The Righteous of the Armenian Genocide

Shines long-overdue light on the heroic individuals who took action in the face of the Armenian genocide. This book tells the stories of the Muslims, Christians, Jews and others who made a courageous stand against the mass slaughter of Ottoman Armenians in 1915, the first modern genocide. Foreigners and Ottomans alike ran considerable risks to bear witness and rescue victims, sometimes sacrificing their lives. Diplomats, humanitarians, missionaries, lawyers and other visitors to the Empire stood up, including Tolstoys daughter, Alexandra; Raphael Lemkin, the jurist who first established genocide as an international crime; and the polar explorer Fridtjof Nansen, who recognised and relieved the plight of stateless Armenian refugees. Ottoman subjectsfrom officials and officers to ordinary townspeople and villagersfaced near-certain death for their entire family by resisting orders and helping Armenians. Unlike the Righteous of the Holocaust, these heroes have been systematically ignored and eraseda major injustice. Based on fresh research, and hoping to repay a moral debt to Ottoman Muslims who braved everything to rescue the authors forebears, this book is an important, moving testament to a grievously overlooked aspect of the Armenian tragedy.