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Turkish Jews lobby against Armenian resolution

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Published: 03/13/2007

A delegation of Turkish Jews
lobbied against a resolution under consideration in the U.S. Congress that
would recognize the 1915 massacres of Armenians as genocide. The
three-person delegation, headed by Silvyo Ovadya, the president of the
Turkish Jewish community, attended this week's American Israel Public
Affairs Committee policy conference and met with Jewish leaders as well as
members of Congress.

Turkish diplomats have been unsuccessful in
mustering broad community support against the non-binding resolution
proposed by Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), who is Jewish and has a large
Armenian constituency. A number of Holocaust scholars
have labeled the massacres, carried out by Ottoman-era Turks, as a
genocide and have called it a precursor to the Holocaust. Ovadya said such
considerations were best left to historians, but claimed that politically
the resolution would harm relations between the United States and its
closest Muslim ally.

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