Deportations of Kurds (1916–1934)

The Deportations of Kurds by Turkey refers to the population transfer of hundreds of thousands of Kurds from Turkish Kurdistan that was perpetuated by the Ottoman Empire and its successor Turkey in order to Turkify the region. Most of the Kurds who were deported were forced to leave their autochthonous lands, but the deportations also included the forced sedentarization of Kurdish tribes. Turkish historian İsmail Beşikçi emphasized the influence of fascism on these policies, and Italian historian Giulio Sappeli argued: "The ideals of Kemal Atatürk meant that war against the Kurds was always seen as an historical mission aimed at affirming the superiority of being Turkish." Occurring just after the Armenian genocide, many Kurds believed that they would share the same fate as the Armenians. Historians Dominik J. Schaller and Jürgen Zimmerer state that this event "not only serves as a reminder of the unsettling fact that victims could become perpetrators, but also that perpetrators [as some Kurds were during the Armenian Genocide] could turn victims".