Lebanese Talk Show Host Paula Yacoubian: The Ottomans Were the Forefathers of ISIS, but Armenian Genocide Was Not About Muslims Killing Christians

On the centennial of the Armenian genocide, Paula Yacoubian, a Lebanese talk show host of Armenian descent, described the Ottomans as "the forefathers of ISIS." Yacoubian warned against falling into the trap of "political propaganda," which characterizes the genocide as "Muslim killing Christians," and explained that it was Muslim Arabs who had protected the Armenian refugees.

Following are excerpts:

Paula Yacoubian: I had wanted to tell you the story of my father, because no matter how often I tell his story, it is never enough. But since everybody knows what burden we carry on our backs - our history as children in exile in our Lebanese mountain of refuge - I will not recount the story of my father this time. Whenever I tell his story, I begin to cry, and I've decided that I won't cry today.

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My father was a refugee from the massacres, not my grandparents. Every day, my sister and I would hear tales of history first-hand from my father. The thing that bothers and upsets me the most is hearing that it was about Muslims killing Christians. We all fall into the trap of this political propaganda. The murderers are not just after a victim. They want to accomplish a goal. When people are labeled – "we are Muslims," "you are Christians" - it draws more resentful people to become killers, it leads them to sharpen their swords, and it gives new meaning to killing for those who consider setting out on Jihad, on a holy war, or a religious war. When the Ottomans, the forefathers of ISIS, killed the Christians - true, they tortured and killed the Greeks, the Chaldeans, and the Assyrians, but they killed and tortured more Muslims.

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Sometimes, historians write history from a religious perspective only. Today, when ISIS kills Christians, people say: 'It killed Copt Christians' or 'It killed Ethiopian Christians.' Nobody counts the Muslims killed by ISIS. This encourages more killings and more bloodshed. It is their way of recruiting more people who harbor hatred toward the other. We must not fall into this trap, because we know better. We have been living here among our people and our neighbors. Let me prove this point by saying that it was the Muslim Arabs who protected the Armenians, who were all Christians.

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Our most important message in this centennial should be that those who kill wish to label or tag groups of people by means of religion. I don't know why people become madly insane when religion is involved. Perhaps the religious scholars here can explain this better than I can. I don't know why it increases the desire for killing and hatred. To this day, I cannot understand how one can discriminate against people on the basis of their religion.

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