Why Turkey Celebrates the Historic Slaughter and Rape of Christians
“There was weeping in every house, and sorrow in all churches; the groaning of grown men and the shrieking of women accompanied looting, enslavement, separation, and rape.”
While the West continues self-flagellating over its past, Turkey just celebrated a day when its ancestors slaughtered, raped, and enslaved tens of thousands of people solely for the “crime” of being Christian.
On Friday, May 29, 2026—the 573rd anniversary of the conquest of Constantinople (now Istanbul)—Turkey held nationwide celebrations (images here). As usual, Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan participated, including by honoring and finding “inspiration” in Muhammad (or Mehmet) the conqueror of Constantinople:
The faith, determination, and courage of Fatih [Conqueror] Sultan Mehmet and his heroic soldiers during the conquest of Istanbul give us inspiration today to achieve the goal of the Turkish century…. I remember Fatih Sultan Mehmet and our beloved martyrs with compassion, respect, and gratitude, who left us a legacy of this world city of unique beauty, and I greet all our citizens with my most heartfelt sentiments.
In order to understand the significance of what may seem to be benign remarks, some much-needed background is necessary.
Towards the end of the first millennium, the Turks, whose origins lay in the eastern steppes of Asia, had become Muslim and began to raid and conquer portions of Asia Minor, which was then, and had been for a millennium, Christian.
By the end of the fourteenth century, they had entirely conquered Asia Minor (today “Turkey”) and began eying Constantinople, just across the Bosporus. Although generations of Turks had repeatedly besieged it, it would fall to Ottoman Sultan Muhammad II, Erdoğan’s hero.
But why did Sultan Muhammad and his Muslim predecessors attack Constantinople in the first place? What made it an enemy to the Turks?
The same thing that made every non-Muslim nation an enemy: not only was it “infidel”—in this case, Christian—and therefore in need of subjugating; but as New Rome, Muslims—starting with the Muslim prophet Muhammad, as Erdoğan acknowledged during May 29 celebrations—had always eyed and desired it.
That was the sole justification and pretext—the sole “grievance”—that propelled the Turks to besiege it (as their Arab counterparts did eight centuries earlier): the kingdom of Constantinople was peopled by non-Muslims who refused to submit to Islam.
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