Throughout his lengthy political career, Israeli President Reuven Rivlin has been a staunch and vocal advocate of official recognition as genocide of the mass killings of Armenians in Ottoman Turkey in 1915; however, following his election to the top post earlier this year, it appears that he has reversed his stance to one that falls in line with Israel’s official policy on the controversial matter.
Israeli media reported Rivlin decided to refrain from putting his signature on an annual petition calling Israel to recognize the atrocities visited on the Armenians, having signed the document in previous years.
Armenia has been trying to get Turkey to recognize the killings of up to 1.5 million people under the Ottoman Empire as genocide.
But Turkey says 500,000 died of fighting and starvation during World War I and categorically rejects the term genocide.
Over the years, Israel has refrained from commenting on the matter for fear of angering Turkey, which was its closest ally in the Muslim world until the Mavi Marmara incident in 2010.
Last year Rivlin, then a parliamentarian with the Likud party, spoke at a Knesset session devoted to marking the 98-year anniversary of the Armenian Genocide; he said that “Turkey has always been and will be an ally of Israel. Talks with Turkey at this time are understandable and necessary strategically and politically, but these circumstances cannot justify the Knesset’s denial of another nation’s misfortunes.”
Rivlin added it was “inconceivable that the Knesset would ignore this tragedy, the historical facts of which are so well established. We find it hard to forgive the disregard of other peoples and unfortunately for us we should not ignore other people’s misfortunes.”
Source: I24NEWS
