Karel VALANSİ

The 2019 results of Kadir Has University´s ´Social and Political Trends in Turkey´ research that has been conducted for 10 years, revealing the public impulses, were announced on January 15th.

´His Merciful Majesty, An Architectural Glance at Jerusalem in Light of Ottoman Documents´ exhibition was opened with a reception in Kadir Has University on November 11th.

22 people who lost their lives in the horrible Neve Shalom attack on September 6th, 1986, were commemorated with a ceremony. The ceremony which started with the victims’ relatives lighting candles in memory of the terror victims, went on with the meaningful speech of Beri Koronyo, Advisor to Turkey Rabbinate Foundation. Following the prayer for the lives lost, the cenotaph in Ashkenazim Cemetery, was visited.

The film “La Dalkavo Ora”, which depicts the centuries-long journey of a Sephardic family, serves as a document that will be passed on to next generations. While watching the film, you set off from Istanbul and travel to first Greece and then to Auschwitz, Portugal and finally to Spain where everything had started. We talked with Producer Selim Kemahli, Director Caglar Malli, actress Deniz Bensusan and composer Renan Koen about the story of how the film was made.

This year at 15th Kadir Has Awards, Prof. Dr. Ivet Bahar received ‘Outstanding Achievement Award’. Bahar was presented with her award at a ceremony held at Kadir Has University Cibali Campus, on March 22nd. We talked with Prof. Dr. Ivet Bahar primarily about her studies on neurodegenerative diseases and battle with drug addiction.

The EU-Turkey statement of March 2016 has become one of the main pillars of the EU’s migration strategy, essentially limiting the flow of migrants to the EU. The statement is accepted as a turning point in Europe’s crisis over refugees. On the third anniversary of its signing, we talked with Ambassador Christian Berger, the head of the EU Delegation to Turkey, the agreement’s impact on refugees and on Europe, Turkey-EU relations, EU relations with the Middle East including Israel and the rise of antisemitism in Europe.

We knocked on Ankara Jewish Community Leader Can Özgön’s door to get to know Ankara Jews better, to learn about their problems, to talk about the history of the Jewish neighborhood and where the community stands today. We discussed the heavy burden they bear as a community consisting of only 35 members to preserve their history and keep their synagogue alive.

International Holocaust Remembrance Day was commemorated in Ankara on January 24, 2019.