Turkish Hackers Target Vatican Website After Pope's Genocide Comment

An anonymous reader writes Turkish hackers have brought down the official Vatican City website, following Pope Francis' statement in which he referred to mass killings of Armenians by Turks as 'genocide'. According to reports, the website www.vatican.va was first taken offline on Monday evening with a Turkish hacker, named @THTHerakles, announcing that he would continue to target the website should an official apology not be issued from the Vatican City. The hacker said that the Pope's comments were "unacceptable" for a respected religious figurehead. "Taking sides and calling what happened with the Armenians genocide is not true ... We want Pope [Francis] to apologize for his words or we will make sure the website remains offline," he added.

Comments

Mass Murder

[Anonymous Coward]

Because killing over a million people of a certain way of life is not genocide...

Re:Mass Murder

[khallow]

I think a big part of the reason it's so taboo is that the founders of modern Turkey were probably involved in the genocide, including Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, the president of Turkey from 1923-1938. To admit that the leaders of Turkey of the past, were involved might call into question the legitimacy of Turkey today (particularly among minority groups like the Kurds and the hardcore religious) and undermine its secular myth building.

Re:Mass Murder

[lyovushka]

Mass murder of over a million people of certain way of life after which only 50000 remain is genocide.

Genocide.

[Anonymous Coward]

It was a genocide. Genocide, genocide, genocide. The mass killings of the Armenians by the Turks 1925 was a genocide.

Now, vailant Turkish hax0rs, go ahead and take down the Internet.

Re:Genocide.

[Anonymous Coward]

In fact, Raphael Lemkin, coined the term "genocide" in 1943 describe the slaughter of 1.5 million Armenians by the Ottoman Empire. Those acts were the inspiration for the term.

Armenian Genocide

Raphael Lemkin was explicitly moved by the Armenian annihilation to coin the word genocide in 1943 and define systematic and premeditated exterminations within legal parameters. The Armenian Genocide is acknowledged to have been one of the first modern genocides, because scholars point to the organized manner in which the killings were carried out in order to eliminate the Armenians, and it is the second most-studied case of genocide after the Holocaust.

Re:Genocide.

[Anonymous Coward]

Strictly speaking, Lemkin invented the word "genocide" to describe the Nazi's mass killings of Jews.
The killing of Armenians was "merely" used as an example of another genocide.
http://www.etymonline.com/inde...
http://www.preventgenocide.org...

Re:Just curious

[GLMDesigns]

The Inquisition. You mean the 2,000 - 10,000 (at the most) that were killed over a period of 300 years; with the overwhelming majority done over a few decades in Spain?

Compare that with Hitler 11,000,000 and Stalin 20,000,000+, and Mao 40,000,000+ and the Inquisition begins to pale in comparison.

Re:Just curious

[MightyMartian]

Some of the Crusades may have been, though the intent, from Rome's side was to save Eastern Christianity, and also probably to gain the upper hand over the Byzantine Emperors, who viewed themselves (with some justification) as supreme over the Bishop of Rome. To the European Princes, this was about grabbing one of the most valuable pieces of territory on Earth, and that's the first thing they did once they had driven back the Muslims; seize land that rightfully belonged to the Byzantine Empire and set up their crusader kingdoms.

Then there's the Fourth Crusade, which never reached the Holy Land, but rather stopped in Constantinople, looted the city, killed many of the residents (all of which, one should be reminded, were Christians), and set up a puppet state. Look up the Sack of Constantinople, one of the vilest acts of treachery in the history of Christendom, and an act that almost certainly undermined the Byzantine Empire, leading to the collapse of Christendom as a political force in Anatolia and the Levant.