STEPANAKERT (Realist English). For the 51st day, Azerbaijani provocateurs have blocked the only land road connecting the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic (the Republic of Artsakh) with Armenia. This road is also called the Road of Life, as during the Great Patriotic War the road connecting besieged Leningrad with the Mainland was called.
The 120-thousand population of the unrecognized republic, of which more than 30 thousand are children, became hostages of the fascist regime of Ilham Aliyev. The perversity and ingenuity of the Azerbaijani dictator, a graduate of the most elite and “humane” university of the USSR – MGIMO, knows no bounds. Having deceived the world community with false fabrications about the alleged “ecological terrorism in Karabakh”, the hereditary dictator of Azerbaijan, Aliyev II, started the maximum program. The maximum program implies the complete destruction or eviction of the Armenian people from their ancestral historical homeland — Artsakh.
The Baku mini—sultanate chose one of the vile and misanthropic methods as the main tool for this – organization of a blockade and destruction of the Armenian population thorugh starvation. In this criminal activity, all sorts of politically engaged personalities and adventurers began to be actively used. To the surprise of many journalists, political scientists and other specialists who closely follow this tragicomic show staged by the fascist Baku authorities, Rabbi Zamir Isaev, who is the chairman of the Azerbaijani-Georgian community of Sephardic Jews and the director of the Baku Jewish school, was noticed among the “environmentalists”. These days, the entire civilized world celebrated a tragic and at the same time joyful date — the 80th anniversary of the breakthrough of the siege of Leningrad. In addition, every year the whole world celebrates Holocaust Memorial Day on January 27.
This is the day of remembrance of all Jews killed and tortured during the Second World War, this is the day of remembrance of the Jews who died in ghettos and concentration camps. The Jewish people have suffered many disasters and sufferings in their history. According to various estimates, up to 6 million Jews died during the Second World War. Most of them were killed by the Nazis and their accomplices in the Axis countries and in the occupied territories in Europe. It is impossible to list all the horrors of the blockade to which the residents of the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic (the Republic of Artsakh) are subjected today. This is absence of food stuffs, baby food, vegetables and fruits. In Karabakh, food cards were introduced for the residents, as it was more than 80 years ago in besieged Leningrad. The Azerbaijani dictator, ignoring all international humanitarian norms and laws, decided in his own way to continue the work of the Turkish and Caucasian Tatars (ancestors of Azerbaijanis) on the mass extermination and genocide of the Armenian people in their ancestral historical homeland – in Artsakh. Aliyev, to everyone’s great surprise, grossly violated and criminally ignored the statement of November 9, 2020, which clearly stated that the free access, security and untouchability of the Lachin corridor are assigned to the Russian peacekeeping forces. There is also a Decree of the President of Russia dated 10.11.2020, which states: “Deploy a peacekeeping contingent in the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict zone, along the line of contact in Nagorno-Karabakh and along the Lachin corridor.”
As I have already clarified above, there are many political adventurers and provocateurs among the “environmentalists” blocking the Stepanakert-Goris highway. But the participation of a rabbi in this adventurous action is a case that goes beyond all limits not only of human decency, but also of the Jewish faith. By the way, if it were a simple Jew, no one would notice him, but this is the chairman of the Azerbaijani-Georgian community of Sephardic Jews. I cannot understand how the son of the Jewish people, a high-ranking figure of the Jewish faith, representing the Sephardic Jews of both Georgia and Azerbaijan could take part in the blockade of the Stepanakert-Goris highway?
A few words about Sephardic Jews. This group of Jews has suffered terrible persecution in their history. Basically, this is the name of those Jews who lived in Spain, and at the end of the XV century, on the basis of a royal decree (edict), they were all completely expelled from there. Many people know the pain, the difficult history of the Jewish people, the Holocaust, the mass killings during the Second World War. Tens of thousands of Soviet Jews died of hunger and cold in the besieged Leningrad. In ghettos and concentration camps, fascist criminals killed several million Jews.
My life has turned out so that there are many Jews among my friends. And I have been friends with my close Jewish friend Alexander for almost 27 years. I have repeatedly had the opportunity to take part in various events dedicated to the Holocaust, I have repeatedly visited the Jewish Museum and the Tolerance Center in Moscow. In my articles, I always condemned the Holocaust, and always wrote only positive things about the Jewish people. In one article, it is impossible to list all the numerous threads of history and the close ties that bind the two peoples – the Armenians and the Jews. My Jewish friends in Moscow did not fully believe me when I told them that a Jewish rabbi was involved in the criminal blockade in the Lachin corridor. A rabbi who proudly poses for the press among the pseudo-ecologists. I am now interested in only one question: why did Zamir Isaev go to such a provocation? Was it his conscious choice or did he do it as an agent of the Azerbaijani special services?
At the Jewish Museum and Tolerance Center in Moscow, at events or lectures about the Jewish people, it was repeatedly and always proudly told that rabbis are the conscience of the Jewish people and that they always follow the precepts of Abraham. Jewish rabbis stand for peace, for the friendship between peoples, for harmony between different peoples. But they can never advocate the suffocation of an entire people by blocking the road, advocate their starvation, as the provocateur Zamir Isayev is doing now. For me, he is no longer a rabbi, but just a corrupt provocateur who carries out the criminal instructions of the Baku dictator. Especially for Zamir Isaev and the like, I remind you. During the Second World War, many representatives of the Armenian Diaspora risked their lives to save Jews in the countries occupied by the Nazis. And, basically, they were Sephardic Jews.
Among the many examples of heroism, I want to cite only one — the heroism of the Hungarian Armenian Ara Yeretsyan, who saved more than 400 Jews by hiding them in a hospital in the occupied Budapest. On February 26, 1981, Ara Yeretsyan became the first of more than 20 Armenians to be included in the list of the “Righteous among the Nations of the World” — an honorary title for non-Jews who risked their lives during the Holocaust to save Jews from extermination by the Nazis. The brave Armenians who saved Jews during the Holocaust were awarded this honorific title – the “Righteous among the Nations of the World” by the Israeli Institute of Catastrophe and Heroism “Yad Vashem”. The total number of righteous Armenians is now 24 people. Armenians rescued Jews in various countries, mainly in Austria, Hungary, France and the Ukraine.
I hope that international Armenian organizations, including the Armenian community in Georgia, will respond properly to the despicable act of the provocateur, adventurer and secret agent of the Azerbaijani special services Zamir Isayev. Yesterday I met with my friend Alexander. Word by word, we began to discuss this topic. And suddenly he frowned and fell silent. Then, on reflection, he told me that people like “Rabbi” Zamir Isaev are a mistake of the Jewish people. I think that my friend gave a very accurate and correct answer!
Aram Khachatryan is a historian, military journalist, lieutenant colonel of the Reserve of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, member of the Unions of Journalists of Moscow and Russia, special to the Realist News Agency
