SULTANIC SAVIORS AND TOLERANT TURKS: WRITING OTTOMAN JEWISH HISTORY, DENYING THE ARMENIAN GENOCIDE

Authors : Yücel Güçlü

Pages : 98-110

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Publication Date : 2025-06-14

Article Type : Other Papers

Abstract :“Sultans as Saviors” tells how Mediterranean Jewish writers of the 16th century—whose who settled in the Ottoman realm and those who continued to be expelled from city after city after the Inquisition—extolled the praises of the sultan in messianic terms. How the early modern Jewish affective disposition was repeated in the first Ashkenazi and Sephardi histories of the Ottoman Empire is demonstrated. How following the Armenian “genocide” in 1915 and the collapse of the empire Turkish Jews promoted the same Ottoman-era narrative is examined. In 1892, on the four hundredth anniversary of their ancestors’ having taken refuge, Ottoman Jews organized a celebration of Turkish tolerance. For Ottoman Jews and Muslims alike, historical events and historical memory would be linked to a politics of memory. The view that Turkey had played a major role in rescuing Jews from the Holocaust is discussed. The role of leading Turkish Jews as lobbyists, in the United States of America, Europe and Israel, denying “genocide” on Turkey!s behalf is related. The ways in which the Turkish Jewish lobby became regularized as the Quincentennial Foundation in 1989 are indicated. Developments in Turkish and Ottoman historography at the turn of the new millenium are argued.
Keywords : Türkiye, Orta Doğu, Ermeni, Yahudi, Türkler

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