Evacuation of Ayvalik

Evacuation of Ayvalik
Evacuation of Ayvalik
Location	Ayvalik
Date	1917
Target	Greek population of Ayvalik
Attack type	Ethnic cleansing, deportation, genocidal massacre, mass murder
Victims	12,000-23,000 deported
Perpetrators	Ottoman Empire, Young Turks, Otto Liman von Sanders
Motive	Anti-Greek sentiment, Turkification, Turkish nationalism, racism

Greek genocide
Greek genocide
Background
	Young Turk Revolution, Ottoman Greeks, Pontic Greeks, Ottoman Empire
The genocide
	Labour Battalions, Death march, Pontic Greek genocide, Massacre of Phocaea, Evacuation of Ayvalik, İzmit massacres, 1914 Greek deportations, Samsun deportations, Amasya trials, Burning of Smyrna
Foreign aid and relief
	Relief Committee for Greeks of Asia Minor, American Committee for Relief in the Near East
Responsible parties
	Young Turks or Committee of Union and Progress; Three Pashas: Talat, Enver, Djemal; Bahaeddin Şakir, Teskilati Mahsusa or Special Organization, Nureddin Pasha, Topal Osman, Mustafa Kemal Atatürk
See also
	Greco-Turkish War (1919–1922), Greeks in Turkey, Population Exchange, Greek refugees, Armenian genocide, Sayfo, Diyarbekir genocide, Istanbul trials of 1919–1920, Malta Tribunals
	v; t; e;

The evacuation of Ayvalik took place in May 1917 as part of the genocide policies of the Ottoman government. The population of the predominantly Greek-inhabited town of Ayvalik, Ottoman Empire (in modern Turkey) on the east coast of the Aegean Sea was forcibly deported to the hinterland of Anatolia by the Ottoman authorities. The deportation was organized by Imperial German Army General and chief military adviser to the Ottoman Empire, Liman von Sanders, and included death marches, looting, torture and massacre against the local civilian population.

Persecution against the population of the predominantly Greek-inhabited settlement of Aivalik on the east coast of the Aegean had begun in 1910. In 1917, during World War I although nearby Greece was still a neutral state, the ethnic Greek population of the Ottoman state was viewed as an internal threat and genocide policies continued to be implemented.