ISTANBUL \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009d The man in the ski mask struck in the twilight of late afternoon, strangling the elderly woman from behind, beating her senseless and leaving her for dead. He ran off with 50 Turkish lira, about $30, and her engagement ring, a last memory of her long-dead husband.<\/p>\n
\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u056a\u0093He just beat me, over and over again,\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u009d said the woman, Turfanda Asik, 88, who spent two weeks in an intensive care unit. \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u056a\u0093He hit my back, my skinny back. What have I done to him? What did he want?\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u009d<\/p>\n
Ms. Asik was left bruised and blinded in one eye. Her beating is thought to be the first of a string of attacks in the last few months on elderly Armenian women in Samatya, Istanbul\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7s historic Armenian quarter. Until recently in Samatya, a neighborhood of wooden houses built long ago and centuries-old churches, residents left their doors unlocked.<\/p>\n
As brutally as she was beaten, Ms. Asik was lucky. One victim of the attacks died from her wounds.<\/p>\n
Along the crooked streets of Samatya, where a conquering sultan resettled Armenian Christians after capturing Constantinople in 1453, and in its teahouses, churches and social clubs, the attacks have awakened fears \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009d rooted in past episodes of repression that residents say had waned in recent years as Turkey became more accommodating toward its minorities.<\/p>\n
\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u056a\u0093The community is always living with fear because the Armenian community has always been under pressure,\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u009d said Rober Koptas, the editor of Agos, an Armenian newspaper here that has devoted several issues to coverage of the attacks. \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u056a\u0093We were always regarded as foreigners, as second-class citizens.\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u009d<\/p>\n
Armenians and other minorities were once widely discriminated against in modern Turkey, subject to violent attacks by nationalists and shut out from prestige professions like the army officer corps. In Samatya, Armenians were typically artisans and merchants, many toiling in the maze of stalls at the nearby Grand Bazaar.<\/p>\n
But in recent times their lot has improved, thanks to reforms brought on by Turkey\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7s efforts to join the European Union, a process that has lately stalled. Mr. Koptas, the newspaper editor, said younger Armenians like him \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009d he is 35 \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009d are speaking and writing \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u056a\u0093side-by-side with our Turkish compatriots.\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u009d<\/p>\n
\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u056a\u0093The fear has decreased,\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u009d he said. \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u056a\u0093But for the older generation, it is always there.\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u009d<\/p>\n
When the authorities recently arrested a suspect in the attacks who they said was mentally disturbed and of Armenian origin \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009d not a fanatical Turk motivated by hatred, as many assumed \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0080\u009d it only raised more suspicions among some residents of Samatya, who said they thought the police had merely found a convenient scapegoat.<\/p>\n
Regardless of the perpetrator, the violence has recalled a tortured past and, perhaps, hinted at future tensions as Turkey prepares to face the 100th anniversary of the genocide of its Armenian population in the last years of the Ottoman Empire.<\/p>\n
Even though that milestone is two years away, in 2015, the country is already questioning how the anniversary will be treated: as a chance for reconciliation and full recognition of the massacres by the Ottoman Army or an occasion for more tension and hate speech of the sort that appeared on social networks after the recent attacks.<\/p>\n
\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u056a\u0093Turkey has to face this,\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u009d Mr. Koptas said. \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u056a\u0093Only with this will Turkey become a democracy.\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u009d<\/p>\n
On a chilly afternoon in January, a few hundred protesters marched down a narrow street that connects with Samatya\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7s main square, which is bordered by cafes and open-air fish shops. \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u056a\u0093The Armenian people are not alone!\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u009d was one chant. \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u056a\u0093Shoulder to shoulder against fascism,\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u009d was another.<\/p>\n
\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u056a\u0093This is normal,\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u009d said Ayse Demir, a student who participated in the protest, reflecting the sentiment that Armenians are constantly under threat. \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u056a\u0093Armenians can be killed.\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u009d<\/p>\n
Another student, standing beside Ms. Demir, said, \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u056a\u0093There are lots of racist people in Turkey.\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u009d<\/p>\n
Sedat Caliskan, 35, a taxi driver who is Muslim, stood watching the marchers. \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u056a\u0093For years, nothing like this has happened,\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u009d he said of the attacks. \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u056a\u0093I want to believe that these are isolated incidents.\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u009d<\/p>\n
In simple terms, he spoke of a sense of harmony between Christians and Muslims in the neighborhood. \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u056a\u0093On Sundays they go to church, and on Fridays we go to the mosque,\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u009d he said.<\/p>\n
Mr. Caliskan lives three doors down from the murdered woman\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7s home, which is adorned with red carnations and signs that read: \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u056a\u0093Don\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7t touch our Armenian neighbor\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u009d and \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u056a\u0093Don\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7t remain silent. Don\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7t be intimidated.\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u009d<\/p>\n
As he sipped tea and watched the protesters, one longtime resident, a Greek man named Yorgi Eskargemis, a retired textile merchant, said that the neighborhood is still as beautiful as the days it was called \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u056a\u0093Little Paris.\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u009d But the attacks, he said, are a \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u056a\u0093stain\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u009d on the community.<\/p>\n
Overhearing the conversation, a man standing at the cafe door piped up. \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u056a\u0093We are all brothers here,\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u009d he said.<\/p>\n
Ms. Asik, whose first name means \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u056a\u0093fresh fruit\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u009d in Turkish, has outlived a husband and two children. Years ago, she gave up her day job in a butcher shop but kept her tiny apartment in Samatya. Recently, she lay on a daybed and wept.<\/p>\n
\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u056a\u0093It really hits me hard in the heart,\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u009d she said, recalling what went through her mind as she was attacked in her building\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7s vestibule. \u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u056a\u0093How could you keep hitting me so hard? Don\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0549\u0084\u00a7t you fear God?\u0569\u00a7\u0549\u0082-\u0539\u009d<\/p>\n
<NYT_AUTHOR_ID><\/p>\n
Sebnem Arsu contributed reporting.<\/p>\n
nytimes.com<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
\u0569\u0082\u0539\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
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