Today’s Armenian Genocide rally in Times Square was well-attended by politicos, trying to make a point that they support recognition of the events of 1915 as genocide against the Armenian people. Some of the notables included (and this is only some of them) US Senators Bob Menendez (D-NJ) and Chuck Schumer (D-NY), Congressman Frank Pallone (D-NJ), former US Ambassador to Armenia John Evan (who got canned from his post for recognizing the Armenian Genocide a few years back), and Curtis Sliwa–the founder of the Guardian Angels–who (pictured above) gave a rousing and aggressive speech about America’s failure to push Turkey to recognize its past. I’m guessing close to 5,000 people attended the rally which lasted 2 1/2 hours.
Among the thousands of Armenian Americans (and friends) that attended the rally were a small group of kids with really provocative signs that verged on the nationalistic (one crassly equated Turks with idiots–I think most Armenians can make the separation between a government and its people).
Someone at the rally mentioned to me that the previous day’s Armenian Genocide denial rally in Times Square (reputedly funded by the Turkish government and organized by a strange committee named YOUNG-TURKS) only included 200 protesters but they augmented their small numbers with large video screens and more professionally orchestrated banners (here’s the web posting on TURKSES announcing the rally [post], and just in case that comes down here’s a PDF of the announcement [PDF]).
The fact that the Turkish government is pouring money into such events shows how desperate they are becoming. Eventually, they must know that their lies will be surmounted by the truth.
Photo courtesy my camera phone.
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