Nazi
Germany had its state-sponsored Kristallnacht (“Crystal Night”) against
its Jewish citizens in 1938, and the Turkish government repeated the
feat against its Greek, Armenian, and Jewish citizens less than two
decades later, on September 6-7, 1955. The riots were orchestrated by an
array of Turkish security organizations, both official and clandestine,
with the active participation of extreme nationalist groups shepherded
by the governing Democratic Party (1950-1960) and government-controlled
trade unions.
The
process of Turkification that started at the turn of the twentieth
century had entered the economic field after genocide and ethnic
cleansing had been executed in 1915-1922, during the last years of the
Ottoman Empire. The forcible population exchange between Turkey and
Greece (1924) exempted the Greek population of Istanbul. In the
Republican period, discriminatory policies against non-Muslim citizens
included laws excluding non-Muslims from certain professions, campaigns
to impose the Turkish language, the anti-Jewish pogrom in Eastern Thrace
(1934), the Wealth Tax of 1942, and the recruitment of army work
battalions during World War II. In a report on minorities, the
Republican People’s Party (which ruled from 1923-1950) stated in 1946
that its goal was to leave no Greek in Istanbul by the 500
th
anniversary of its conquest (1953).
Turkish-Greek relations soured after 1953, when Greek Cypriots began their armed struggle for
Enosis
,
the annexation of Cyprus—under British mandate—by Greece. Greece
appealed to the United Nations to demand self-determination for Cyprus
in 1954, while Great Britain wanted to solve the dispute without taking
it to the U.N. Security Council, and leaned on Turkey to counter Greek
claims.
An
anti-Greek propaganda campaign started in 1955, with the main Turkish
newspapers agitating public opinion along nationalist organizations. The
British convened a tripartite conference in London with Turkey and
Greece (August 29-September 6, 1955), which fell apart when news broke
of the bombing of the Turkish consulate in Salonica (Greece), adjacent
to the house where Mustafa Kemal Atatürk was born.
The
bombing was organized by the Turkish consulate with the knowledge of
the Turkish Foreign Affairs Ministry. Oktay Engin, a university student
in Salonica, carried out the explosion. He was arrested on September
18, but after his alibi the initial charge of executing the attack was
dropped to incitement. After spending nine months in detention, he
escaped to Turkey in September 1956, before the Greek courts sentenced
him to three and a half years in prison. He would be later promoted by
the Turkish Interior Ministry.
News reports of the bombing were first announced by radio in Istanbul in the early afternoon of September 6, and the daily
İstanbul Ekspres
,
associated with the Democratic Party and the National Security Service,
repeated them in print. The insinuations that the Greeks were behind
the bombing became the trigger for a protest rally on the night of
September 6 as cover to gather the rioters, most of who had been trucked
into Istanbul in advance. The homes and workplaces of Greeks and other
non-Muslim communities had been identified beforehand. Owners of Turkish
shops had been told the day before to put Turkish flags on their
windows; the shops without flags were destroyed or damaged. According to
witnesses, the mob was furnished with a list of addresses.
The
riots started in Taksim Square by 5 pm, and rippled out through Beyoğlu
(Pera) during the evening, with smashing and looting of non-Muslim
property. A correspondent for the French daily
France-Soir
wrote:
“Everything happened as if the agitators had divided one by one the
neighborhoods of the minorities, even the streets. I followed the
arsonists for hours. When they arrived in front of a store, they asked
for the owner. When the latter appeared, they asked: ‘Where’s your
passport?’ If the owner of the passport was Greek, or even Armenian or
Jewish, the looting started. Through the whole night, I heard from this
frenzied mob a word that seemed to have been forgotten for a long time,
giaour
” (
giaour
“infidel”).
The
police was ordered to hold a passive stance and leave the mob to roam
the streets freely. The function of the Turkish militia and police was
not to protect the lives and properties of the victims, but to preserve
adjacent Turkish properties, except in a few cases where police officers
prevented criminal activity. The fire brigade, whenever it reached a
fire, claimed that it was unable to deal with it. According to a cable
to the U.S. Department of State by the American consul general, “the
destruction was completely out of hand with no evidence of police or
military attempts to control it. I personally witnessed the looting of
many shops while the police stood idly by or cheered on the mob.” The
riot died down by midnight with the intervention of the army and the
declaration of martial law.
On
the morning of September 7, a mob overran the İzmir National Park,
where an international exhibition was taking place, and burned the Greek
pavilion. Next, it completely destroyed the church of Saint Fotini. The
homes of the few Greek families and officers were then looted.
After
the events, a total of 5,000 people were arrested, some nationalist
leaders were taken to court, but nobody was convicted. There was an
attempt to implicate Turkish Communists in the riots, which fired back.
Attempt by Greece to bring the issue to the U.N. and NATO fizzled due to
the lenient attitude of Great Britain and the United States towards
Turkey within the context of the Cold War.
Estimations
of victims are varied, with a number of 30 to 37 Greeks as most likely.
Moreover, 32 Greeks were severely wounded. The mobs beat and injured
many people, destroyed and vandalized cemeteries, dragging the dead in
the streets. Some 200 Greek women were raped. It was also reported that
Greek boys were raped and that a priest was burned alive. Many Greek
men, including at least one priest, were exposed to forced
circumcision.
The
material damage was considerable, including 5,317 properties (4,214
homes, 1,004 businesses, 73 churches, 2 monasteries, 1 synagogue, and 26
schools). According to the Istanbul police, 3,836 Greek (2,572),
Armenian (741), and Jewish (523) businesses were destroyed. The American
consulate estimated that 88% of the businesses were non-Muslim (59%
Greek, 17% Armenian, and 12% Jewish), as well as 92% of the homes (80%
Greek, 9% Armenian, and 3% Jewish).
Estimates
of the economic cost of the damage varied from the Turkish government's
estimate of 69.5 million Turkish liras (equivalent to 24.8 million
dollars) to the Greek government's estimate of 500 million dollars. The
Turkish government paid 60 million Turkish lira of restitution to those
who registered their losses.
The
pogrom greatly accelerated the emigration of Greeks and Armenians from
Turkey. The Greek population of Istanbul decreased from 65,108 to 49,081
between 1955 and 1960. Overall, the Greek population of Turkey declined
from 119,822 persons in 1927 to about 7,000 in 1978, and some 2,500
according to current estimates.