Clash at ABC Ashrafieh as Armenians Protest Turkish Film

A fistfight erupted Wednesday at the ABC mall in Ashrafieh after a number of young Lebanese Armenian men tried to stop the showing of the Turkish film Son Mektup at a Grand Cinemas movie theater.

Despite the objections, the show went on as scheduled, in the presence of the Turkish ambassador, MTV reported.

The protest was organized by the Tashnag Party, the biggest Armenian party in Lebanon, which described its move as a “peaceful rally.”

“The sit-in escalated into a stampede and a brawl between the protesters and those who came to watch the movie,” LBCI television said.

“Security forces arrived and locked down the mall for around an hour before managing to disperse the protesters,” it added.

MTV said customers were allowed to reenter the mall after the demo was dispersed.

The Tashnag Party meanwhile issued a statement describing the film as a “new Turkish absurdity” and an attempt to “underestimate the minds of the Lebanese.”

The film's plot tells the story of a young Turkish air officer who falls in love with a nurse during the 1915 Gallipoli Campaign.

Turkey on Wednesday marked 100 years since the start of the Gallipoli Campaign by the Allies in World War I, an event seen now as a glorious victory by Ottoman forces and a crucial moment in the formation of the modern Turkish state.

On March 18, 1915, joint British-French naval forces sought to force their way through the Dardanelles Straits separating Europe from Asia in a bid to take Istanbul, then known as Constantinople.

However the attack was repelled by fierce Ottoman resistance, forcing the Allies to stage a land campaign in April that the Ottoman forces would also defeat in a months-long battle.

Although the Ottoman Empire, allied with Berlin, was on the losing side in World War I and subsequently collapsed, the Gallipoli Campaign is regarded by Turks as a seminal moment in their history.

Critics have accused Turkey of cynically shifting the date to overshadow ceremonies expected in Armenia and across the world to remember the 100th anniversary of the mass killings of Armenians by Ottoman forces in World War I.

Turkey has always rejected pressure to accept that the killings were a genocide and shows no sign of changing its position in the anniversary year.

“Here we are in Beirut today witnessing a new Turkish opportunist bid through the showing of a propaganda film in Lebanese movie theaters,” the Tashnag Party said in a statement.

The film “narrates a bloody and oppressive phase of the Ottoman history,” Tashnag added.

It also slammed the employees of the “ominous Turkish embassy and those who work in its 'black rooms'.”

“The step might seem innocent on the surface but its core and objectives are full of inherent Turkish malevolence.”

Y.R.