. A powerful combination. Hard, but not impossible, to challenge.

To our credit, as Americans—after decades of denial, demonstrations and, eventually, dialogue—we are today openly struggling with these deeply intense issues that are so closely tied to our very foundation, growth, and future as a nation. In Turkey, it is still illegal to talk about them.

Imagine Birmingham or Montgomery, Ala., at the height of Jim Crow.

Imagine a time in American history, thankfully behind us now, when segregationists openly celebrated Klan lynchings, and school children were raised to revel in old-school Westerns that demonized American Indians and glorified their destruction.

Well, sadly, that is where Turkey stands today.

In modern Turkey, Hrant Dink’s killer is treated like a hero, and those guilty of his assassination are let free. Armenians are regularly threatened with renewed deportations, the remaining Christian heritage of Anatolia is being systematically erased, and the country’s most popular films and books are about scapegoating and striking down treasonous minorities.

There are, of course, Turks who line up on the side of the angels. Unfortunately, however, U.S. policy toward Ankara has long been to play to the lowest common denominator, backing demagogues who appeal to their population’s basest instincts, at the expense of the small but growing number of brave souls who are struggling and sacrificing for the simple freedom to speak and act in pursuit of their country’s highest aspirations.

Turkey today is not a post-genocidal state, but a pre-genocidal society, angrily lashing out at its imagined enemies and, it would seem, seeking out its next target. The remaining Armenians on the soil of present-day Turkey – reminders of the unfinished work of Turkey’s last genocide – are high on this list, as, of course, are the Kurds, the most likely victim of its next.

The bottom line is that what is needed is not simply a change in Turkey’s policies, but rather a profound, long-term movement driven by both international and domestic pressure to rehabilitate Turkey into a modern, tolerant, and pluralist society that—as proof of its reform—willingly forfeits the fruits of its genocidal crimes.

Any less would be a disservice to Turkey’s victims, to Turkey’s neighbors, and to Turkey’s own citizens.

Noam Chomsky

Chomsky is the internationally renowned Institute Professor Emeritus at MIT. In addition to his pioneering work in linguistics, he has been a leading voice for peace and social justice for many decades. “The New Statesman” calls him “the conscience of the American people.” Howard Zinn described him as “the nation’s most distinguished intellectual rebel.” He’s the author of scores of books including Failed States, What We Say Goes, and Hopes and Prospects.

Chomsky and David Barsamian have collaborated on a series of best-selling books.

Their latest is How the World Works. This interview will be part of Demand the Impossible, to be published later this year.

The Armenian Weekly thanks David Barsamian for providing a transcript of the interview.

 ***

D.B.: Let’s talk about Turkey. The country for a number of years strove to get into the European Union, and did not succeed. There’s a front-page New York Times article [Jan. 5, 2012] entitled “Turkey’s Glow Dims as Press Faces Charges.” Turkish human rights advocates say that there’s been a “crackdown” on journalists that “is part of an ominous trend.” Further, it says, “The arrests threaten to darken the image of the prime minister, Erdogan, who is lionized in the Middle East as a powerful regional leader who can stand up to Israel and the West.” According to this report, “There are now 97 members of the news media in jail in Turkey, including journalists, publishers, and distributors,” a figure that human “rights groups say exceeds the number detained in China.” One of those imprisoned is Nadim Sener, an award-winning journalist, for his reporting on the murder of Hrant Dink, a prominent Turkish-Armenian journalist who was assassinated in Istanbul in January 2007.

N.C.: First of all, that this report should appear in the New York Times has ample ironic connotations. What’s going on in Turkey is pretty bad. On the other hand, it doesn’t begin to compare with what was going on in the 1990’s. The Turkish state was carrying out a major terrorist war against the Kurdish population: tens of thousands of people killed, thousands of towns and villages destroyed, probably millions of refugees, torture, every kind of atrocity you can think of. The Times barely reported it.

They certainly didn’t report—or if they did, it was very marginal—the fact that 80 percent of the weapons were coming from the U.S., and that Clinton was so supportive of the atrocities that in 1997, kind of when they were peaking, that single year Clinton sent more arms to Turkey than in the entire Cold War period combined up until the onset of the counterinsurgency campaign. That’s pretty serious. You won’t find it in the New York Times. Their correspondent in Ankara, Stephen Kinzer, barely reported anything. Not that he didn’t know. Everybody knew.

David Barsamian

So now if they’re upset about human rights violations, we can take the reaction with a grain of salt. Now they are willing to highlight the human rights violations because it’s not the U.S. that’s backing them, it’s a country that’s been standing up to the U.S. And that they don’t like. Erdogan’s popularity in the Middle East does not make him popular in the U.S. He’s by far the most popular figure in the Arab world, whereas Obama’s popularity is actually lower than Bush’s, which is quite a trick.

Turkey has taken a fairly independent role in world affairs, which the U.S. doesn’t like at all. They’ve maintained trade relations with Iran—in fact, are even increasing them. Turkey and Brazil carried out a major crime. They succeeded in getting Iran to agree to a program of transferring the low-enriched uranium out of Iran, which happened to virtually duplicate Obama’s program. In fact, Obama had actually written a letter to Lula, the Brazilian president, urging him to proceed with this, mainly because Washington assumed that Iran would never agree, and then they could use it as a diplomatic weapon against them and have more support for sanctions. But they did agree. There was great anger here that they got Iran to agree, because then that might undermine the push for sanctions, which is what they really were after. So that was another source of hostility.

And there are others. For example, in the case of Libya, Turkey, which is a NATO power, interfered with NATO’s early efforts to carry out the bombing of Libya, effectively overriding the UN resolution, though they claimed they were observing it. Turkey was by no means cooperative; in fact, they actually blocked NATO meetings. Washington didn’t like that either.

They don’t like the increasing trade relations with Iran, they don’t like their independent foreign policy. So given that situation, it’s appropriate to condemn human rights violations in Turkey, which are there. There’s been regression. Actually, there was a lot of progress over the past 10 years, quite considerable progress, but the last couple of years have been pretty unpleasant. It’s correct to protest them, cynicism aside.
D.B.: In March 2011, Orhan Pamuk, a leading Turkish writer, Nobel Prize winner, was fined for his statement in a Swiss newspaper that “We have killed 30,000 Kurds and 1 million Armenians.” Hardly any discussion of Turkey can take place without mention of at least the Kurds, and sometimes of the Armenians.

N.C.: Actually, the Kurds are rarely discussed. The worst atrocities against the Kurds, as I mentioned, were in the 1990’s. And then the press coverage was very slight and dismissive. I actually ran through it once. There were a couple of things, but not a lot. That, of course, was the most significant period, not just because of the scale of the atrocities but because we could have stopped them. They were being supported strongly by the U.S., and NATO generally, the U.S. in the lead. If that had been made public, it could have had an effect.

It was particularly striking in 1999. There was a NATO conference, an anniversary, in 1999, that was right around the time of the decision to bomb Serbia. There was plenty of coverage in the West about how NATO was lamenting the fact that atrocities are being carried out so close to the NATO world, so we have to do something about it, like bomb Serbia. Actually, much worse atrocities were being carried out within NATO, namely, in Turkey. But try to find a word about that. You can find a word. I wrote about it, a couple of other mavericks wrote about it. So the cynicism is overwhelming.

But putting that aside, the problems are real. I was in Turkey a year ago at a conference on freedom of speech. A large part of it was devoted to the Turkish journalists speaking, describing their own activities in trying to write about, expose the Hrant Dink murder, the atrocity against the Armenians, the repression of the Kurds. These are very courageous people. It’s not like a New York Times correspondent, who could write about it if he wanted and nothing would happen. Maybe he would be censured by the editors. These guys can get sent to jail, undergo torture. That’s serious. But they talk openly and strikingly.

In fact, one of the most interesting things about Turkey—here, again, is an irony—the European Union says, “We can’t invite them in because they don’t meet our high standards of human rights,” and so on. Turkey is about the only country I know of in which leading intellectuals, journalists, academics, writers, professors, and publishers not only constantly protest the atrocities of the state but regularly carry out civil disobedience against it. I actually participated to an extent 10 years ago when I went there. There’s nothing like that in the West. They put their Western counterparts to shame. So if there are lessons to be learned, I think it’s in the other direction. Frankly, I never thought that Turkey would be admitted into the EU, mainly on racist grounds. I don’t think Western Europeans like the idea of Turks walking around freely in their streets.

D.B.: How do Turkish-Israeli relations have an influence Washington, with the 2010 Israeli commando raid in international waters on a Turkish ship killing nine Turks, one of whom was an American citizen? And now there has been a suspension of diplomatic relations.

N.C.: It started before that. Turkey was the only major country, certainly the only NATO country, to have protested very sharply against the U.S.-Israeli attack on Gaza in 2008-09. And it was a U.S.-Israeli attack. Israel dropped the bombs, but the U.S. backed it, blocked the UN resolution, and so on, including Obama. Turkey came out very strongly in condemnation. There was a famous incident in Davos at the World Economic Forum where the Turkish prime minister spoke out strongly against the attack while Shimon Peres, the Israeli president, was on stage with him.

In general, they stood out for their protest—one reason why Erdogan is so popular in the Arab world. Of course, the U.S. didn’t like that. Having cordial relations with Iran and condemning Israeli crimes does not make you a favored figure in Georgetown cocktail parties.

D.B.: And now there’s a report that Israel, which has long been denying the Armenian Genocide, is considering a resolution, primarily to irritate the Turks now, who they know are hypersensitive to any mention of the Armenian Genocide.

N.C.: It cuts both ways. Israel and Turkey were pretty close allies. In fact, Turkey was the closest ally of Israel, apart from the U.S. Their alliance was kept kind of under cover, but it was perfectly open, from the late 1950’s. It was very important for Israel to have a powerful non-Arab state allied to it. Turkey and Iran under the Shah were very close to Israel. At that time they refused to allow any discussion of the Armenian Genocide.

In 1982, Israel had a Holocaust conference. It was organized by a Holocaust specialist in Israel, Israel Charny, somebody I knew as a kid in Hebrew-speaking camps. He went to Israel. He organized it. He wanted to invite someone to talk about the Armenian atrocities, and the government tried to block it, strongly opposed it. In fact, they pressured Elie Wiesel, who was supposed to be the honorary chair, to resign, which he did. They went ahead with it anyway. It was over strong government opposition. At that time Turkey was an ally, so you don’t talk about it.

Now, as you say, relations are frayed, so you can sort of stick it to the Turks, you can talk about it now. In fact, Israel’s behavior has been pretty remarkable. One of the incidents that didn’t get much publicity here but really bothered the Turks was a meeting between the Turkish ambassador to Israel and Danny Ayalon, the deputy foreign minister. He called in the Turkish ambassador and they set up a photo op with the Turkish ambassador sitting on a very low chair and Ayalon sitting on a higher chair above him. And then the photographs are publicized all over. Countries don’t act like that. It’s very humiliating. The Turks didn’t like it a bit. Israel is so arrogant, they didn’t care. They figure, we can do anything we like so long as the master is behind us, which he is.

That’s one of a series of events which actually, from Israel’s own strategic point of view, is not very brilliant. The Turkish-Israeli military strategic relationship, trade relationship, commercial relationship is pretty significant. Again, we don’t really know the details, but for years Israel has been using eastern Turkey, as the U.S. has, for military bases, military training, preparations for possible war, aggression in the Middle East. If they sacrifice that, it’s serious.

D.B.: And the Mavi Marmara incident, in which nine Turkish civilians were killed.

N.C.: The Mavi Marmara was part of a flotilla. It was attacked in international waters by Israeli commandos, who killed nine people, Turks, one of them Turkish American. Attacking a ship in international waters is a serious crime. Israel was kind of surprised at the reaction—with some justification, because they’ve been hijacking ships in international waters since the late 1970’s, and the U.S. never made a fuss about it. They’ve been attacking ships going from Cyprus to Lebanon, sometimes killing people, sometimes taking prisoners, kidnapping them, and taking them off into Israeli jails, where they are kept as hostages. And the master never objected. So they were a little surprised that there was a fuss about this. But there was a lot of international indignation, not just by Turkey but more broadly, for their really criminal behavior. Turkey demanded an apology, Israel refused. It led to a serious souring of relations.

D.B.: There has been a severing of diplomatic relations.

N.C.: Severing at least on the surface. There’s probably more going on under the surface. But, yes, a formal severing of relations.

D.B.: The Kurds, who straddle three or four countries—Iran, Iraq, Turkey—constitute, I think, the largest single minority in the world that does not have a nation-state. What about the situation of the Kurds, particularly the semi-autonomy that they have achieved in northern Iraq? How viable is that?

N.C.: There are plenty of problems. They have achieved a kind of semi-autonomy in northern Iraq, but, first of all, there’s a lot of repression and corruption there. Furthermore, it’s fragile. And it’s not really viable. They’re landlocked. If they don’t have significant support from the outside, they can’t be sustained for long. And they’re not only landlocked but they’re surrounded by enemies, so Iran on one side, Turkey on the other, Arab Iraq as well. There’s a connection to Syria, but that doesn’t help much. So it exists by the tolerance of the great powers, primarily the U.S., which could be withdrawn.

The U.S. has repeatedly sold them out over the years. They sold them out to Saddam Hussein in the 1970’s and again in the 1980’s. During Saddam Hussein’s atrocities against the Kurds, the U.S. government tried to silence them. The Reagan Administration refused even to acknowledge them. They tried to blame them on Iran. The Kurds have an old saying, which goes something like, “Our only friends are the mountains,” meaning we can’t rely on outsiders for support. If you look at their history, they have plenty of reason to believe that. So I think they have to find some mode of accommodation with the surrounding countries and also a way to deal with their Kurdish population.

The Kurdish population, say, in Turkey, is quite excited about Kurdish semi-autonomy in Iraq.

D.B.: They see that as a model?

N.C.: They see that as something hopeful, but they themselves have not been well treated by the semi-autonomous Iraqi Kurds, who are after their own interests. One of the few American journalists to have really worked in the area, Kevin McKiernan, once described a mountain in northern Iraq called Mount Kandil. He said it has two sides: on one side there are terrorists, on the other side there are freedom fighters. They’re exactly the same people: They’re Kurdish nationalists. But one side faces Turkey, so they’re terrorists. The other side faces Iran, so they’re freedom fighters. Apparently, they’re pretty well integrated. It’s reported that the guerrillas on the mountain have regular commercial and other interactions with the general surrounding population.

Not enough rocks around
To stone the whole bunch of us
Each one of us one by one –
We gather around on the same rock
All of us in one place and we wait
For that one gargantuan meteor
– That never comes

……………………. Zahrad
Translated by Tatul Sonentz

***

Celestial Snicker

There’s a naughty star
Anchored up in heaven –
Over three million years now
It’s been looking at earth
And laughing its head off

……………………. Zahrad

Translated by Tatul Sonentz

Yasin hayal: Did you know that the man who killed Talat Pasha was never punished, and that he was released?

The ruling coming out of the Hrant Dink trial has shocked all of us. Shock is a good thing, a beautiful thing actually. It’s a sign of innocence and clarity. It shows that people’s consciences are still clear, and reflects their belief that the most natural thing in the world is to expect, at a minimum, something very ordinary and humane from one another. In fact, there’s no reason for us to be so shocked. If we knew where the people who are hiding Hrant’s murderers stand; if we knew how they view us; and, more importantly, if we were able to make that connection between Hrant Dink’s murder and the genocide of 1915, we wouldn’t have been so shocked. We would have heard them say, “Are they crazy? Have they lost their minds? Would this state ever give up one single brick of its foundation?” Our shock is caused by the mistake of not seeing the strong connection between this murder and the Armenian Genocide. What is shocking is the fact that we were shocked in the first place. It’s a pity that we can’t see what they see, or know what they know.

Hrant Dink was murdered in order to avenge Talat Pasha’s murder. Everything, and I mean everything, was organized in a way to seek revenge for the assassination that occurred in 1921. Upon his release after serving time in prison for his role in the McDonalds bombing of 2004 in Trabzon, Yasin Hayal, the person who planned Hrant’s murder, spoke about Talat Pasha with his father. He asked his father, “Dad, do you know how Talat Pasha was killed?” Yasin Hayal himself knew a thing or two about it, and added, “Did you know that the man who killed Talat Pasha was never punished, and that he was released?”

Why didn’t they kill Hrant Dink in front of his home? Or why didn’t they kidnap him, kill him, and dump his body in some remote location, just like the many crimes designated “perpetrator unknown” in Turkey? If they had wanted to, they could have, but they preferred not to. Instead, they killed him in front of Agos, on the street, in broad daylight, with a bullet to the back of his head. Why? Because through Hrant, they wanted to take Talat Pasha’s revenge from the Armenians. Talat Pasha was murdered by Soghoman Tehlirian, a survivor of the genocide, in Berlin on March 15, 1921. Tehlirian approached Talat Pasha from behind and shot him in the head. On June 3, after a two-day trial, the assassin was found not guilty of murder.

But the murder has another similarity that we’re not aware of. Those who planned Talat Pasha’s assassination had decided that Tehlirian shouldn’t escape, that he should remain at the scene and submit himself to arrest. Likewise, according to evidence from the Hrant Dink investigations, gunman Ogun Samast was to remain at the scene, or submit to arrest elsewhere in Istanbul. Everything was supposed to occur the way it had in 1921. The goal was not only to avenge Talat Pasha’s assasination, but to remind us of the genocide of 1915, of the strangling of the voices of Armenians. They were trying to say, “We will not give a single Armenian the chance to speak freely on this soil after 1915.” Oh, if only we had known what they knew, seen what they saw…

God came to the rescue of those among us who were shocked and could not see the connection between the genocide of 1915 and Hrant Dink’s murder. Rauf Denktas died around the same time. It was as if God was telling us, “Are you blind? Open your eyes, observe. Are your brains so dull? See and understand.” He wanted us to see the line of government-VIPs standing at Rauf Denktas’s funeral, to open our eyes and understand the connection between Hrant and 1915.

Who was Rauf Denktas? He was on the team that paved the road leading to Hrant Dink’s murder. Denktas was the president of the Executive Board of the Talat Pasha Committee, which was responsible for the Talat Pasha meetings and activities in Europe—Lausanne in 2005, Berlin in 2006, and Paris and North Cyprus in 2007. It was formed to organioze actions against Armenians in Europe and Turkey under the slogan, “The Armenian Genocide is an international lie.” It was one of the most important mass organizations of Ergenekon. A number of its founding members are now defendants or detainees of the Ergenekon prosecution. During the investigations, defendants were questioned over the Talat Pasha Committee and its activities. Ferit Ilsever, a defendant and member of the Talat Pasha Committee, complained that 17 of the 49 questions directed at him were about the committee. He believed, rather innocently, that the investigation being conducted over “the veil of the Ergenekon terror organization” was actually against the struggle they were waging “against the ‘Armenian Genocide’ lie.”

While Hrant Dink’s real murderers remained free in Istanbul, all these state VIPs were getting in line to attend Rauf Denktas’s funeral. They were sending us, the shocked ones, the following message: “We built up this state on 1915. To shed light on the Hrant Dink murder means to question the establishment of this state, to pull bricks out of its foundation. Why would you expect us to reveal the truth of Hrant Dink’s murder? Don’t you get it? We are all Rauf Denktas, and we will always be on Talat Pasha’s side.”

Ninety years of denial policies have blinded our eyes, dulled our brains, and atrophied our brains. We can’t see the link between the genocide of 1915 and Hrant’s murder the way they can and do. They made us forget 1915, but they never forgot it. They’ve dulled our memory of 1915, but they themselves never forgot it. We’ve been so dumbed down that some of us get spooked by the very word “genocide,” especially when someone says, “The genocide ought to be recognized.” Some of us still don’t want to link Hrant’s death with confronting our history, the history of 1915. In fact, Hrant is what we were forced to forget, the thing that was hidden from us.

Remember the fairy tales where the hero is given a key to the 40th room that is never to be opened? Think of a room in an old house where the trunk that holds our deepest secrets is hidden away. Hrant is the key. To unlock the secrets of his murder is to open all the secrets behind the formation of our republic. But this government doesn’t have the guts or the will to do this because they are “partners of the secret.”

Our Prime Minister [Recep Tayyip Erdogan], our President [Abdullah Gul], [Deputy Prime Minister] Bulent Arinc, and other members of the administration have stated that they are unhappy with the ruling and that the public conscience has been wounded. There’s no better way to mock someone than this. As an old politician once said, “Did someone tie your hands, that you weren’t able to capture the murderers?” Are you telling me that the same people who have access into the “cosmic room” (top-secret room) of the general staff can’t find those who planned Hrant Dink’s murder when even the public has a good idea of who might be behind it? It isn’t just crocodile tears you’re shedding; it’s beyond that! You realize, don’t you, that your behavior is an example of supreme disrespect towards those who have not let go of this prosecution for five years.

Once his sentencing was official, Hrant intended to take his entire family and walk the deportation route from his birthplace Malatya to Der Zor; he wanted to abandon Turkey. He used to say, “They don’t want me here, just like they didn’t want my ancestors. And if that’s the case then there’s no point in my staying here. I’m going to follow their path out.” Hrant wasn’t ignorant about 1915, the way we are. He experienced the connection between the 1915 genocide and what was being done to him, every single day; he felt it in his bones. Before he died he told me that he wanted to turn the courtroom, where he was being prosecuted for the use of the word genocide, into a scene out of history. He said, “Yes, I’m going to come out and say that 1915 was a genocide and I’m going to turn the courtroom into a tribunal of history.” They didn’t give him the chance.

We need to open our eyes and shed light onto our dulled minds. Hrant Dink was murdered to avenge Talat Pasha. Hrant is “1.5 million + 1.” Without seeing that and knowing that, we will never understand this murder nor reveal the truth about it. During the days leading up to 2015, we will never learn the truth about this murder without saying, “Yes, 1915 was a genocide and it must be recognized,” and “Hrant was murdered because he reminded you of all the Hrants from 1915.” This is the only way to save our Muslim faith and our Turkishness from the past and from the hands of today’s murderers.

I know how hard it is to live as an Armenian in this country. I understand and feel deep inside of me the emotions behind the words “I can’t live here anymore,” and the wish to abandon the land you were born in. I don’t know if I have the strength to do it but I want to scream out: You are the light that will let us redefine our Turkishness. You are the opportunity to remind the Muslims in Anatolia today of the Muslims of yesterday who, when faced with the annihilation of Armenians, said, “There’s nothing in the Kuran that allows this” and who opposed it and tried as much as they could to save the lives of Armenians. If you go, there is no meaning left to Turkishness or Muslim faith. You give us the opportunity and the possibility to take this country and save it from being the country of murderers and those who protect them.

I’m not saying this to convince you of something. These words are for Hrant Dink’s friends: You are writing history. You are signing on to a principle on this soil. By never letting go of this case for the past five years and saying “This case isn’t over until we say it’s over,” you honor Turkey and you represent its tomorrow. You show us how this republic can be redefined, not as the country of murderers and their protectors, but as the common land of all citizens of diverse religious and ethnic roots.

Let Hrant Dink be our symbol. Let him be our Martin Luther King. If they want to lock arms around Rauf Denktas and Talat Pasha, then let us form a tight circle around Hrant. Let Hrant and “1.5 million +1” be the thing that separates our republic from their republic.

Joe Zeronian, Ed.D., the newly elected president of the AMAA

On Oct. 15, at the Annual Meeting of the AMAA, the general membership elected the following members to the Board of Directors: Bryan Bedrosian, Anita Buchakjian, Nazareth Darakjian, M.D., Robert Hekemian, Sr., Louis Kurkjian, Kenneth Kevorkian, Lori Muncherian, Harold Nahigian, and Arsine Bedrosian Phillips, Esq. They were installed on Oct. 16 at the Annual Meeting Worship Service, held at the United Armenian Congregational Church of Los Angeles.

On Dec. 3, the Board elected its officers and approved the Executive Committee as follows: Joseph Zeronian, Ed.D., president; Nazareth Darakjian, M.D. and Peter Kougasian, Esq., vice presidents; Thomas Momjian Esq. and Arsine Phillips, Esq., secretaries; Nurhan Helvacian, Ph.D., treasurer; Anita Buchakjian, assistant treasurer; Berjouhy Gulesserian, advisor; Levon Filian, executive director; Albert Momjian, Esq., solicitor; and Joyce Stein, representative of the Stephen Philibosian Foundation.

The AMAA was founded in Worcester, Mass. in 1918 and incorporated in New York in 1920 with the purpose of strengthening and supporting the Armenian people in their Christian faith and to encourage religious education as well as literary and philanthropic work. Since its founding, the AMAA has expanded its programs of educational, evangelistic, relief, social services, church, and child care ministries to 24 countries around the world.

For more information about the AMAA ministries, visit www.amaa.org or call the AMAA headquarters at (201) 265-2607.

More unemployment maybe? Higher gas prices? More foreclosures? Another conflict perhaps?

Whatever may be in store for 2012, count on progress being somewhere in the mix. For better or worse. Is the world moving too fast? Are we keeping pace with technology? One of my children has no home telephone and doesn’t know what a postage stamp looks like.

Like him, the other two let their cell phones do the talking and figuring. They could go for months inside a fallout shelter and still keep in touch with the outside world.

Maybe it’s me. The older I get, the less tolerance I seem to have for progress. You’re looking at the guy who balked when electric typewriters replaced the manual. When computers came along, I came very close to leaving journalism because I felt intimidated by all this jazz.

I also felt the same way about microwaves, DVD players, and iPods. When blackberries hit the market, I thought they were something you threw into a cereal bowl.

You know what they say. Progress always means change…but change doesn’t always mean progress. Stretching the point—city traffic, for example, moved faster in the horse-and-buggy days.

I finally saw the movie “The Time Machine.” Being a big science fiction buff and aficionado of H.G. Wells, I enjoyed the book back in my high school days but somehow never saw it screened until a friend loaned me his copy.

In it, the lead character invents this concoction that travels through time. He finally lands in the year 8,000 and the world he sees is hardly what he would ever imagine. The moon has shattered and the human race is divided into two classes—those who live by light and others prone to darkness.

No cars. No fancy clothes. Not even a restaurant or a plaza. They just exist, one race above the ground and the other below, keeping out of each other’s way. I wonder if time will become our greatest enemy, not that I’ll be around to see it.

As the years tend to manifest themselves and the earth evolves, each New Year becomes a gift. If I were incapacitated, time would then be a curse. No one wants to be a burden to their family, let alone themselves.

Much as my mother used to say, “Son. Never get old.” But time waits for no one. We make the best of it because life is a precious gift. So long as I see the sun rise and the gleam in a grandchild’s eye, then each day carries a blessing.

I don’t need a television with 228 stations, nor 46 varieties of ice cream from which to choose. I don’t need a fancy car with seat warmers and jet propelled cylinders that can break the sound barrier. One suit is all that’s found in my closet, not one for each day.

Keep the nook and all other devices that access books with the touch of a finger. I enjoy reading books the old-fashioned way, hand-held and seated in my easy chair. Same with newspapers. They still serve a very unique purpose. You’ll never see anyone making a mad dash in a downpour with a computer over their head.

I still work out with a walkman plugged into my ears, not an iPod. Not that the sound is any better but what would I do with all the cassettes I’ve collected over time? Or my records. I still play them on a turntable, purely for nostalgic sake.

“You can sell them on eBay and make a tidy sum,” a friend suggested. “There are collectors who pay big money for rare records and books.”

Never been on e-bay and wouldn’t know how to access it if I tried. Same with the TV remote. Should something go wrong, I’m in a panic mode and call my seven-year-old grandson. He’s got all the electronic answers.

I should have called him when I lost my internet connection. Much as I tried everything, nothing worked. I kept staring at a blank screen and got more frustrated by the hour. My wife was no help. She stayed clear of the whole mess.

“I’m calling the technician,” I told her. “Seems like we have a defective computer line.”

I managed to get an appointment for three days later, which seemed like an eternity. The fix-it man showed up, pushed a few buttons, and solved the dilemma.

He hit the “A” key on the top line of my computer and presto! Only cost me $60 for a house call.

Students interested in applying for an Armenian Bar Association scholarship can obtain an application by visiting www.armenianbar.org. The application deadline is April 30. The application must either be postmarked by April 30 or, if e-mailed, it must be received no later than midnight (PST) on April 30.

The Armenian Bar Association is the largest organization of Armenian lawyers in the world and performs many functions on behalf of the Armenian community, such as responding to the press or media about topics relating to Armenians, educating Armenian Americans regarding their legal rights, and advocating the rule of law in Armenia, all of which are important aspects of advancing both the economic and the humanitarian well-being of Armenia. The Armenian Bar Association has also engaged in many cross-national efforts between the United States and Armenia, such as hosting Armenian attorneys and judges in the United States and promoting Armenian American attorneys’ involvement in the Armenian business and legal world, both as educators and as advisors.

On May 17- 19, the Armenian Bar Association will hold its 23^rd Annual Meeting in Glendale. For information on registering for the meeting, visit www.armenianbar.org.

NEW MILFORD, N.J.—On March 3, the Hovnanian School will mark its 35^th anniversary with a festive anniversary gala celebrating 35 years of excellence in education. The event will take place at the Westmount Country Club in Woodland Park with an art exhibition and cocktail hour beginning at 6 p.m., followed by dinner and dancing at 7:30 p.m.

Spearheaded by a number of current parents and many alumni, the Gala Committee is comprised of representatives from every aspect of the Hovnanian School family. The committee has been diligently planning the gala for months to assure a celebration worthy of the school’s growth and excellence.

The evening’s two main honorees will be Dr. John Apovian and Hratch Kaprielian, two men with diverse backgrounds who share a common concern for people and the greater community, and have been generous in their support of charitable causes.

Apovian, a child of immigrants, is a well-known and respected physician in New Jersey whose success can be traced to his work ethic, perseverance, and compassion. He has had an illustrious career through his private practice and his association with Hackensack University Medical Center, where his efforts have contributed to the hospital’s growth and well-deserved international reputation. He is recognized by colleagues and patients as a caring and skillful physician. Although technically “retired,” his active schedule includes his duties as director of the Ambulatory Care Clinic at Hackensack University Medical Center, and clinical assistant professor at the New Jersey Medical School. He is married to Ines Chinni from Bologna, Italy, whom he lovingly describes as “the only woman for me.” They have three children.

Kaprielian came to the United States in 1971 where he pursued a career in the jewelry industry and worked his way up to become a successful entrepreneur with interests in various businesses on an international level. He is currently a high-ranking executive of Franck Muller, one of the most respected names in the world of watch making. Kaprielian is well-known in the Armenian American community as a generous supporter of various charitable, educational, and humanitarian organizations, including the Hovnanian School, Armenia Fund USA, and a long list of charities providing aid to the people in Armenia and Artsakh. His daughter is a graduate of the school, and he has continued his generous support so that future generations of Armenian Americans can benefit from the unique educational opportunities offered.

The Hovnanian School was founded in 1976 by a number of individuals, led by Vahakn and Hasmig Hovnanian. Originally known as the Armenian School of New Jersey, it was renamed Hovnanian School in the mid-1980’s in recognition of the immeasurable contributions of the Hovnanian Family. The school’s mission is to build an active community of lifelong learners in a nurturing educational environment where each child feels happy, respected, proud, secure, and loved, and to nurture its students’ understanding of their heritage to develop a positive identity. Under the leadership of Anahid Garmiryan, who has been the principal for more than a decade, the school has received national acclaim and attention for its excellence and innovation.

Dr. Greg Simonian, the chairman of the Board of Trustees, expressed his hope that the community will come together to celebrate this milestone anniversary. He noted that the most recent evaluation from the Middle States Association of Colleges and Schools praised the school for its “outstanding academic program,” and specifically commended the “high percentage of student scholarships and acceptance into prestigious high schools indicative of the scholastic caliber and the guidance of excellent teachers.”

A 35^th anniversary booklet is being prepared for the occasion. To support the Hovnanian School through the booklet, or to reserve tickets ($175 per person) to the gala, e-mail 35years@hovnanianschool.org or call the school at (201) 967-5940. All proceeds will benefit the Student Education Fund.

“We look forward to the decades ahead,” said Simonian, “as the Hovnanian School continues on the road first paved by the founders and early supporters, who against all odds, set the foundation for one of the finest schools in the United States.”

The stipulations follow: (1) Scholarships will be awarded to high school students of Armenian heritage (proof is needed) who are residents of the United States and have resided in Bergen County for not less than a year. (2) Students must be applying to an accredited four-year college or university. (3) The primary criterion for awarding scholarships is academic excellence. To qualify, students should have an A-B average and a minimum SAT score of 1600 (reading, writing, and math combined). (4) Additional points will be given for Armenian education and membership in Armenian cultural organizations, as well as involvement in the Armenian and local community and school athletics or activities. (5) The Scholarship Committee reserves the right to not award scholarships in the event the said committee, in its sole judgment, determines that all applicants are deemed unqualified.

Prospective applicants can request applications or additional information by writing to Nora Hovanesian-Mann, 16 Rickland Rd., Old Tappan, NJ 07675 or e-mailing Nora.Hovanesian@maisonduchocolat.com. Completed applications must be filed no later than April 30, 2011.

The evening began with emcee Andrew Bagdasarian welcoming the crowd and asking Archpriest Gomidas Baghsarian, pastor of Sts. Vartanantz Church, to offer the blessing. After the singing of “Mer Hairenik” and a moment of silence for those who have passed away during the last year, dinner was served.

Bagdasarian then recognized the head table, which included Der Hayr Gomidas Baghsarian, Sarah Varadian, senior president, and Steve Elmasian, ARF advisor. Honorary members of the chapter, former Olympics kings and queens, Varadian Spirit Award recipients, and sister organization representatives were also recognized at this time.

Varadian, the newly elected senior president, gave a report on the chapter’s activities over the past year and thanked the out-going executive for a job well done, with special emphasis on the chapter president, Talene Taraksian.

Elmasian then gave a report on the Seniors’ activities. He focused on the importance of the chapter to reach out to its members no matter their background and to continue the traditions that have been maintained for close to eight decades. He spoke at length about the near-fatal injuries Cory Garabedian recently suffered in a car accident on Christmas Eve and how he has galvanized a community and a nation.

After Elmasian’s hopeful and inspirational speech, it was revealed that all of the proceeds from the raffle and silent auction would be donated to Garabedian and his family to help cover the cost of expensive medical treatments. The support of all in attendance, including those from other communities, was overwhelming. It was the true meaning of community, with everyone coming together, whether they knew Garabedian or not, to give all they could to support one of their own. Twenty raffle items were donated, and the chapter raised over $6,000.

Four members of Seniors have graduated to the ranks of alumni and were honored next. Two alumni in attendance, Margaret Stepanian and Peter “DOC” Bedrosian, were called to the front of the room to be greeted into the alumni fraternity. Those successfully reaching the rank of alumni are Melkon Megerdichian, Vicken Rachdouni, Christine Tutunjian, and Sonig Varadian.

Der Gomidas closed the evening with a prayer.

The Junior and Senior members were then asked to step to the floor as the band played the chapter song, “Hey Djan.”