The dogs sleep in the streets, all over the city, wrote Mark Twain in 1867.
They would not move, through the Sultan himself passed by.
Stray dogs on the streets of Istanbul.
They extend their humanity to those inferior animals, which are neglected or persecuted among us.
In all the streets there are, at certain distances, vessels filled with water for the dogs.
Then came a period of modernization, where dogs came to be associated with poverty and unkemptness.
The people of Istanbul vehemently opposed this carnage.
They rescued as many dogs as they could and hid them away in their homes and barracks.
The Director of Istanbul Pasteur Institute, Dr. Remlinger even suggested setting up of extermination camps.
If ten slaughterhouses are established, each can process a hundred dogs a day.
The municipality workers captured 80,000 dogs and sent them to Sivriada, never to return.
The island was rock solid with no trees, vegetation, water or food.
Not a single dog survived.
Some drowned while trying to escape.
Some were killed by others for food.
But most of them starved.
Screams, cries, heated arguments were heard all across Istanbul for days.
The Turks were irate and resisted the operation.
People hid as many as they could in their homes.
However, later I discovered 30,000 more in the city.
I gradually destroyed them as well.
The massacre of the city’s stray dogs left a scar on the psyche of Istanbul residents.
We believe this is in no way different from the Sivriada massacre that was committed in the past.
