APOLOGY FOR VILIFYING ONE MAN,
YET NO APOLOGY FOR KILLING 1.5 MILLION
By: HARUT SASSOUNIAN
05-11-2010 14:49:00 | Armenia | Articles and Analyses
Ramgavar Mamoul
In 2008, the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), an Alabama-based non-profit civil
rights organization, published an article titled, "State of Denial: Turkey Spends Millions
to Cover Up Armenian Genocide." It was a hard-hitting exposé of the Turkish
government’s elaborate and sinister efforts to pressure U.S. politicians and entice
academics to deny the facts of the Armenian Genocide.
According to the SPLC article, "Turkey exerts political leverage and spends millions of
dollars in the United States to obfuscate the Armenian genocide…. Revisionist
historians who conjure doubt about the Armenian genocide…are paid by the Turkish
government."
Going beyond such general statements, SPLC specifically referred to Guenter Lewy as
"one of the most active members of a network of American scholars, influence peddlers
and website operators, financed by hundreds of thousands of dollars each year from the
government of Turkey, who promote the denial of the Armenian genocide…."
Lewy, professor emeritus of political science at the University of Massachusetts, had
qualified the Armenian Genocide in his lectures and writings as a "bungling misrule"
rather than a deliberately planned and executed mass murder. He had made similar
claims in his controversial book published by the University of Utah Press in 2005: "The
Armenian Massacres in Ottoman Turkey: A Disputed Genocide."
Shortly after publication of SPLC’s article, an $8 million defamation lawsuit was filed
against the civil rights group on behalf of Prof. Lewy by attorneys David Saltzman and
Bruce Fein from the Turkish American Legal Defense Fund (TALDF), which is
"generously supported by the Turkish Coalition of America," according to TALDF’s
website.
Before a jury could judge the merits of the charges in court, however, SPLC agreed to
settle the case by issuing "a retraction and apology" and promising to pay an
undisclosed sum to Prof. Lewy. Had SPLC not settled the case, TALDF would have had
a difficult task proving in court that Prof. Lewy was actually libeled. In order to win the
lawsuit, TALDF had to prove that SPLC had made those accusations "with malicious
intent" and "reckless disregard for the truth." Furthermore, TALDF lawyers would have
to show that the long-retired 87-year-old professor had suffered actual financial loss,
such as getting fired from his job or having a contract canceled as a direct result of the
article.
Some SPLC supporters have wondered why it chose to settle the lawsuit when its
chances of losing in court were minimal. A knowledgeable source told this writer that
SPLC may have settled the case in order to reduce its exposure to mounting attorney
fees, combined with the likelihood that Prof. Lewy may have agreed to settle for far less
than the $8 million he had originally demanded. With the lawsuit behind it, SPLC could
once again dedicate itself to its actual mission of defending civil rights.
In its retraction, SPLC stated: "We now realize that we misunderstood Prof. Lewy's
scholarship, were wrong to assert that he was part of a network financed by the Turkish
Government, and were wrong to assume that any scholar who challenges the Armenian
genocide narrative necessarily has been financially compromised by the Government of
Turkey. We hereby retract the assertion that Prof. Lewy was or is on the Government of
Turkey's payroll…. We deeply regret our errors and offer our sincerest apologies to
Professor Lewy."
In response to complaints from SPLC supporters opposing the settlement, however,
Penny Weaver, a public affairs spokesman, stated: "Our settlement of this matter does
not mean we are endorsing Mr. Lewy’s views or taking his side. But we are
acknowledging that we mischaracterized his views and wrongly said that he was taking
money from the Turkish government. It was an error, and we apologize for that." The
original article which precipitated the lawsuit is still posted on the SPLC’s website.
Needless to say, no one should be defamed because of his or her views on the
Armenian Genocide, no matter how wrong or offensive they are. Unless one possesses
evidence to the contrary, one cannot simply assume that those making distorted
statements on the Armenian Genocide are motivated by greed or are paid agents of the
Turkish government.
It is both commendable and ironic that lawyers for a Turkish interest group are eager to
file a multi-million dollar lawsuit in the United States ostensibly to defend the civil rights
of a client. In Turkey, however, anyone who dares to talk about the Armenian Genocide
risks being charged for telling the truth and thrown into prison for years under the
infamous Article 301 of the Turkish Penal Code which bans "insulting Turkishness!"
If TALDF were truly interested in protecting civil rights, it would allocate its considerable
resources to abolish Article 301, which would considerably lessen financial support from
generous donors and bring its operations to an end.