The Events that Changed the Course of the Armenian Diaspora

Vahe H. Apelian

If I were to point to the date and the event that fundamentally altered the course of the Armenian Diaspora, it would be April 13, 1975.  This past April Friday thirteen brought back memories of  that event that also ended up changing the course of my life. As to the event, it is the deadly encounter on that Sunday, April 13, 1975, between the armed members of the Lebanese Phalange (Katael) party and Palestinians.

 On that fateful gorgeous Sunday afternoon, I was returning from Anjar, the Armenian inhabited village of former Moussa Daghtsis. I was held in traffic as I approached Beirut. I asked an armed civilian who was directing the traffic what was the problem? He said that there was a military clash between the armed members of the Phalange (Kataeb) Party and Palestinians. The details of that deadly encounter appear to remain murky to this day. That day and that that incident is generally accepted as the beginning of the Lebanese Civil war as a result of which, a year later, on July 9, 1976, I set foot in the NY Kennedy Airport as another immigrant.

In a few weeks, the Lebanese will elect the members of their parliament. The first and the only election I participated in Lebanon was the one that took place in the latter part of April 1972. The Lebanese Parliament then was carefully crafted and comprised of 55 Christian and 44 Muslim members with each of the two religious denominations having its share based on its demographic constituency. The Armenian Orthodox community was allocated four seats, the Armenian Catholic Community one seat and the Evangelical community one seat. Traditionally the candidate for the Armenian Catholic and Evangelical seats was reserved to the Phalange Party. During that election, the dominant Armenian political party (A.R.F.) was able to secure the candidacy of the first Armenian Evangelical, Antranig Manougian, M.D.

The A.R.F. had adopted a cherished tradition of appointing only one party member and reserving the other three seats to prominent individuals who reprepresent the other segments of the greater Lebanese Armenian Community. Melkon Eblighatian. M.D. represented the A.R.F. and acted as the representative of the Armenian Parliamentarian bloc. The other three were Souren Khanamirian, the prominent philanthropist who represented the Armenian business community; Khachig Babigian, the prominent lawyer who represented the Catholicoate of Cilicia and Ara Yerevanian, the consul of Gabon, businessman, and philanthropist, represented the non-A.R.F. fraction.

 

Standing LtoR: Tsolag Tutelian, Hovsep Seferian, Antranig Manougian, MD, Souren Khanamirian, Melkon Eblighatian MD, Sako Karkodorian, Arpi (Baghdassarian) Shahinina, Garo Sassouni, Mary (Bakalian) Arevian, Khatchig Babigian.  LtoR: ? Hovsepian 9/), ?, Yetvart Eloyan, ?, Hourig Panian, Vahe H. Apelian, ?, Zvart Sarhadian.

Sometimes in the later part of 1974, Dr. Melkon Eblighatian presented to the A.R.F. Zavarian Student Association his experiences as a parliamentarian. He had succeeded Movses Der Kaloustian who was the longstanding member of Lebanese Parliament. Dr. Eblighatian gave much tribute to his predecessor noting that the greatest challenge he faced was being accepted as the one who will be filling Der Kaloustian’s vacant seat. Among the wheeling and dealing Lebanese descendants of the merchandizing Phoenicians, Movses Der Kaloustian had stood apart with his unblemished impeccable conduct through the many years he served as a parliamentarian.

The second part of Dr. Eblighatian’s lecture constituted analyzing the political situation in Lebanon. A heightened political mood prevailed in the country. He concluded his lecture saying, I quote verbatim, “hot days await us during the upcoming spring”. The ensuing turn of events, starting with the “bus incident” on April 14, 1975, proved that he was prophetic indeed.

Sometime in early 1980’s Dr Melkon Eblighatian visited New Jersey where his son Norayr lived with his family. I interviewed him and recorded it. Norayr and I then transcribed the interview. I wrote an introduction and presented it to “Hairenik” Daily where both my interview and introduction were presented on the front page.  My contention in my introductory remarks was that the Lebanese civil war had far more destructive ramifications to the Diaspora Armenians than to the rest.

March 2011 is usually regarded the time that sparked the current civil war in Syria. One year and a few months later, in November 2012, the Syrian Armenians in Aleppo convened under the auspices of Archbishop Shahan Sarkissian to prepare the community brave the ongoing civil war. See the following link: http://vhapelian.blogspot.com/2018/04/aleppo-armenians-convene.html

I cite these to two examples to make a point. Often times we, as Armenians, criticize ourselves that we historically lack political foresight. I do not believe it to be necessarily so. In both of these cases, the Armenian leadership anticipated the upcoming and alerted the community and undertook measures to face the upcoming turmoil. But I doubt that if anyone could have possibly anticipated the level of ensuing destruction.

The civil wars in Lebanon and in Syria fundamentally changed the course of the Armenian Diaspora. These two communities remain the best hopes for the preservation of the Western Armenian culture in spite of the fact that are debilitatingly wounded. My late father used to say “stallions fight and the grass gets trampled”. We were patches of Armenian Diaspora's green grass in these two countries and we were prepared to weather the storm. But forces far greater than could have been possibly foreseen overwhelmed us and continuous to linger perilously altering the course of the post-genocide Armenian Diaspora.