Armenians Treated Poorly Before Genocide
The Ottoman Empire was filled with Armenians throughout even the capital city, Constantinople. These Armenians were considered a different race from the Turks, the reason being that the Armenians followed Christianity and the Turks were Islamic. This lead to major setbacks and disablilities for the Armenians within the Ottoman nation, since the Turks held all the power. Although the Armenians lived throughout the nation, the places that they did live in, seemed to be more segregated, for they lived in poor, dangerous living conditions. In these areas, the Turkish leaders overtaxed them just for being Christians. In acts of attempting to spread the Islam religion, the Turks regularly kidnapped Armenians and tried to force them into converting to Islam. Also, the Turkish leaders limited the Armenians' rights, such as the right to worship, the right to testify in court, and the right to carry weapons or ride horses. The punishment for breaking any of these rules could be as cruel as execution.
Reasons for Poor Treatment
The intentions of the massacre was soley due to the Christian Armenians living in a Muslim empire. These mass killings were meant to frighten the Armenians. At this point in time, they were gaining more political power and taking more jobs and busniesses and, ultimately, money that the sultan thought should belong to the Muslims, so he began the quiet extermination.
Hamidian Massacres
The Ottoman Empire in the late 1800s was ruled by the Muslim absolute ruler, Sultan Abdul-Hamid II. As part of the Muslim religion, he was entitled to spread the word of the Kuran. The easiest way for him to do so, as leader of a vast empire, was to make sure everyone in the empire was Muslim as well. In 1895, he lead a massacre of between 100,000 and 300,000 Armenians, and burnt down many Armenian-based marketplaces and other businesses.