History of Turkish Jews - Ottoman and Modern
Posted: Sun Oct 21, 2012 6:08 am
From now on the nerd user name HAL 9000 will be reserved for Science and Technology threads, or at least for subjects that are not political.
From now on, in my comments about the Middle East, etc, I will be known as "TurkishJew". The avatar is my grandfather in the Ottoman Empire. (Update: I was just informed that I am not allowed to use two different user names simultaneously, and so from now own I will only use the TurkishJew identity uniformly. The HAL9000 account has been disabled.)
This thread is about the history of Ottoman and Modern Turkish Jews. At the height of the Ottoman Empire, approximately 185,000 Jews resided there. Currently the Jewish population of Turkey is 17,000.
Later I will give a lot of details about Turkish Jews in this thread, but let me first entertain you by mentioning my grandfather in the Ottoman Empire. I am the black sheep of my family in comparison, he risked his life for Turkey several times, both before and after the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire. The Ottoman Jews were loyal to the end, even after Turkey was invaded by European powers.
Here is my grandfather in the Ottoman Empire. He actually played backgammon with Mustafa Kemal. He was known by Ataturk, but they were not close friends.
These are the pictures of two of my grandfather's medals he earned in the Ottoman Empire before or during World War I:
This medal is obviously Turkish:
But this second medal (the two sides are different but the following images are from the same medal) requires some explanation because it is obviously German, it is not Turkish. Germany and the Ottoman Empire were allies during World War I (actually even before World War I started.) This medal was given to my grandfather for his accomplishments in the Ottoman Empire, by the German prince Eitel-Frederick who had high opinion of Turkey.
From now on, in my comments about the Middle East, etc, I will be known as "TurkishJew". The avatar is my grandfather in the Ottoman Empire. (Update: I was just informed that I am not allowed to use two different user names simultaneously, and so from now own I will only use the TurkishJew identity uniformly. The HAL9000 account has been disabled.)
This thread is about the history of Ottoman and Modern Turkish Jews. At the height of the Ottoman Empire, approximately 185,000 Jews resided there. Currently the Jewish population of Turkey is 17,000.
Later I will give a lot of details about Turkish Jews in this thread, but let me first entertain you by mentioning my grandfather in the Ottoman Empire. I am the black sheep of my family in comparison, he risked his life for Turkey several times, both before and after the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire. The Ottoman Jews were loyal to the end, even after Turkey was invaded by European powers.
Here is my grandfather in the Ottoman Empire. He actually played backgammon with Mustafa Kemal. He was known by Ataturk, but they were not close friends.
These are the pictures of two of my grandfather's medals he earned in the Ottoman Empire before or during World War I:
This medal is obviously Turkish:
But this second medal (the two sides are different but the following images are from the same medal) requires some explanation because it is obviously German, it is not Turkish. Germany and the Ottoman Empire were allies during World War I (actually even before World War I started.) This medal was given to my grandfather for his accomplishments in the Ottoman Empire, by the German prince Eitel-Frederick who had high opinion of Turkey.