Istanbul pogrom

The Istanbul pogrom was a violent mob attack, mainly on the city's Greek minority, but also on Armenians and Jews, which lasted for about a day. It was set off by false reports that the house in Thessaloniki where Mustafa Kemal Atatürk was born had been bombed by Greeks, a report spread by the Turkish press and apparently planted by the state security service during the Cyprus dispute. Crowds, many of them brought in from outside the city, looted and destroyed thousands of shops and homes, and set fire to churches, schools and cemeteries. Several people were killed and many were assaulted. The riots, in which the authorities took part, accelerated the emigration of the Greek community, which had already been shrinking.

Open on the timeline