The 1896 Defense of Van or Van Rebellion was an act of self-defense by the Armenian population in Van

Van, Turkey

Van is a city in southeastern Turkey and the seat of the Kurdish-majority Van Province, and is located on the eastern shore of Lake Van. The city's official population in 2010 was 367,419, but many estimates put this as much higher with a 1996 estimate stating 500,000 and former Mayor Burhan...

 against the armed forces of the Ottoman Empire

Ottoman Empire

The Ottoman EmpireIt was usually referred to as the "Ottoman Empire", the "Turkish Empire", the "Ottoman Caliphate" or more commonly "Turkey" by its contemporaries...

 in June 1896.

Background

The Van region had avoided the earlier stages of the Hamidian massacres

Hamidian massacres

The Hamidian massacres , also referred to as the Armenian Massacres of 1894–1896, refers to the massacring of Armenians by the Ottoman Empire, with estimates of the dead ranging from anywhere between 80,000 to 300,000, and at least 50,000 orphans as a result...

 in 1895. However, by January 1896 there was increasing violence - a report by the British vice-consul in Van, W. H. Williams, said the many Armenian villages had been looted and "Armenians are everywhere in a state bordering on panic, afraid lest the spring will bring still further disasters".
The Ottoman authorities eventually sent an expedition to attack the Armenian population of Van in June 1896.

Defense and Massacre

Between the 3 and 11 June some six to seven hundred Armenian men defended the Armenian sections of the Aigestan (Garden City) district of the city. After a week of fighting, the sultan sought assistance from the Western powers to end the violence, promising that he would guarantee the lives and safety of the Armenians of Van. After some negotiations, and making clear they had been acting in self-defense in the face of continual massacre, the Armenian defenders agreed to leave for Persia, escorted by Ottoman troops. En route, as nearly 1,000 Armenians marched towards the border, they were massacred by Ottoman troops and Kurdish tribesmen. This was followed by further massacres throughout the Van region. Vice-consul Williams estimated that some 20,000 Armenians had been killed and some 350 Armenian villages destroyed.

Aftermath

In July 1897, an Armenian Fedayee group undertook a revenge attack, known as the Khanasor Expedition

Khanasor Expedition

The Khanasor Expedition was an attack by an Armenian irregular unit against the Kurdish Mazrik tribe on July 25, 1897. In 1896, in the aftermath of the Defense of Van, the Mazrik tribe had ambushed and slaughtered many of the Armenian defenders of Van as they were retreating into Persia...

, against the Kurdish Mazrig tribe that had been responsible for the massacre of the defenders of Van when they were moving towards the Persian border.