Sebastien de Courtois

Abdel Messih Numan Karabasi

1. Page. 94 of the book

In Tur Abdin in August 1888, “a Kurdisch chieftain from jebel Tur (= Tur Abdin), Hajo Sarukhan, attacked a number of jacobite villages, several people were massacred and many houses were burned” (page 94)

2. Page. 95 of the book

At the eve of the year 1895, the Syrian Orthodox Church numbered thirteen dioceses. Immediately after the First World War, it would have only five, plus a new one, Lebanon. (Page 95)

3. Page. 100 of the book

[……] the Muslims’ hostility towards Christians seems to have doubled, and they show it, I have heard, without any sense of moderation. Thus, recently, in one of the main Mosques in Harput, a Mullah, quite insane as he has been described to me, preached holy war and called upon all Turks to prepare to exterminate the Christians (Page 100, Report #1 January 25, 1895)

4. Page. 106 of the book

Paul Cambon, the drafter of the Franco- British entente of 1914, later Ambassador in Istanbul wrote on 4-11-1895 a letter to his mother about the massacres in Diyarbekir,, Asia Minor is literally in flames….. They are massacring all the Christians without distinction” (Page 106)

5. Page. 120 of the book

...But very close to Jzireh, in the Jacobite (= Syrian Orthodox) villages of Jebel Tur (= Tur Abdin), the Kurds plundered and massacred to their heart’s content (Page 120)

6. Page. 120 of the book- Roman Catholic father Galland about the situation in Tur Abdin which he encountered in 1896:

I would not know how to express to you the pangs of sadness that gripped us when we saw, in the Christian villages we crossed, the still recent signs of looting and arson, the homes without roofs or doors, al wide open and emptied of their inhabitants, the profaned churches in the same state, the harvests abandoned in the fields for lack of hands and beasts of burden. Large towns almost deserted, where only a few groups of women and children wander through the ruins, since the men for the most part died under Kurdish knives and bullets [...] In the smallest villages, the victims number in the hundreds, and it should be noted that everywhere, the first to he attacked were the priests, then the schoolteachers and the main landowners or other influential figures. [...] The Kurds still come at any time rob the Christian villagers of the few flocks they managed to save (Page 120/121, November 1, 1896, a letter reporting on Father Galland’s trip from “Jezireh to Siirt via Jebel Tur”)

1. The village Sa‘diye (Page. 40 of the book)

It is situated 10 km eastern of Amid; there were Syrians and Armenians living; in total approximately 300 people. On the first Friday of November 1895, the Kurds entered the village and started to kill the men and boys. They took women's and girls in prison, and plundered their houses. The Christians escaped to the church and took refuge and barricaded the door. But the Kurds made a hole in the roof and poured naphtha and hay above them and set it in fire. To be able to escape, the refuges had to open the closed gate; however the Kurds were ready in front of the entrance to stab everybody who came to the outside. Nobody escaped, only three men, who escaped to Amid and told about the catastrophe.

2. The city Mipharqat (Maiperqat; Page. 43 of the book)

…. The Kurds entered the city and started to kill the inhabitants, robbing their properties and rapping the young women. Because there were no roads to escape or places to hide, they went to the church. The Kurds went to the roof and made a hole and poured naphtha above them and set it on fire.

Of the horrible acts, we have to mention this one: they attacked a house and encountered there a nice woman; when they started to dishonour the woman and ridicule here chastity before the eyes of her man; the later took a stick and attacked them. However, they tied him, cut his hands and foots and after that they killed him. The hands and foots of the woman were cut off as well without killing here. The women had a baby which she could not breast-feed the child anymore. A good man saw this happening and brought here to Amid. She carried here child by her teeth. She didn’t live long and died.

3. Sewerak (Page. 44 of the book)

The despot Hadgi Osman Pascha and his brother acted very nasty. They invited the Kurds of their vicinity and set them against the Christians; the Kurds attacked the Christians with swords and sticks and knocked them very hard. Only four families could escape. The number of martyrs was about four thousand. The other villages in the vicinity of Amid underwent the same fate:

In the east: ‘Ainschah, Telkhas, Giranekh, Satya, Safna, Sa‘diye and Quzan.

In the west: ‘Alibar, Qartah, Qarakilisa (= the black Church) and Qanqart.

In the north: Qadhi and Batrakiye.

In the south: Ka‘kiye, Garukhiye, Khan Aqfanar, Arzaoghli and Hulan.

The same happened to the following villages: Bschariye, Ligeh, Gharzan, Frotbrat, Adjaman, Hesenmansur and others.

Although the inhabitants of Mardin have been suffering much distress; no massacres took place in their city. This in contrast to the villages around Mardin such as in Qusur, Banabil, Hesno d-Atto (Qal‘et Mara), Mansuriye and other villages. Those who escaped the massacres took refuges in the Monastery Za‘faran.