Kegham Balian
@kbalian90 • 7,540 subscribers
Jerusalemite Armenian | Writing: @ArmenianWeekly and @TWIPMagazine | Correspondent @301arm | Comms @SavetheArQ | Ceramist @BalianCeramics.
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For nearly 800 years, the key to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre has been in the hands of two prominent Muslim Jerusalemite families. This tradition dates back to Salah ad-Din’s conquest of Jerusalem in 1187, helping preserve the delicate Status Quo and preventing daily access to the Church from becoming a flashpoint among the different Christian custodians. Today, as the great doors undergo renovation, their descendants, Adeeb Joudeh and Wajeed Nuseibeh, still keep that same balance: one safeguards the key, the other opens and closes the Church each day.
Kegham Balian482,202 views • 3 months ago
BREAKING: George Deek, Israel's Special Envoy to the Christian World, says "We never got involved or took position in the conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia, per se", which led to the ethnic cleansing of Christian Armenians and their Churches from Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh). You have to admire that carefully placed "per se". The amount of heavy lifting it does for Israel's image in the Christian world would've been commendable had it not been a typical hasbara escape hatch, absolving Israel of any responsibility or accountability, and invariably collapsing under the weight of Israel's own record during that war. In no particular order: ⁃According to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), between 2016 and 2020, leading up to the 44 Day War, roughly 69% of weapons exports to Azerbaijan came from Israel, in a war that butchered 5,000 Armenian soldiers, barely adults. So neutral. ⁃The highly advanced Israeli weapons systems included loitering munitions (suicide drones) such as the IAI Harop and Elbit SkyStriker, Hermes 900 reconnaissance drones, Spike anti-tank guided missiles, and LORA surface-to-surface ballistic missiles. ⁃Israeli weapons manufacturer Aeronautics Defense Systems used a suicide drone by attacking Armenian positions during a sale presentation at the behest of Azeri officials who requested a live demonstration. ⁃Israeli military personnel trained Azeri soldiers in piloting drones. ⁃Azerbaijan supplies 65% of Israel's crude oil imports, which are pumped via the BTC pipeline through Georgia and Turkey. A clear energy security and arms agreement: you send oil, we give you weapons. So neutral. ⁃In December 2023, Azerbaijan effectively blockaded the Lachin Corridor, the only route between Armenia and Artsakh. A starvation campaign ensued for 9 months, targeting hundreds of thousands of Armenian indigenous Christians: Food shortages, supermarket shelves emptied, families lining up for hours for a piece of bread. No fuel. No medicine. Cancer patients requiring urgent treatment were stranded. Malnutrition. Miscarriages. George Deek was Ambassador at that time. He was there in Baku. Did he voice concern for the besieged Christians in Artsakh? No. His country enabled it. Haaretz, an Israeli outlet, even published a bombshell report entitled "Israel's fingerprints all over the ethnic cleansing of Nagorno-Karabakh". To quote the Special Christian envoy himself: "When violence against a vulnerable minority is ignored because acknowledging it is politically inconvenient, there is a name for it: abandonment." For Israel, the defense of the Armenian Christian presence in Artsakh was politically inconvenient. That is why they were complicit in the ethnic cleansing of 150,000 indigenous Christian Armenians from their 2,000-year-old homeland.
Kegham Balian29,595 views • 10 days ago
For over 50 years, 90-year-old Jerusalemite Armenian Hovan Bedrossian has rung the bells of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre on Holy Fire day. This year, he won’t. He’ll be forced to watch it on TV, like all the Armenians of Jerusalem, and all the other Christians.
Kegham Balian109,961 views • 2 months ago
On Jerusalem Day, Israeli activist and interfaith scholar Yisca Harani always stands in front of the Saint James Monastery in the Armenian Quarter, educating Jewish passerby on Armenians. A young group of Jews stopped by, and as always, she started explaining to them about Armenians, specifically, about how they saved Sha'ar Yishuv HaCohen in 1948, who later became the Chief Rabbi of Haifa. "I thought I had reached them. I thought I was making progress, until one of them asked, ‘But what is an Armenian?’” said Yisca. She said Armenians are Christians. "They turned into animals upon hearing that, you could see the hate in their eyes," continued Yisca. Four of the young boys then spat on an Armenian sign, and left.
Kegham Balian31,598 views • 21 days ago
![BREAKING: Israeli News Channel Kan 11 Insults the 1,700-Year-Old Armenian Presence in Jerusalem. [Video with subtitles⬇️] On Thursday, May 15, 2025, following Armenia’s Eurovision performance of “Survivor” by Armenian artist PARG, a commentator on Israel’s Kan 11 News mockingly stated: “I can’t believe we gave ‘these’ guys an entire quarter in Jerusalem. Survivor — that’s how we feel after watching this song.” This was not only insulting, but egregiously inaccurate. Though Kan 11 brands itself as a news channel, its grasp of historical fact appears to be tenuous at best — and nonexistent at worst. So allow me to provide a brief historical input: Breaking News for Kan 11: •The Armenian presence in Jerusalem dates back to 301 AD — the year Armenia became the first nation in the world to officially adopt Christianity as its state religion. This milestone led to a wave of Armenian pilgrimage to the Holy Land and, over centuries, the stone-by-stone establishment of what is now known as the Armenian Quarter of Jerusalem. •No one "gave us" a quarter in Jerusalem. We fought for it, built it, over centuries, preserved it and continue to defend it to this day. In the face of such ignorant and racially-laced commentary, we assert — and will always assert — the truth: The Armenian Quarter of Jerusalem has always been Armenian, and it will always remain Armenian. We are a people who have endured genocide, dispossession, cultural erasure, and generational trauma — and yet we remain, we are still, against all odds, still here. We remain more united than ever, and we remain resolute in defending our rightful and ancestral presence in the Holy City that is Jerusalem. Kan 11 crossed a red line. An immediate public apology is required to the Armenian people — for the insult, for the distortion, and for the disgrace.](https://image.24vids.com/tw-1923390077297733839/amplify_video_thumb/1923389959601311744/img/YAMkrhK194l3f2ip.jpg)
BREAKING: Israeli News Channel Kan 11 Insults the 1,700-Year-Old Armenian Presence in Jerusalem. [Video with subtitles⬇️] On Thursday, May 15, 2025, following Armenia’s Eurovision performance of “Survivor” by Armenian artist PARG, a commentator on Israel’s Kan 11 News mockingly stated: “I can’t believe we gave ‘these’ guys an entire quarter in Jerusalem. Survivor — that’s how we feel after watching this song.” This was not only insulting, but egregiously inaccurate. Though Kan 11 brands itself as a news channel, its grasp of historical fact appears to be tenuous at best — and nonexistent at worst. So allow me to provide a brief historical input: Breaking News for Kan 11: •The Armenian presence in Jerusalem dates back to 301 AD — the year Armenia became the first nation in the world to officially adopt Christianity as its state religion. This milestone led to a wave of Armenian pilgrimage to the Holy Land and, over centuries, the stone-by-stone establishment of what is now known as the Armenian Quarter of Jerusalem. •No one "gave us" a quarter in Jerusalem. We fought for it, built it, over centuries, preserved it and continue to defend it to this day. In the face of such ignorant and racially-laced commentary, we assert — and will always assert — the truth: The Armenian Quarter of Jerusalem has always been Armenian, and it will always remain Armenian. We are a people who have endured genocide, dispossession, cultural erasure, and generational trauma — and yet we remain, we are still, against all odds, still here. We remain more united than ever, and we remain resolute in defending our rightful and ancestral presence in the Holy City that is Jerusalem. Kan 11 crossed a red line. An immediate public apology is required to the Armenian people — for the insult, for the distortion, and for the disgrace.
Kegham Balian162,676 views • 1 year ago
BREAKING: Tzvika Fogel, Chairman of the Knesset’s National Security Committee and a member of the far-right Otzma Yehudit (Jewish Power) party, is blatantly lying about his encounter with Armenians in Jerusalem’s Armenian Quarter. “I was surrounded by 15 Armenians. They threatened my life and my health, and within two minutes ten Border Police officers arrived,” said MK Tzvika Fogel. You can watch the footage in its entirety where you can clearly see the arrival of MK Fogel, with the Police already present, and not a single Armenian surrounding him nor threatening his life. Furthermore, he mentions that the parking lot in question is public. This is also wrong: there is a sign at the entrance which very clearly states, in 3 languages, that the parking lot is private property. Mr. Fogel owes the Armenian community of Jerusalem an apology.
Kegham Balian28,160 views • 2 months ago