1st Annual Pinocchio Competition
By Jirair Tutunjian
The 1st Annual Pinocchio Competition was held at Liar Lake, Georgia, 250 k (give or take 50 k) south of Atlanta. The two competitors were R.T. Erdogan of Turkey and Benyamin (Bibi) Netanyahu of Israel. The moderators were Ursula Van Der Lying of EU and former UK Prime Minister Tony (Fibber) Blare. Van Der Lying is famous for denying knowledge of the explosion of the Nord Stream gas line while Blare is hailed among prevaricating circles as the man who denied UK participation in the attack on Iraq.
DER LYING: Welcome to the 1st Annual Pinocchio Competition. The winner will be the competitor who utters the most and biggest lies. He will be presented with the 1st Pinocchio Award and 100,000 in fake shekels or liras. The floor is yours Mr. Netanyahu.
BN: There is no and never was a Palestinian nation. These people, who call themselves Palestinian, are carpetbaggers from Arabia.
DER LYING: Two points for Bibi.
RTE: I can top that. There was never an Armenian state in Asia Minor or in the South Caucasus. There was also no Armenian Genocide: We moved them from the theater of war inland to safe grounds in the Fertile Crescent.
BLARE: Two points for Mr. Erdogan.
BN: Israelis are not a colonialist-settler community. After our exile, we returned to our homeland and purchased the God-given Land of Israel from Arabs.
RTE: There’s 100 percent press freedom in Turkey. Those who say we have imprisoned journalists are Kurd and Armenian agents.
BN: Jewish freedom fighters—Stern and Lehi groups–didn’t kill Lord Moyne or Count Bernadotte. The Mossad didn’t kill politician-poet Ghassan Kanafa
DER LYING: Two points for Mr. Netanyahu.
RTE: Reports that we killed journalists, including Armenian editor HrantDink are Armenian-Zionist propaganda. By the way, there is zero trade between Turkey and Israel. The so-called pipeline transporting Azeri gas to Israel via Turkey is transparent Greek-
BLARE: Two points for Mr. Erdogan.
BN: Although they don’t like us, Arabs living in Israel enjoy equal rights. We don’t enroll them in the IDF because we don’t want them to get hurt.
BLARE: Three points for my good friend Bibi.
RTE: Prime Minister Blare should be disqualified as moderator-judge. He is clearly in Netanyahu’s rich pockets.
DER LYING: Mr. Erdogan, you exaggerate the intimacy between Bibi and Mr. Blare. Your turn, Bibi.
BN: Palestinians are ingrate. Before our return to Eretz Israel, the land was desert. We made it into a garden.
RTE: Please spare us the octogenarian clichés. You killed Yitzhak Rabin and are now plotting to kill Ehud Olmert and Ehud Barak for criticizing your Gaza genocide.
BN: How can we commit genocide of Palestinians when there are still fifteen million Palestinians? We are merely moving Gaza Palestinians south for their protection, just as you moved Armenians to Syria. Now you want to gobble Syria.
DER LYING: Two points for Bibi
RTE: That is rich, but I can top it: Turkey and Syria have been connected with brotherly bonds forged over 1,000 years. We have no plot to carve northern Syria or any part of it.
BLARE: Three points for Mr. Erdogan.
BN: Likewise, we have no plans to annex the West Bank or any part of the “the land between the Nile and the Euphrates.”
DER LYING: Mr. Blare and I agree that you each deserve three points for superb lying.
RTE: To add to my earlier comment: We have warm relations with brother Vladimir Putin. Reports that we supplied Ukraine with BayraktarTB2 drones are Zionist-Greek propaganda. We also had nothing to do with brother Ilham Aliyev’s
BN: You terrorize Greece, Cyprus, Lebanon, Syria, Armenia, grab Iraqi and Syrian lands, intimidate Georgia, threaten us practically every day…but you still have excellent relations with your neighbors. These are not even good lies because even a ten-year-old knows you are lying.
RTE: I am confused by what Netanyahu says: isn’t the purpose of this august event to determine who can tell a bigger lie?
BLARE: I agree with Mr. Erdogan. I give him four points.
DER LYING: I disagree and give Bibi four points.
BLARE: Time is up. Let’s count the points and declare the winner.
DER LYING: I counted 15 points for Bibi and 15 for Mr. Erdogan.
BLARE: My count says 16 points for Mr. Erdogan and 16 for Bibi. We have a tie. The winners of the 1st Annual Pinocchio Competition are Mr. Benyamin Netanyahu and R.T. Erdogan. Congratulations. You are both world-class liars. Thank you for offering us a master class in prevarication.
