Musa Dagh

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Allied forces evacuate Armenian survivors from the Syrian coast and transfer them to a French naval cruiser, 1915.

The French warship Guichen, pictured above, participated along with several cruisers in the rescue of some 4,000 Armenians who had taken shelter on Musa Dagh.

Armenian Genocide

Early elements
Hamidian Massacres · 1896 Ottoman Bank Takeover · Adana Massacre · Young Turk Revolution
The Genocide
April 24, 1915 · Armenian notables deported from the Ottoman capital · Tehcir Law · Armenian casualties of deportations · Ottoman Armenian casualties
Major extermination centers Ter Zor · Sivas · Muş · Diyarbakır · Erzurum · Trabzon
Resistance (Armenian resistance) Zeitun · Van · Musa Dagh · Sasun · Urfa · Armenian militia
Other targeted groups Assyrians · Pontic Greeks
Foreign reactions and aid Reactions · American Committee for Relief in the Near East
Responsible parties
Young Turks Enver · Talat · Djemal · Committee of Union and Progress · The Special Organization · Ottoman Army · Kurdish Irregulars
Aftermath Courts-Martial · Operation Nemesis · Partitioning of the Ottoman Empire · Denial
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Musa Dagh (Turkish: Musa Dağı, Jebel Musa (Arabic), or Musa Ler (Armenian) meaning "Moses Mountain") was the site of resistance by the Armenians during the Armenian Genocide. The denizens of that region were violently expelled from their seven villages (Kaboussieh, Yogohonoluk, Bitias, Wakef, Khodr Bey, Hedj Habibli) by the Ottomans in 1915. As Ottoman Turkish forces converged upon the town, the populace –aware of the impending danger– fell back upon Musa mountain and repeatedly thwarted assaults for fifty-three days. Allied warships, most notably French, in the Mediterranean responded to distress signals and rescued the remaining survivors just as ammunition and food provisions were being exhausted. The warships then transported them to Port Said, Egypt. These historical events later inspired Franz Werfel to write his novel The Forty Days of Musa Dagh(1933), a fictionalized account based on Werfel's detailed research of historical sources.

Other survivors fled elsewhere, seeking refuge in Lebanon. Today, the town of Anjar is divided into seven districts, each commemorating one of the villages of Musa Dagh.