The Ground is Trembling Beneath Our Feet, Yet We Are Still Dancing

BY MARIE ROSE ABOUSEFIAN, PHD

The world is once again in restless turmoil: in one place there is a war provoked by powerful states, elsewhere nations stand under the threat of new wars, and in yet another place there is a massacre on display before the eyes of the world, an open genocide against a defenseless and unarmed people, seven million Palestinians, who have lived for nearly 80 years as slaves, as captives on their own ancestral land. And within my whole being, the never-fading presence of the genocide committed with the same savagery against my own nation, awakens once more, together with the disgust it gives rise to toward its perpetrators and, at the same time, to those watching in silence.

Disgust at the population of the world that pretends to be blind, who with indifferent silence watch the extermination of an unarmed, peaceful people, their horrific slaughter on their own soil, their death by starvation, the desperate, heartrending cries of children beg for a drop of some solution called “food,” waving empty pots in the air, their eyes filled with horror, their dignity stripped away, their humanity annihilated. The merciless slaughter extends even to those who stretch out a helping hand, foreign doctors working voluntarily, distributors of international aid, journalists and photographers who reveal the truth details of daily mass killings.

The disgust is not directed toward a powerless people, wandering like a herd of animals, who witness the explosions of their homes, who emerge from the ruins covered in dust and debris, who have been fleeing for two years from place to place in their own fertile land without finding a single safe corner, slaughtered and annihilated under the open sky by a rain of bombing. The disgust is toward those who carry out this destruction, those who govern it, those who rule the world, those who decide the fate of nations, those who proclaim themselves almighty, and to whom we ourselves, with readiness and even unconditional enthusiasm, entrust today the destiny of our own lives and of future generations.

I feel disgust when I see that my country, which endured the same genocide 110 years ago and only five years ago suffered ruthless massacres of its people and the loss of vast territories, now watches in indifferent silence and accepts the extermination of the defenseless Palestinian people, without a single outcry, without a single accusation from our nation. Yet have we not endured the same catastrophe, and do we still not carry within our very cells that unquenchable pain? Especially today, every farsighted Armenian understands that we as a nation are once again being led down the same path as the Palestinians, as our rights and lands are handed over to the enemy, leading us gradually toward annihilation.

In the memory that lives within me is the genocide committed by the Turks against my ancestors: driving us like herds of animals from place to place, subjecting us to the same starvation and humiliation. It still lives within me, even though 110 years have passed, and I did not personally endure that horror. Yet what my family lived through has become an inseparable part of my being. And since I am Armenian, I am naturally the heir of my people’s distorted national identity, a legacy forged by great powers, one I cannot escape no matter how much I may wish to.

Therefore, I cannot pretend indifference toward any genocide committed against any people, for the genocide inflicted upon my own nation before my birth has shaped my genes, my very being. Mixed with my blood, it circulates within me and has become an inseparable part of my biography.

It turns out that centuries are powerless to erase lived horrors from the memory of human cells. It turns out that cellular memory is stronger and more enduring than the dictates of the brain or the demands of the stomach. This is why the biography of the descendants of the genocide begins instinctively before their birth and continues, extending into the lives of their offspring. It is no accident that people remain interested in each other’s nationality, for it carries within itself both a face and a history.

Though I was born at the end of the Second World War, I already had a biography before my birth, independent of my own will, and I have always felt obliged to begin from there.

I was born in Aleppo. Though I have never reconciled myself with that fact, I remain grateful both to that country and to that city, and to its people, for it was the first refuge of the survivors of the genocide of my nation, of my family. That country, despite its indescribably harsh economic and political circumstances, despite its own agony, received, aided, and restored to life my half-dead, starving people.

I cannot reconcile myself with being born there, because in truth, in a peaceful world I should have been born in Marash, that ancient city of Cilicia where my mother and her father’s family were born. Or in my father’s birthplace, Alexandretta. Or in the birthplace of my grandmother’s family, Sebastia (Sivas).

Yet the policies of the great powers: Germany, England, France, Russia, America, designed to protect their own interests and those of Turkey, not only deprived my people and their descendants of living on their native land, but also deprived me and my future generations of the national and human right to be born and to live on our ancestral soil. They deprived us of our identity.

I know that in today’s advancing world my accusation, or my irreconcilability, may seem strange to many of you, especially to those born outside the homeland. For today the very concept of the influence of land and place has vanished from the world, though the destructive politics of the powerful, guided by their own interests, has not disappeared.

Humanity has become rootless, landless, like a single celled organism. It grows wherever it is displaced and thrown, and if by fortune it ends up even in one of the great powers that bring calamity upon and destroy its own country, it no longer thinks of its vanishing homeland, its nationality, or the life-giving sap that nourishes its roots. It feels happy and blessed to shelter under the protection of that powerful state, though it is itself its immediate victim, stripped of its national face, its inner essence, its land, its country, and most often its language.

Moreover, whether consciously or unconsciously, satisfied with its own security, it provokes and stands behind that state as it carries out coups in its own homeland, even participates in the destruction of its own country under the pretext of regime change. For now, it already bears a geopolitical identity, as the powerful call the uprooted faceless ones, thereby justifying their crimes. The meaning of this is incomprehensible to the displaced themselves, yet they proudly accept this new label along with what they call the “improvement and democratization” of their country. They are no longer capable of penetrating the depths of reality, for their minds are already fed only on the surface.

Since I do not belong to that group of the so called “happy ones,” I am a person of a different way of thinking. Therefore, I reject becoming merely a number within the population of a foreign, even powerful country. I reject all the “justifications” of the great powers for the destruction and displacement of peoples.

Had there been no genocide in the life of my people, had my mother or father not been born during the years of genocide, and had our land, Western Armenia, not been seized by the Turks, naturally both my birthplace and my essence would have been different. I would have been born in my own country, and my being, my way of thinking, would have been shaped by the steadfast determination of belonging to and possessing that land. That feeling is foreign to me now.

The treacherous policies of the great powers deprived me of that feeling. Therefore, I ceaselessly and restlessly probe both our history and world history, searching within their “justifications” for even a single convincing argument for subjecting us to deprivation, for believing their promises of “peace treaties”. Finding none, I remain true to my principle, clinging to my roots.

Today, the nation that in the 21st century commits the greatest genocide, depriving an entire people and their descendants of their identity, itself held the world captive for 80 long years with the holocaust carried out against it on German soil. It turned that tragedy into a national privilege, imposing its whims upon the world. It transformed it into the right to rule the globe, into law, into authority, into monopoly, by which it has prohibited the recognition, acceptance, and condemnation of the far more horrific genocides committed against other peoples before and after it.

They would not allow it, they obstructed in every way, they hindered acceptance in the highest bodies, especially of the Armenian Genocide. They even tried to eliminate the very concept of GENOCIDE so that the world would focus only on their holocaust, because they had burned and gassed people in furnaces, whereas Armenians had been destroyed in the same manner by the Turks before them, only in natural furnaces, in caves, where the cave entrances were blocked and sealed, and deadly gases were used with special pillows in bathhouses to kill children.

We were unable to compel the world to acknowledge what was done to us, because by their holocaust they captured the world, they erased particularly our and the other genocides committed and continuing in the world.

The nation that condemned the world with its holocaust, enslaved it, and granted itself the right to domination, using Zionism and Mossad and its control over the world’s banking, today openly employs the most extreme means of extermination not only in Palestine but also in Lebanon, threatening the entire Middle East.

It is appropriate here to recall the Armenian proverb, “Let me get my footing, and then see what I will bring down on your head.”

Yet Palestine had nothing whatsoever to do with their holocaust, and yet today, instead of Germany, they themselves have become the target of Jewish vengeance. As the saying goes, “For the strong, it is always the weak who is guilty”. This has been and remains the slogan of the world and of the powerful.

Do you think that this extermination and humiliation, aided by those self-proclaimed “humanitarian” states that claim to defend the rights of peoples, will be erased from the cellular memory of the Palestinian people who, like us, survive only by chance?

When asked why especially Palestinian children are being killed, Israel’s Minister of Defense openly declared before the world: “We kill them so that our children may have a safe life in the future.”

Do you hear this, Alen Simonyan, Nikol, and your followers: “so that their children may have a safe life in the future”? They know, they are certain, that this terrible massacre and humiliation will not be erased from each surviving Palestinian child, orphan, and youth and generation yet to come. It is already in their cells and one day it will rise and take revenge. And you wretched mercenaries praise even the open calls of the savage enemy you have bought with money to destroy your own people.

The genocide committed jointly by the Turk, the English, Germans, and French against my ancestors lives on in me, stored deep in my memory and still as strong as ever, even though, I repeat, 110 years have passed, and I did not personally live through that catastrophe.

This is why, within me, it has also taken root and become a sticky sediment the massacre committed 37 years ago against our compatriots in Artsakh, Sumgait, and Baku, with the same humiliations and the same savagery that went unpunished.

And moreover, has come, erupting like a volcano, the massacre agreed just five years ago between our country’s hired ruler and the enemy, the shameful surrender of Artsakh, liberated at great cost, to the enemy. That same enemy had for 34 years been groaning, searching for means, carrying out futile assaults to tear away even a fragment of its coveted Artsakh, until by the command of the powerful West and with their direct assistance there appeared a present day semi-literate, power hungry, treacherous nonentity who declared his readiness to offer unconditional service to those who wish to destroy us.

Israel destroys the indigenous Palestinians and drives out the survivors so that it may have land in which to live, to expand, and to grow stronger. We, the Armenians, hand our country over to the enemy as if it were the enemy’s centuries old possession, and we immediately displace the Armenian population without voice or protest so that the enemy will have territory, will grow in strength, and will finally destroy us.

How is our country’s leader different from the perpetrators of genocide? His crime against his own nation is no less a genocide, and is worthy of the highest punishment, because it was carried out not by the enemy, but by a leader who is hostile to his own country and his people.

Do you think it is accidental that no country pays attention to the complaints of our humanitarian organizations, to the pleas to punish Azerbaijan and to free the prisoners? Everyone knows the truth. They know that it was our authorities who surrendered the country, that to remain in power they killed 7,000 patriotic young men who defended the integrity of the homeland, that it is they who handed over Artsakh’s political leaders and displaced the people of Artsakh.

They also know the origin and the “victory” of this pitiable regime’s so called “velvet revolution,” how it seized power, because they too participated in that coup. They know how the CIA spared no effort and money to hand authority to agents of Turkey and continues to spare nothing to keep this regime, which serve them faithfully and voluntarily, so that they may carry out their greatest plans.

This is why we have no right to wait for elections, because seven years ago those who appointed them, their masters, will again choose them in return for their loyal service.

Our people must understand that in a country like ours, taken captive, the people do not choose; the masters choose, and they have already chosen. There is no need to look for new ones, and the so called “international observers” used to justify election fraud are the very ones who protect the interests of those masters.

So do not be deceived by the appearance of fair elections. If we want, if you wish, to free the country from these mercenaries, they must be removed from power beforehand. Remove every single member of the current regime, without exception, at any cost.

I advise our society to finally sober up and follow the enemy’s news more closely than the lies that conceal the reality of our government, which loyally serves the enemy. Because the enemy acts openly, our government is completely in their trap, serves them willingly, and carries out their demands without reservation, so the enemy has no need to lie.

Let me remind you that 110 years ago we also did not believe the declarations of the Turks who planned our destruction. Instead of thinking and organizing, we continued our celebrations.

Today in my country the people are terrorized, brought to their knees, and silenced by the threat of war, and no one notices that the enemy no longer needs to wage war and inflict human losses, not to keep a promise given to Trump, because the current government satisfies all their demands immediately and beyond.

We witness how America, under promises of “peace,” continues to destroy countries and peoples. We see who the real masters of that country are, those who, through their Zionism and Mossad, are strangling the world.

Fortunately, the new media operating in the world, risking their lives revealing the truth, along with progressive thinkers from various fields, professors, renowned lecturers, military figures, generals, and journalists, defy every danger and relentlessly expose the full reality of wars instigated under false pretexts to serve the interests of dominant states. They reveal the previously committed and ongoing crimes, presented to the world with lies and imposed by the powerful: destroyed countries, people exterminated by the hundreds of thousands, displaced populations torn from their land, creating a new breed of wandering humanity.

All this is done to awaken those of us who are bewildered, to rouse peoples in general, so that they will no longer believe the justifications for deceitful wars, will not be persuaded by continued toxic propaganda, and will stand by their identity and their countries, especially those like us who have already fallen into the enemy’s trap.

The emergence of newly powerful countries and their alliance for peaceful prosperity have begun to cast a shadow over and shake the foundations of the former great powers. They will use every means to retain their leading role and preserve their power. And that means new wars, new losses.

This warmongering country, of whose ignorant successive victims we are also one, a country that spares even its own citizens when necessary for its interests, has for many years been slowly undermining our state, imposing upon us the present destructive Armenian leadership. Now, for the sake of its great aim, the destruction of its greatest rival, it drags us into surrendering the last scrap of our territory, the Zangezur corridor, and into our final annihilation.

And what are we doing?

Instead of organizing, uniting, and rallying around a single national party, the ARF, and instead of presenting to the people with serious revelations the destructive consequences of the deceived, imposed state in which they live and the indifferent path to destruction that it has chosen, we waste time on cheap personal insults. We analyze the foolishness of those in power, their curses, and their crude expressions, sinking ever deeper into meaningless, fruitless quarrels.

Perhaps the serious thinkers have vanished from the country, and the field has been left to a herd of wretches whom we, having become their captives, meekly follow to see what further devastation they will wreak and what new orders of the enemy they will carry out.

No matter how the current regime uses the law to silence those who expose its anti-national policies, those who warn the people about the danger to the country, and those who seek to unite the nation, and no matter what sanctions they impose to keep power in their hands, the people still see it. It can no longer be hidden that the authorities serve the enemy, and it is unforgivable that people remain silent.

It is unforgivable that the nation has been silent and remains silent about their justifications for changing the country’s Declaration of Independence.

Since 2019 the present Turkey friendly regime, at the enemy’s direction, has attempted to eliminate the Republic of Armenia’s Declaration of Independence of August 23, 1990, which is the cornerstone of our restored Second Republic.

The people do not ask what right the enemy has to demand changes to the Republic’s Declaration, its Constitution, or the nation’s symbols.

After all, the Republic of Armenia has not fought a war, has not been defeated, and has not surrendered. According to our government statements the country’s borders have not been “changed,” and the current government calls the state sovereign.

If the Republic of Armenia is truly sovereign, as is repeatedly and pointlessly asserted, and if every person with even a basic command of Armenian understands the meaning of the word sovereign, then why are these changes even up for discussion?

Even the most illiterate citizens know that the Declaration cannot be changed if the country has not been defeated and handed over to the enemy.

Changing the Declaration is needed not only by the enemy but also to cover up and justify the illegal treason committed by the current government.

Although since 1990 one of the national goals recorded in the Declaration has been the international recognition of the Armenian Genocide, as you know this was disregarded by the very first president, Levon Ter-Petrosyan, and the neglect continues to this day.

Naturally, the current Turkey pleasing regime, in line with its internal aims and at the enemy’s demand, is gradually erasing the fundamental provisions that form the indissoluble part of our independent state, in order later to free itself from responsibility. This is why people have no right to remain indifferent about this matter, because it concerns the integrity of their country.

I want to emphasize also that yes, Artsakh is an inseparable part of Armenia, it is Armenia and nothing else, as are Syunik, Armavir, Ararat, all that has belonged to the Armenian people for centuries. Enough of declaring a pretext of war against Artsakh.

The enemy does not fear what it has obtained easily and calls it its homeland. We, however, immediately renounce our age-old homeland, for which hundreds of thousands of lives were sacrificed to liberate, making war a cause to ignite.

Wake up, enough with covering the actions of these traitors with a veil of concealment.

Let me remind once more, our Second Independence was achieved with the direct participation of the West, and therefore from the very first moment, from the first president, Levon Ter-Petrosyan, it became a compulsion to bow voluntarily before the Turks, to carry out their orders, to flatter them, and especially to foster a hostile attitude in the people toward Artsakh, to refuse to accept it as part of Armenia.

Until we face this reality, reveal it, and bring the guilty to justice, the condition of our country will remain the same. No matter who comes to power, they will continue the same policy if the principal responsible parties and their Turkey-friendly network remain inside the country.

Yes, it should be recalled every time that our independence, which began with Levon Ter-Petrosyan’s Turkey leaning stance, forbade commemorating and reminding others of the genocide. A witness to this is our first foreign minister, Raffi Hovannisian, who was dismissed for insisting on remembering the genocide.

In 2008, we witnessed the humiliation we suffered in the desire to sign a reconciliation with the Turks without any conditions, which, although it was not realized that year thanks to the resistance of the people, especially the diaspora, nonetheless resulted in the implementation of “Football Diplomacy”. This led to the Armenian football team playing on its own field without the Ararat emblem on their uniforms.

We did not experience a national outrage, no one was held accountable, no one demanded an explanation. The people swallowed it and quietly continued their daily lives, growing day by day more resentful of their leader from Artsakh.

If in 2008 it was a voluntary act of flattering the Turks, which the people accepted with indifference, then 17 years later another leader, no longer a hated Artsakh Armenian but one specifically chosen and trained by the enemy, proving his unquestioning loyalty to his superior and carrying out orders with absolute precision, removes the national Armenian symbol Ararat from passport stamps.

And yet, with his arrogance, he dares to reserve for himself the right to justify the implementation of the imposed order with the most ridiculous (as a Western Armenian would say, trivial and silly) pretexts.

I grieve even more for our mountain, which is not only occupied, but is also subjected to endless tugging and torment by its own country, in its own soil, much like our fate. It turns out that not only is it difficult to be Armenian, but it is also equally hard to be part of the Armenian nature, full of trials.

The terrifying thing is that the people have made peace with all this and calmly continue their dances and celebrations. Meanwhile the world is in restless commotion, former Al Qaeda groups and ISIS today rule countries.

We still have a widespread diaspora in those countries. We have institutions, wealth, and mostly also a growing generation. How can we ignore all this? Who will look after our compatriots if not our own country? Certainly not the current enemy-serving authorities.

The world is witnessing a new form of captivity and destruction offered to the Palestinians under the name of peace. The three year long war in Ukraine, driven by Western powers, continues and raises the danger of a third world war.

Everyone is arming, except us. At the enemy’s command, and following its orders, our already pitifully equipped military capacity is being reduced, which is further proof of our captive condition.

They act correctly from their point of view, because we do not need defense, given that the enemy protects us, whether from inside or outside. The enemy is an enemy, and that is that.

The country’s leader fears raising the issue of prisoners on international platforms, refuses to pronounce the true name of the country’s most important territory the Zangezur Corridor, and denies it, all to demonstrate his unreserved loyalty to new masters by publicly displaying his pitiful political, state, human, and national ignorance.

Even then, he remains intoxicated with the recognition of those masters, who themselves do not even remember the name of his country, confusing it with Albania. These are the very masters who hired him as their agent, for which he is paid.

Does our people not understand or analyze all this? Do they not feel that we are no longer an independent state? That under the current authorities, and therefore for all of us, our very breath is in the enemy’s hands. But how can they realize this when they are absorbed in dances and revelry?

The founders of our first state did not sacrifice their lives, were not destroyed in prisons and exiles, for you to hand yourselves over to the enemy today through dancing.

Enough of waiting for salvation from Europe or mighty America; you are their immediate victims.

What are these hired hands who freely undermine and destroy the country that belongs to us, to our children and grandchildren? And an entire nation, rendered powerless, waits for its fate.

Are you not tired of being the victim?  Who are you waiting for now?

I cannot allow my grandchild, who grew up Armenian with great difficulty in a foreign land, to continue living there like me, forever searching for his identity, sinking into himself, unable to feel the power of his native soil under his feet.

Enough. Stop and feel the movement of the earth sliding beneath your feet. Hear the country’s plea. Fear the curse of future generations. You are depriving them of the irreplaceable national strength of having a country and feeling ownership of it.