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from page 29
Nalbandian's text represented a
change in Israeli policy, which has
always avoided blaming Turkey for
the atrocities, or even fully acknowl-
edging them.
The prime minister's office, the
foreign ministry and the Knesset all
tried to placate Turkey. Knesset
Speaker Reuven Rivlin and other
officials entered the fray, persuading
Nalbandian to delete the word
"genocide" and instead refer only to
"the suffering of the Armenian peo-
ple." Nalbandian said she was disap-
pointed but that she did not want
to create problems for Israel.
On government orders, organizers
scrapped the 4,000 programs pre-
pared for the event due to the brief
reference to the Armenian genocide.
New ones were quickly printed at
the last minute. The offensive words
were also hastily erased from a
plaque created for the ceremony. In
the end, Turkey could rest easy as
Officials persuaded
Naomi Nalbandian
to refer only to 'the
suffering of the
Armenian people.'
Nalbandian lit the torch and kept to
the sanitized script. I cringed.
Admittedly, Turkey is a key
regional ally of Israel. It's the only
Moslem country with which
Jerusalem enjoys warm relations. It
provides strategic military coopera-
tion and may one day even supply
some of our fresh water — all high-
ly important stuff not to be dis-
counted.
Still, it's no reason for Israel to
deny another people's tragedy just to
placate Turkey. Surely, if there is one
country and one people that should
be sensitive to this, it's Israel and
the Jews who are justly outraged by
the obscenity of Holocaust deniers.
Lamentably, Israel's caving in to
Turkey's intimidation on the eve of
Independence Day is only the latest
episode in Jerusalem's consistently
spineless, evasive policy over the
years. Such a suppression of truth
and history is a blight on Israel's
name. By our indifference and fail-
ure to recognize this genocide, we
are helping victimize the Armenians
again. We should know better. ❑