TURKISH "FORBEARANCE."

Press, Volume LVIII, Issue 17607, 9 November 1922, Page 6

TURKISH "FORBEARANCE."

■ 1 MEW. P. BEEVES ON THE SMYRNA MASSACRE." (FROM OTTR OWN CORRESPONDENT.) LONDON, September 29. As Chairman of the Anglo-Hellenic League, Mr W. Peniber Reeves has been taking the part of the unhappy Greeks. In a letter to ■ the "Daily Telegraph" he refers to a report of the meeting of the British Muslim Society presided over by Lord Headley. "I read that a resolution was unanimously passed," he writes, "apparently with enthusiasm, calling for a diplomatic surrender to the Kemalist Turks on the ground of the 'forbearance shown by the Turkish army which, though flushed with victory, 'has abstained from the violence which might have been expected under the circumstances.' On the same day I also read in your contemporary, 'The Times, the report of their special correspondent from Smyrna, in that, speaking of the awful condition of that once great and flourishing city, he says, 'for once, rumour has not exaggerated. He goes on to describe how one of the richest cities of the Levant l'.es 'a stark skeleton/ how thousands of unfortunates have been massacred, or perished horribly in the flames, while many million pounds worth of property has been stolen or burned. He 6impiv confirms the striking and poignant description from Mr Treloar previously published by yourself, and I only quote him because 'The Times' has been for long hostile to Greek policy, and is utterly unlikely to exaggerate the Smyrna calamity. "Yet we have the Muslim Society asserting that the victorious Turks have not shown the violence which might have been expected. In Heaven's name, what further violence did these friends of the Turks expect of them? Are they surprised that the Turks spared any of the unfortunate inhabitants of Smyrna? Truly, this extraordinary resolution of the Musl:m Society throws a flood of upon the opinion which Turkman Muslim havo to their protegee. It helps us to estimate the Moslem notion of torbearanoe where Christians are concerned. If the expectations of those who love Turks are these which the Muslim Society clearly had, we can imagine the expectations of the unhappy Greeks and miserable Armenians of Asia Minor and Thrace."