In Torture, Hair and Beard Pulled

Mousa Dagh survivor Dikran Luhijian shares accounts of the #ArmenianGenocide and beginning efforts to defend against Turkish attacks, as reported in “The Wichita Beacon” on January 5, 1916. “When an official order from the Turkish Government from Antioch was served upon the six villages of Mousa Dagh to prepare for banishment in eight days, we began to prepare for something entirely different. Resistance of the Turkish forces seemed almost hopeless. But no worse than the murder and rapine of the soldiers and the scattering of families into the barren wilderness raided by Arabs and cruel Kurds. We decided to withdraw to the heights of Mousa Dagh, carrying with us all the food and supplies possible.”

Armenian resistance efforts would inspire Franz Werfel’s “Forty Days of Mousa Dagh” – the 1933 best-seller, which later inspired Jewish resistance efforts against Nazi occupation in the Warsaw ghetto.#genocidediary