Can Kurds be blamed for being recruited by ottomans within the Death Squads launched and formed by Sultan Abdul Hamid under the name of (Hamidian Regiments)? Those squads left behind hundreds of thousands of dead people and the same number of displaced people. Of course, Kurdish battalions did not practice all those crimes. Ottomans relied on recruiting all of those who were under their occupation in order to carry out their brutal desires…

Without a doubt, the answer: is that the oppressed occupied Kurdish people cannot be blamed. They are just like other peoples who were forced by the occupier to join its fighting regiments; otherwise, they would be doomed to death; and their sons and women would be displaced.

Turkish Ottoman goal was, undoubtedly, to create strife among peoples whom they occupied. That was the basis of the Ottoman policy which they perfectly practiced among peoples and tribes, even among relatives and families. They incited each other against each other and motivated them to quarrel and fight with the aim of maintaining an endless dispute among them. Thus, they gain political benefit from those disputes. That made their racist empire last for long centuries (400 years) in the east only.

Kurds themselves suffered from massacres and calamities. Kurdish memory is full of stories of death, displacement, and persecution conducted by Ottomans. On their way to Iraq or on their way back to Istanbul, those who were in Diyarbakir, the homeland of Kurds, were destined to be subject to intimidation practiced by Ottoman armies and their heartless leaders.

Perhaps “Bitlis” massacre committed by Sultan Murad IV in 1639 revealed the Kurdish way of thinking and reactions that came later and prompted some of them to agree to join Hamidian Regiments attributed to Sultan Abdul Hamid, and implement the orders of their Ottoman leaders.

As for the Armenian suffering, it is too horrific to be accurately described. However, it is noteworthy that some groups of Kurds admitted the participation of some Kurdish recruits on orders of Ottoman Empire in the crimes committed by Ottoman sultans and army leaders against Armenians. Some Kurds along with Turkish Ottomans participated in the genocide resulted from those crimes.

However, it is noteworthy that several Kurdish tribes and clans opposed and rejected these massacres. Sources indicate that they hid fugitive Armenians, and protected them from the ravages of Ottoman killing machine.

Ottoman plan required to displace Armenians from their main homes towards Iraq and Syria, so that they would be received by Hamidian Regiments which should also carry out the dirty works and genocide.

Armenians left their countries through Iran, then, they were intercepted by Kurdish forces as planned by Istanbul. Notwithstanding, Ottoman soldiers carried out the orders of their army leaders who killed whoever refused to obey the orders.

Although Ottomans pledged to Europeans to protect Armenians, their hidden intention aimed at punishing and killing them because, according to the alleged Turkish reason, they helped Russians to defeat Ottomans; although they, i.e. Armenians, were mere civilians who helplessly lived under the occupation of Ottoman Empire. However, Ottoman authorities were looking for a scapegoat for its dignity that wallowed in the mud of Russians and grave defeats they had.

In a rare confession, the Grand Vizier Mohammed Talaat Pasha, who had the rank of a prime minister, and was one of the most important policy makers of Ottoman Empire from 1908 to 1918, mentioned the following in his memoirs:

Although we have punished several guilty people, most of them were not touched. Those people whom we can call outlaws due to their illegal attitude ignoring the central government system were divided into two categories. Some of them acted out of personal hatred or to achieve an individual benefit. Those who plundered the goods of the deported Armenians were easily punished, and we punished them. However, there was another group who sincerely thought that the public interest of society required that Armenians who slaughtered innocent “Mohammedians”, as well as those who helped Armenian bandits to endanger our national life should be punished.

Although these were faltered allegations, they acknowledged the collective punishment committed by Ottomans against Armenians claiming that it was conducted by local clans and peoples. Notwithstanding, facts confirm that it was an organized, systematic, and carefully studied crime. It resulted in killing and displacing more than two million Armenians. Ottomans tried to repudiate and attribute it to Kurds.