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shana tova!

Aurora (Arshaluys) Mardiganyan was just 14 when the sky collapsed on her head. In 1915, as the Armenian Genocide began, her village was torn apart by turkish soldiers. She watched as her father, her brothers and all the men in her family were dragged away and murdered. The women and children, including Aurora, were spared only to be marched into the desert—a death sentence of a different kind.

The march was relentless. Day after day, Aurora trudged through the searing heat, surrounded by the dying and the dead. There was no food, no water—just the constant, gnawing hunger, thirst and sexual mutilation. Those who fell behind were shot or left to die under the unrelenting sun. Aurora witnessed countless mothers cradling their dying children, their bodies wasting away before her eyes. The air was thick with the stench of death, and the ground was littered with the bodies of her people, unburied, forgotten.

According to her story, the turkish soldiers decided to nail the 17 girls of her village in the group to crosses—in a grotesque parody of their Christian faith, but they miscounted and only constructed 16 crosses; Aurora was the lucky one who was not crucified.

She endured much, being sold into a harem as a teen, for 85 cents. She was beaten, assaulted and dehumanized in ways no child should ever endure. Aurora’s spirit was broken over and over again, yet somehow, she survived.

When she finally escaped, Aurora found her way to the United States, carrying the weight of what she had witnessed. She was alone, orphaned by genocide, but she was determined to tell the world what had happened. Her story, Ravished Armenia, recounted the horrors in graphic detail—images too painful for most to even imagine. But for Aurora, they were not just stories; they were the memories that haunted her every day.

She agreed to relive her trauma once more, acting in the film Auction of Souls, where she portrayed her own suffering and the atrocities she had witnessed. But even then, Aurora was exploited. The people behind the film saw her pain as a commodity, and she was never properly compensated. She gave everything—her story, her dignity, her voice—but received little in return.

In the early 1930s, both the book and the film faded from the public’s attention. The sudden and complete silencing of the film had two explanations: the growing U.S.-turkey alliances, and an agreement between Hollywood and Germany. Aurora had written about being raped by a roving gang of german soldiers in turkey before being sold into a harem

The film that was supposed to tell her story was lost, leaving behind only fragments, just like the memory of the millions of Armenians who were massacred.

Here you can find Aurora Mardiganyan's book, "RAVISHED ARMENIA".

I’m slowly realising that almost nobody thinks that antisemitism is a real problem. They only think nazis are a problem (if that even), because they were conditioned to hate them.

But they don’t consider their own antisemitism to be antisemitism - they just consider it to be common sense, or justified political activism!

Crazy but not surprising how when hezbollah bombs civilian areas, the same people who are mad at Israel for exploding pagers which were only handed out to hezbollah members, are not upset at all.

Yall don't care about innocent civilians being caught in the crossfire. You at best want all Israelis dead (which would be a genocide as wanting a whole nationality is mentioned in the definition of genocide) and at worst you want all jews dead (which is still wanting a genocide to happen).

Portrait of Mary Victoria Leiter, the later Lady Curzon of Kedleston, Vicereine of India, 1887

Alexandre Cabanel

Feels like a cruel joke that the October 7th anniversary falls between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. And 101 hostages still aren’t home.

So I've been hearing that there shouldn't be a country for the jews, that it should be like "other countries" and "be for everyone".

Ok, so your country that has separation of church and state, which days are the work week?

Mon-Fri? Huh? Why is that? Maybe to make it so people won't work on Sundays, and then, go to church?

In Israel, the work week is Sun-Thu. I don't know if Americans even know that.

Friday night to Saturday night is the Sabbath, so having these days off make it easier to observe.

Muslim countries, usually, have the workweek be Sat-Wed for similar reasons.

People are so stuck on their American Defaultism that they forget that so many things are structured on purpose to benefit different people.

So when people say that Israel should be abolished and there should be a "neutral secular state", what they mean is that it should be more like what they consider the "normal" and "default".

They act like there is a "one size fits all" culture, that anything else is some perversion for the ideal of what a country should be.

That's just one of many many things, cultural and religious, that makes Israel the only place in the world where jews can live without being an afterthought.

I have a lot of problems with Israel.

So many, many problems, especially with the government, and with what's to come with Trump's victory.

I genuinely hope for a change, for the end of suffering, for lasting peace and justice.

But I'm so done with people that have their country built to suit them telling me mine shouldn't exist.

Shana Tova! Happy 5785!

why are people so convinced that israel somehow got remote access to random lebanese civilians phones and blew them up somehow without ever interacting with them????? ignoring the obvious (they were literally pagers who tf is going to use a pager in this day and age) that is literally not possible

ive actually seen random pro pals in america say that they're scared their phone is gonna explode and im just like be so fucking for real right now the mossad DOESNT KNOW YOU EXIST