Washington, D.C: In Defense of Christians (IDC), the nation’s leading advocacy organization for Christians and other religious minorities in the Middle East and Africa, commends President Joseph R. Biden for becoming the first U.S. president to recognize the Armenian Christian Genocide, the systematic killing of 1.5 million Armenians between 1915 to 1923. This historic recognition is a positive first step toward rectifying a historic injustice committed against the Christian faithful at the hands of the Ottoman Empire.

IDC also remembers the additional 1.9 million Greeks, Assyrians, Chaldeans, Syriacs, Arameans, and Maronites who were also killed for their Christian faith, and further calls on the administration to recognize the devastating effect this genocide had against the region’s greater Christian community.

IDC thanks Senator Bob Menendez (D-NJ), Senator John Cornyn (R-TX), Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA), Rep. Gus Bilirakis (R-FL), and countless others for their strong and tireless advocacy toward this milestone genocide recognition.

IDC was proud to work for years alongside the Armenian National Committee of America in advocating for genocide recognition.

“IDC sends its deepest thanks and congratulations to President Biden on becoming the first president in U.S. history to recognize the Armenian Christian Genocide,” said IDC President Toufic Baaklini.  “We look forward to working with his administration to bring greater awareness to the ongoing persecution of Christian genocide survivors, and descendants, by an increasingly rogue Turkey, even in the present day.