Remember the United States Holocaust Memorial Council letter Historian Taner Akcam used to bust the identity of racist “Holdwater”?  As Akcam said, these are public records.  Now on, these are virtual too.

This was the letter “Holdwater” used to have at his hate website some time ago (he has removed it now).  His name is censored out from this copy.

Here is the uncensored version from the United States Holocaust Memorial Council archives revealing “Mr. Gumen” as the correspondent.

And here is the response of “Mr. Gumen,” also from the United States Holocaust Memorial Council archives, where we find out the first name of Gumen (Murad) and the signature of the genocide denialist cartoonist.

British archaeology Sam Hardy, who visited Turkey’s Mardin mass grave last month, has set up a blog about Kuru (Xirabeba) where a possible mass grave from the Armenian Genocide was discovered by local Kurds and later destroyed by the Turkish military.

Hardy posts many photographs from the village – including those of a ruined (Armenian or Assyrian?) church – and reflects on his visit to the possible Armenian mass grave.

Kuru building 2a: this photograph shows the empty rock-cut graves of the original Roman tomb; I’m not displaying its entrance.

This tomb was reused as a mass grave, where Armenians killed in 1915 were dumped: before, I collated the most relevant and informative English and Turkish-language sources on the planned forensic excavation of the mass grave and its destruction by the Turkish military; and after, I visited the site, photographed it and examined the indefensible excuses offered by the Turkish Historical Society in their attempt to cover up the Turkish military’s destruction of the site.

A comment by an ultranationalist Turk (Ferit) on our previous post has this to say about the covered-up mass grave:

This site was just confirmed by European scholars as definitely being Roman. Your site looses credibility when it references PKK/terror funded Ozgur Gundem and makes phobic comments that the “Turkish Military”, “Historical Society” covered up. Why is it that everytime the Armenian Genocide lie hits a wall, Armenians cry Foul?

You freely call all who do not believe your depiction of events as “genocide” as being “denialist”, but you fall into the same category without being objective, fair and balanced. I wonder what the Armenian heart thinks of after they are fed all the hate filled stories, most of which are really fiction stories(40 days at Musa, Morgenthau,etc.) and do not have the courage to come out and say, IF THE TURKS KILLED US, WHY DID THEY KILL US AFTER 1,000 YEARS? Or HOW MANY DID WE KILL? Or how many Ottoman troops were used to kill any Armenians? The question should be, HOW MANY ARMENIANS WERE INVOLVED IN THE BURNING OF ANATOLIAN and CAUCASIAN Villages? What was their courage and objective. If they were seeking land, then perhaps you should watch Braveheart, to understand how the Turks might have reacted.

Now you get to see both sides of the story, just like in Shrek III.  I can understand people who avoid using the word “genocide,” but I can’t understand absolute idiots like Ferit who don’t even want to admit that there could be an Armenian mass grave in Turkey.  Swiss courts have the answer – Ferit and deniers like him are racists.

Turkish politician loses first appeal against Swiss racism conviction, says lawyer

June 20, 2007 Associated Press

LAUSANNE, Switzerland (AP) – An appeals court has confirmed the sentence against a Turkish politician convicted of racism for denying that the early 20th century killing of Armenians was genocide, his lawyer said Wednesday.

Laurent Moreillon said Dogu Perincek, the leader of the Turkish Workers’ Party, lost his first appeal at a court in the canton (state) of Vaud, where a lower tribunal in March convicted and ordered him to pay a fine of 3,000 Swiss francs (US$2,450; ¤1,870).
Perincek, who was also given a suspended penalty of 9,000 francs (US$7,360; ¤5,600) and ordered to pay 1,000 francs (US$820; ¤620) to an Armenian association, had repeatedly denied during a visit to Switzerland in 2005 that the World War I-era killings of up to 1.5 million Armenians amounted to genocide.

Moreillon said Perincek would now appeal to the Federal Tribunal, Switzerland’s supreme court.

The case was seen as a test of whether it is a violation of Switzerland’s anti-racism law to deny that the Turks committed genocide in the killings. The legislation has previously been applied to Holocaust denial.

The case has caused diplomatic tension between the Alpine republic and Turkey, which insists Armenians were killed in civil unrest during the tumultuous collapse of the Ottoman Empire and not in a planned campaign of genocide.

Turkey has called the case against Perincek «inappropriate, baseless and debatable in every circumstance.  Source

A discussion at Topix.net links to www.muradgumen.org, a website revealing the identity of Turkish-American celebrity cartoonist Murad Gumen who is the racist webmaster behind TallArmenianTale.com, a website that denies the Armenian Genocide.

Another photo of racist “Holdwater” Murad Gumen

According to Muradgumen.org,

Ex-Disney cartoonist and celebrity illustrator Murad Gumen is quick to take credit for his famous Mickey Mouse cartoons and made-up characters like Wonderguy.

But one thing the Turkish-American celebrity doesn’t want anyone to know is that he operates one of the most vicious hate websites in the Internet – TallArmenianTale.com. Disguised under “Holdwater,” Gumen has been hatefully denying the Armenian Genocide – the murder of Ottoman Turkey’s native Armenian population during World War I. His tactics have included dehumanizing respected scholars of the Armenian Genocide in order to discredit their work. When there is nothing else to write to prove his thesis, Mr. Gumen writes that Armenians are rats.

Until late May 2007, the identity of “Holdwater” remained a mystery. “Holdwater” admitted he would lose his career if his identity was ever revealed.

British archaeologist Sam Hardy has updated his recent post on Turkey’s Mardin mass grave with photographs he took in May 2007.  I placed these images next to October 2006 photographs taken by a now banned Kurdish newspaper in Turkey.  They show the “glorious” work of the Turkish Historical Society in covering up a possible mass grave from the Armenian Genocide.

(there are two more photographs in Hardy’s post)

British archaeologist Sam Hardy, according to a post at Human Rights Archaeology, has visited the possible Armenian Genocide mass grave in Eastern Turkey that was first covered up by the Turkish military and later manipulated by the Turkish Historical Society and proclaimed a “Roman site.”

Photo: Yusuf Halacoglu, mastermind of Mardin mass grave manipulation

Linking to our April 25, 2007 update, Human Rights Archaeology reminds that the Kurdish newspaper that reported in Fall 2006 the finding of the mass grave was closed down, and Swedish researcher David Gaunt wasted an entire week in Turkey just to find out (and soon refuse further cooperation) that the possible Armenian skeletons had been cleaned up by official Turkish historians. 

Hardy’s post confirms that the mass grave has been destroyed.  Here are some excerpts from the post.

This post followed a visit to the formerly Roman family tomb, latterly Armenian mass grave, recently destroyed and covered up by the Turkish military with the help of the Turkish Historical Society.

At 10.10pm on the 17th of May 2007, I recorded that,

I visited my first mass grave today, my first nationalist-archaeologist-allied-with-the-military-destroyed mass grave, too; now that‘s negative heritage tourism.

It was the allegedly – to me, fairly definitely – Armenian (or other Other) mass grave in Kuru/Xirabebaba, for the reporting of which Ülkede Özgür Gündem was shut down and on the excavation of which David Gaunt refused to work.

[…]

All of the Roman resting places seemed empty and all of the diagnostic bones from the top of the stack in the centre had gone; only a few long bones and one jaw fragment appeared to have remained.

If it were natural factors that had reburied or degraded “all” of the remains after the reopening of the tomb, it [they] would have to have been exceptional conditions, to have covered the material on top without covering the material beneath that, or to have been such caustic rain, etc., to have decomposed the material on top entirely without leaving any identifiable wear or residue on the material beneath.

[…]

After this site visit, I made my way to a long-ruined, possibly earthquake-“broken” ancient site, which villagers called a church…

When I had discussed the burial site with locals, they had been divided on whether they thought it was a mass grave or not. A few of the men who thought it was a mass grave said that it was destroyed to hide the evidence and commented that, ‘that’s what they’re doing to us’.

They agreed that the Turkish military was working on the assumption that, ‘if there isn’t a body, there isn’t a crime’. (There are, however, hopes that the, ‘no body, no crime’ principle could be outmanoeuvred by developments in forensic archaeology, either through DNA testing of remianing bone fragments or even by identifying traces in the soil, although these would still be dependent upon the potential victims’ descendant community being able to be identified and being willing to cooperate in the process.)

The logic of the “impartial joint excavation” of the mass grave falan falan falan is similar to that of the “impartial joint commission” on the history of the Armenian Genocide.

It is different though; beyond the futility of a joint commission with deniers who aren’t scientists anyway, the erasure of the evidence puts scientists in the position of helping their opponents “prove” their case by their inability to prove their own.

Now you know the face of “Holdwater” Murad Gumen – one of the most anti-Armenian Turkish-Americans on Earth and the webmaster of tallarmeniantale.com, a hate website that denies the Armenian Genocide and compares Armenians to rodents.  

A reader of Blogian sent the following information:

Murad Gumen had his own cable TV show in the 1980s. Here is a page with some photos of him in character as host “Renald Rap.” I assume they are out of date. He would look 20 years older now.

http://www.fortunecity.com/lavender/shaft/780/page2.htm

PROOF that the character of “Renald Rap” is Murad Gumen:

http://shonext.imdb.com/name/nm0347933/

Holdwater: The mysterious name behind the “premier” anti-Armenian websiteBy Taner Akçam

On July 27, 2005, the Yeni Şafak newspaper published an interview, “The Mysterious American Who Drives the Armenians Mad,” about an “interesting and unique” person who writes under the pseudonym Holdwater. “This mysterious American has been financing, for many years, a highly effective, U.S.-based Internet site,” Yeni Şafak reports. “The principal aim of Tall Armenian Tale: The Other Side of the Falsified Genocide is to provide substantial responses to the Armenian Diaspora’s claims of genocide.”According to the newspaper, Holdwater, a New York native, was born in the 1950s to Turkish parents who had migrated to America in the 1940s and raised their son without teaching him a single word of Turkish. He champions the Turkish theses [denial of the Armenian Genocide] on his website at www.tallarmeniantale.com.Holdwater says he uses a pseudonym because he is the target of threats and sabotage on a daily basis. “If I tell you my real name and you publish it in your newspaper,” he told Yeni Şafak, “trust me, within a few days neither my family harmony nor my good business nor my Internet site will still be in existence.”While afraid to disclose his own name because his peace will be disturbed, Holdwater does not hold back from publishing the photographs of intellectuals such as Halil Berktay and Müge Göçek [of the Workshop for Armenian-Turkish Scholarship], and parading them as targets in his articles full of animosity and hatred. It is quite difficult to understand how someone who is afraid of being attacked can organize such ruthless campaigns of belligerence against others.

I too am among Holdwater’s priority targets. He leads the campaign against me, along with institutions such as the Assembly of American Turkish Associations (ATAA) and the Turkish Forum. He publishes articles on his site which claim that I am a terrorist; that I am responsible of the death of Americans in Turkey ; and even that I have planned and organized murders of American civilians. He lists my “terrorist activities” from the years 1974 to 1975, including precise dates and locations. These amount to nothing more than ordinary, small-scale arrests during student demonstrations of the era, which didn’t even make the press at the time. [See “A Shameful Campaign,” Armenian Reporter, Mar. 17]

It doesn’t take too much intelligence to guess who might have passed to Holdwater the police records of these insignificant arrests, whose dates even I had forgotten. But here’s the real problem: Those who funnel this information to Holdwater as “Taner Akçam’s terrorist activities” are actually taking advantage of Holdwater’s ignorance about Turkey .

Poor Holdwater thinks these arrests were for “terrorist activities,” not realizing that they were all related to crimes of leafletting and postering, for which police permission had been obtained. He seems to have no idea that in 1970s Turkey , one had to obtain permission from what is now called the Security General Directorate’s Special Inspection Branch Directorate for Associations, and that even with a special permit in hand, one could be arbitrarily arrested and held at police headquarters for three to five days.

Once I was arrested for an issue regarding the Cyprus landing. As the Student Association, we were distributing authorized leaflets against the [Turkish] military invasion of Cyprus [1974]. Despite showing our permits, we were held for two to three days at police headquarters.

The other actions Holdwater has publicized as my “terrorist activities” were related to our demand for the foundation of a student representation office on campus, where we could voice our issues with the university administration. All this is somewhat difficult to understand for someone who was raised and educated as an American.

In addition, whoever transferred to Holdwater the information about my arrests forgot to send him my photograph. For a long time, therefore, Holdwater represented me on his site by a photograph of a PKK member.

Those who are carrying out a campaign against me, portraying me as a “terrorist,” are exploiting this “mysterious American” called Holdwater. Their calculation is simple: To make use of the “terrorist” image which took root in the U.S. after September 11. They are expecting favors from a mindset which labels as “terrorist” both a person arrested for handing out flyers in 1974 and those who attacked the Twin Towers in 2001.

With this attitude, they are actually making fun of Americans, too. After all, here we have a “terrorist” who has carried out direct “terrorist activities” against Turkey ; and what is logical would be to get hold of this terrorist and hold him to account according to Turkish law. Or at least give information to Americans regarding the past activities of this “terrorist,” his investigation and trial.

Instead, they are telling the Americans something which amounts to: “We treat this man as a citizen with a clean record, but could you be so kind as to treat him as a terrorist?” Because, in fact, the citizen in question had his prison sentence annulled with changes made to the Turkish Criminal Code in 1991 and also has a document stating he has a “clean record.”

Ignorant as Holdwater is about Turkey , it is impossible for him to understand all this. But what I find difficult to understand is why this “mysterious” person is so full of hatred and animosity and why he organizes campaigns of belligerence against others despite stating that he is very afraid. I wouldn’t even want to imagine that Holdwater, who describes his appearance as that of “a typical Christian who goes to church with his family on Sundays,” does not know of the Christian teaching which proclaims: Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.

It is time for someone to take a closer look at the Holdwater issue.

* The golden rule

In his interview with Yeni Şafak newspaper on July 27, 2005, after stating the reasons for withholding his identity, Holdwater says: “I have been able to sustain this struggle for 30 years because I have been able to keep my mouth shut. So please do not push me too much on this sensitive issue.” Holdwater claims to have exceptional skill at protecting his anonymity.I don’t know if anonymity lends a special mystery to Holdwater and a special meaning to his work, or if it makes people wonder, “Who, actually, is this person?” It didn’t strike me that way. I had no interest either in his writings or in his website—until he took on a key role in the campaign against me.

One of Holdwater’s important arguments in this campaign was that a complaint should be filed with American immigration authorities, denouncing me as a “terrorist.” Now, I don’t know if he actually did such a thing. Nor am I aware of a direct link between his argument and my recent four-hour detention at the Canadian border. But I did mention Holdwater and the campaign in an article I wrote on the detention. [See “A Shameful Campaign,” cited above.] Holdwater wrote a 30-page rebuttal, full of lies, insults and attacks.

Holdwater relies on the fact that his name and address are withheld. No one knows who I am, so I’ll say whatever I like, he must think.

This approach of Holdwater must be curbed, and he must be reminded that every game must be played according to its rules. To shamelessly insult others while hiding one’s own identity fits with no proper principle. It’s a disgrace, to say the least.

Holdwater’s claim regarding his intense effort to conceal his identity doesn’t seem to … hold water. Or he doesn’t take historians seriously enough. He doesn’t know we are enthusiastic about documents and love to trace them. To sum up, he has shown a certain degree of carelessness, the kind of carelessness committed by an ordinary person who fancies himself as very clever and more intelligent than others.

Introducing himself on his website, Holdwater published some correspondence he sent and received in his own name—taking care to omit his name before posting the letters online.

According to this correspondence, Holdwater wrote to President Jimmy Carter on April 2, 1980. This letter was forwarded to the United States Holocaust Memorial Council, an organization established by the United States Congress in October 1980. [The USHMC is the governing body of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington , DC.]

On June 2, 1980, Council Director Monroe H. Freedman answered Holdwater’s letter. One senses from the reply that Holdwater’s objections to referencing the Armenian Genocide were taken seriously. Freedman states that he lacks sufficient information on the “Turkish theses” and asks Holdwater to forward citations of relevant sources.

This, of course, is a great honor for Holdwater. Therefore, he sees no harm in publishing a facsimile of Freedman’s letter on his website, with Holdwater’s name removed. Also posted at Tall Armenian Tale is another letter he wrote, this one to the New York Times. We understand from this second letter that, on September 5, 1980, Holdwater had responded to Freedman’s June 2 letter.

I don’t know whether Holdwater is aware of this, but the Holocaust Memorial Council and the Holocaust Museum it governs are public institutions—and therefore this correspondence is available to the public. Which means, in accordance with the principle of transparency, that anyone can view the originals of Holdwater’s letters.

Once you have the text of Freedman’s letter dated June 2, 1980, and published by Holdwater, as well as the information that Holdwater wrote a reply on September 5, 1980, it is rather easy to access these documents. The Holocaust Museum must provide this information to anyone who demands it.

Yes, Mr. Murad Gümen, or, to use the English alphabet, Murad Gumen; as you see, one doesn’t have to be comic-strip detective Kerry Drake to find out who you are (Murad Gümen understands very well what I mean). Tracing the documents published by you has proved sufficient. I believe you will stop taking historians so lightly from now on. As you have understood, we are talking about a document that you yourself have also published.

All I am saying is, to prevent any distortion and alteration of the document, that the name on this document, which you effaced, is Murad Gümen. In a sense, I am rectifying the alteration you made on a document presented to the public.

As you may know, we scholars don’t particularly appreciate the alteration of documents. Such distortion is an occupation reserved for the Turkish Historical Society.

Attacking others, and insulting them, while concealing your own name, does not fit moral conduct at all, Mr. Murad Gümen. Believe me, I am still quite curious as to why you think that I, and many others in my position, do not deserve a right you so readily claim for yourself.

Dr. Akçam, a professor of history at the University of Minnesota , is the author of A Shameful Act: The Armenian Genocide and the Question of Turkish Responsibility (2006). The present article has been edited from a two-part article written for Istanbul ‘s Agos newspaper (“Holdwater: The Mysterious American who Drives Armenians Mad,” May 18, 2007; and “Holdwater: The Golden Rule,” May 25, 2007); the translations for both parts were by Nazım Dikbaş. The July 27, 2005, interview in Yeni Şafak was conducted by Ali Murat Güven.

Murad Gumen, the Turkish-American author of this famous Micky Mouse cartoon is infamous for his part time job – he is the covert webmaster of tallarmeniantale.com, a website that denies the destruction of over a million Christian Armenians by Ottoman Turks during World War I.

Gumen has been using the pseudo name “Holdwater” in denying the Armenian Genocide and comparing Armenians to rodents.  Keeping his real identity secret for many years, Mr. Gumen is now in hot waters.

A Turkish professor of Armenian Genocide, Taner Akcam, is the hunter of Mr. Gumen.  Prof. Akcam, author of recent bestseller on the Armenian Genocide, was repeatedly called “terrorist” in Mr. Gumen’s website leading to a 4-hour detention of the Turkish historian during a recent trip to Canada.

Prof. Akcam, a long time human rights activist now in exile from his native Turkey, apparently did not endure the personal attacks against him.  He did what an average historian would do: go after the documents and sources used on the racist website.

File six in the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Institutional Archives, Accession no. 1997-014, box 152 was the answer. This was a personal communication that “Holdwater” made reference to not realizing it was public domain. Making reference to “Holdwater’s” xenophobia that he would lose his job if his identity were revealed, Prof. Akcam the “terrorist” used a nuclear bomb called revealing the truth.

And the truth is – “Holdwater” is Murad Gumen, a celebrity Turkish-American cartoonist and creator of “Wonderguy” (1993) with an unbelievably “wonderful” hate for the Armenian people and the tragedy called genocide that they experienced in 1915.

Taner Akcam’s two articles on Holdwater in English are available and originally published at Blogian.

Genocide denier Holdwater is in hot waters. Apparently the anti-Armenian idiot behind “Holdwater” is Murad Gümen, a Turk living in the United States.

Taner Akcam, the first Turkish scholar to openly acknowledge the Armenian Genocide, has busted the identity of “Holdwater,” a vicous anti-Armenian and genocide denier whose www.tallarmeniantale.com hatesite is the Idiot’s Guide to Denying the Armenian Genocide. 

Murad Gümen is the idiot behind tallarmeniantale.com and many other genocide denial letters and pseudo-names such as Ilyas Botas and many many others that we don’t know of yet. 

Prof. Akcam told me about this finding on April 15, 2007 and promised me to send the English version as soon as it was published in Turkey’s Agos newspaper.  Please find the English version of Akcam’s articles being published for the first time:

Holdwater: “The Mysterious American Who Drives the Armenians Mad” –

Part 1

Taner Akçam

On 27 July 2005, Yeni Şafak newspaper published an interview, “The Mysterious American Who Drives the Armenians Mad,” about an “interesting and unique” person who writes under the pseudonym Holdwater. “This mysterious American has been financing, for many years, a highly effective, US-based Internet site,” Yeni Şafak reports. “The primary aim of Tall Armenian Tale: Other Side of the Falsified Genocide is to provide substantial responses to the Armenian Diaspora’s claims of genocide.”

According to the newspaper, Holdwater, a New York native, was born in the 1950s to Turkish parents who had migrated to America in the 1940s and raised their son without teaching him a single word of Turkish. He champions the Turkish theses [denial of the Armenian Genocide—ed.] on his Web site at www.tallarmeniantale.com.

Holdwater says he uses a pseudonym because he is the target of threats and sabotage on a daily basis. “If I tell you my real name and you publish it in your newspaper,” he told Yeni Şafak, “trust me, within a few days neither my family harmony nor my good business nor my Internet site would still be in existence.”

While afraid to disclose his own name because his peace will be disturbed, Holdwater does not hold back from publishing the photographs of intellectuals such as Halil Berktay and Müge Göçek [of the Workshop for Armenian-Turkish Scholarship—ed.], and parading them as targets in his articles full of animosity and hatred. It is quite difficult to understand how someone who is afraid of being attacked can organize such ruthless campaigns of belligerence against others.

I too am among Holdwater’s priority targets. He leads the campaign against me, along with institutions such as the Assembly of American Turkish Associations (ATAA) and the Turkish Forum. He publishes articles on his site which claim that I am a terrorist; that I am responsible of the death of Americans in Turkey; and even that I have planned and organized murders of American civilians. He publishes a list of my “terrorist activities” from the years 1974-75, including precise dates and locations. The list he has published is actually ordinary, small scale arrests during student demonstrations of the era, which didn’t even make the press at the time. [See “A Shameful Campaign,” Armenian Reporter, March 17, 2007—ed.]

It doesn’t take too much intelligence to guess who might have passed to Holdwater the police records of these insignificant arrests, whose dates even I had forgotten. But here’s the real problem: Those who funnel this information to Holdwater as “Taner Akçam’s terrorist activities” are actually taking advantage of Holdwater’s ignorance about Turkey.

Poor Holdwater thinks these arrests were for “terrorist activities,” not realizing that they were all related to crimes of leafletting and postering, for which police permission had been obtained. He seems to have no idea that in 1970s Turkey, one had to obtain permission from what is now called the Security General Directorate’s Special Inspection Branch Directorate for the Associations, and that even with a special permit in hand, one could be arbitrarily arrested and apprehended at police headquarters for 3-5 days.

Once I was arrested for an issue regarding the Cyprus landing. As the Student Association, we were distributing authorized leaflets against the [Turkish] military invasion of Cyprus [1974]. Despite showing our permits, we were held for 2-3 days at police headquarters.

The other actions Holdwater has publicized as my ‘terrorist activities’ are related to our demand for the foundation of a student representation office on campus, where we could voice our issues with the university administration. All this is slightly difficult to understand for someone who was raised and educated as an American.

In addition, whoever passed to Holdwater the information about my arrests forgot to send him my photograph. Therefore, for a long time, Holdwater represented me on his site with a photograph of a PKK member.

Those who are carrying out a campaign against me, portraying me as a “terrorist,” are exploiting this “mysterious American” called Holdwater. Their calculation is simple: To make use of the “terrorist” image which took root in the US after September 11. They are expecting favors from a mindset which labels as “terrorist” both a person arrested for handing out flyers in 1974 and those who attacked the Twin Towers in 2001.

With this attitude, they are actually making fun of Americans, too. After all, here we have a “terrorist” who has carried out direct “terrorist activities” against Turkey; and what is logical would be to get hold of this terrorist and hold him to account according to Turkish law. Or at least give information to Americans regarding the past activities of this “terrorist,” his investigation and trial.

Instead, they are telling the Americans something which amounts to: “We treat this man as a citizen with a clean record, but could you be so kind as to treat him as a terrorist?” Because, in fact, the citizen in question had his prison sentence annulled with changes made to the Turkish Criminal Code in 1992 and also has a document stating he has a “clean record.”

Ignorant as Holdwater is about Turkey, it is impossible for him to understand all this. What I find difficult to understand is why this “mysterious” person is so full of hatred and animosity and why he organizes campaigns of belligerence against others despite stating that he is very afraid. I wouldn’t even want to imagine that Holdwater, who describes his appearance as that of “a typical Christian who goes to church with his family on Sundays,” does not know of the Christian teaching which proclaims: Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.

Next week, I want to take a closer look at the Holdwater issue.

Edited from a translation by Nazım Dikbaş for Agos newspaper (May 18, 2007). The July 27, 2005, interview in Yeni Şafak was conducted by Ali Murat Güven.

____________________________

Holdwater: The Golden Rule

Part II

Taner Akçam

In his interview with Yeni Şafak newspaper on July 27, 2005, after stating the reasons for withholding his identity, Holdwater says, “I have been able to sustain this struggle for thirty years because I have been able to keep my mouth shut. So please do not push me too much on this sensitive issue.” Holdwater claims to have exceptional skill at protecting his anonymity.

I don’t know if anonymity lends a special mystery to Holdwater and a special meaning to his work, or if it makes people wonder, “Who, actually, is this person?” It didn’t strike me that way. I had no interest either in his writings or in his Web site—until he took on a key role in the campaign against me.

One of Holdwater’s important arguments in this campaign was that a complaint should be filed with American immigration authorities, denouncing me as a “terrorist.” Now, I don’t know if he actually did such a thing. Nor am I aware of a direct link between his argument and my recent four-hour detention at the Canadian border. But I did mention Holdwater and the campaign in an article I wrote on the detention. [See “A Shameful Campaign,” Armenian Reporter, March 17, 2007—Ed.] Holdwater wrote a 30-page rebuttal, full of lies, insults and attacks.

Holdwater relies on the fact that his name and address are withheld. “No-one knows who I am, so I’ll say whatever I like,” he must think.

This approach of Holdwater must be curbed, and he must be reminded that every game must be played according to its rules. To shamelessly insult others while hiding one’s own identity fits with no proper principle. It’s a disgrace, to say the least.

Holdwater’s claim regarding his intense effort to conceal his identity doesn’t seem to…hold water. Or he doesn’t take historians seriously enough. He doesn’t know we are enthusiastic about documents and love to trace them. To sum up, he has shown a certain degree of carelessness, the kind of carelessness committed by an ordinary person who fancies himself as very clever and more intelligent than others.

Introducing himself on his Web site, TallArmenianTale.com, Holdwater published some correspondence he sent and received in his own name—taking care to omit his name before posting the letters online.

According to this correspondence, Holdwater wrote to President Jimmy Carter on April 2, 1980. This letter was forwarded to the United States Holocaust Memorial Council, an organization established by the United States Congress in October 1980. [The USHMC is the governing body of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, DC.—Ed.]

On June 2, 1980, Council Director Monroe H. Freedman answered Holdwater’s letter. One senses from the reply that Holdwater’s objections to referencing the Armenian Genocide were taken seriously. Freedman states that he lacks sufficient information on the “Turkish theses” and asks Holdwater to forward citations of relevant sources.

This, of course, is a great honor for Holdwater. Therefore, he sees no harm in publishing a facsimile of Freedman’s letter on his Web site, with Holdwater’s name removed. Also posted at TallArmenianTale.com is another letter he wrote, this one to the New York Times. We understand from this second letter that, on September 5, 1980, Holdwater had responded to Freedman’s June 2 letter.

I don’t know whether Holdwater is aware of this, but the Holocaust Memorial Council and the Holocaust Museum it governs are public institutions, and therefore, this correspondence is available to the public. Which means, in accordance with the principle of transparency, that anyone can view the originals of Holdwater’s letters.

Once you have the text of Freedman’s letter dated June 2, 1980, and published by Holdwater, as well as the information that Holdwater wrote a reply on September 5, 1980, it is rather easy to access these documents. The Holocaust Museum must provide this information to anyone who demands it.

Yes, Mr. Murad Gümen, or, to use the English alphabet, Murad Gumen; as you see, one doesn’t have to be comic-book detective Kerry Drake to find out who you are (Murad Gümen understands very well what I mean). Tracing the documents published by you has proved sufficient. I believe you will stop taking historians so lightly from now on. As you have understood, we are talking about a document that you yourself have also published.

All I am saying is, to prevent any distortion and alteration of the document, that the name on this document, which you effaced, is Murad Gümen. In a sense, I am rectifying the alteration you made on a document presented to the public.

As you may know, we scholars don’t particularly appreciate the alteration of documents. Such distortion is the reserved occupation of the Turkish Historical Society.

Attacking others, and insulting them, while concealing your own name, does not fit moral conduct at all, Mr. Murad Gümen. Believe me, I am still quite curious as to why you think that I, and many others in my position, do not deserve a right you so readily claim for yourself.

Dr. Akçam, a professor of history at the University of Minnesota, is the author of A Shameful Act: The Armenian Genocide and the Question of Turkish Responsibility (2006). The present article has been edited from a translation by Nazım Dikbaş for Agos newspaper (May 25, 2007). The July 27, 2005, interview in Yeni Şafak was conducted by Ali Murat Güven. Holdwater’s presentation of his correspondence with Monroe H. Freedman was accessible at www.tallarmeniantale.com/holocaust-memorial.htm as of May 25, 2007. The correspondence between Murad Gümen and Monroe H. Freedman is in the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum Institutional Archives, Accession no. 1997-014, box 152, file 6.