Ottoman Empire

In Defense of Christians’ Richard Ghazal speaks on Syriac Christians in Turkey

Antioch was the first city where followers of Jesus were known as “Christians.” Now the city lies in ruins and its Christians are desperate.

Traditional values and religious freedom are increasingly perceived as contradictory, but they do not have to be.

The same ideology that motivated the 1913-23 Armenian genocide motivates Turkey’s and Azerbaijan’s aggressions against Armenians, Greeks and other Christians.

The odd thing about Bashir and Erdogan is how little they understand the West, and particularly the United States. There is no condemnation of America, its history, and its actions that foreign regimes can make that Americans did not make first, still make, and made more convincingly.

The normalization between the Arabs and Israelis diminishes Turkey’s role as the chief mediator between Israel and the Muslim world, so Erdogan’s anguish probably comes from fear of an “Arab option.”

The story of Kurdish Christians and all other religious minorities in the Middle East is one of great suffering, but it is also a story of survival and great resilience. Fortunately, there is time to save northeast Syria as a refuge for these communities, but only if the international community offers immediate support.

Hagia Sophia’s conversion is the culmination of Erdoğan’s long campaign to transform Turkey into a neo-Ottoman empire.

The Middle East is not overloaded with statues of historic figures, but they do exist. Some are of imperialists and slavers.