Anti-Semitism flares in Greece

The worst-kept secret in literature is that Homer the Greek depicted the Trojans as innocent victims of circumstance in general and of Greek blood lust in particular. The invading Greeks are described as barbarians while Troy is seen as a utopia. It has broad streets, wise rulers, industrious women, and of course Hector and Andromache, the noblest of the noble.

Yet we think of the Greeks positively. We admire the Parthenon and other architectural treasures; we are impressed with its sculpture, we live longer because it was a Greek who opened the world’s eyes to the fact that disease is the result of natural, not supernatural causes. Ours is a government based on the writings of Plato (not “The Republic” which manages to blend the worst elements of fascism and communism, but his “Laws” and his “Statesman”). Our geometry is Euclidian of Pythagorean elements thrown in. And yet. And yet even the greatest of Greek cities Athens built the Parthenon with money stolen from its reluctant allies. Athens thought nothing of destroying a neutral city because it refused to become its ally (read “slave”) and Athens couldn’t take the critiques of Socrates and so had him executed. The glory that was Greece is a bit tarnished, both in literature and in history.

And now again.

For a long time there was little anti-Semitism in Greece. Yes, there were crazy right-wingers there, but Nazism has a bad name in most countries the Germans occupied. However, with the coming of the Gaza war last year politicians and pundits on both the left and right of the political spectrum have been spewing anti-Semitic remarks. And then the arsons and desecrations started.

On the island of Crete the Etz Hayim synagogue was torched, saved, for a while, by two Albanians and a Palestinian immigrant who lived across the street and alerted the fire brigade. But the building was saved only for a while. A second fire was more successful, and while the first did not evoke condemnation by the Greek government, the second one did. “The attack on the Etz Hayyim Synagogue not only constitutes an attack on one of the remaining Jewish monuments in the island of Crete, but also an attack against the history and the cultural heritage of our homeland, Greece,” Prime Minister George Papandreou wrote to the Anti-Defamation-League. “The Government, I personally as well as the entire Greek nation, condemn this abominable act in the strongest possible terms.” Well, maybe he does, but the entire Greek nation seems to be of two minds. A well know anti-Semite, Kostas Plevris wrote a 1,400 page book condemning Jews. He was brought to trial by the Greek chapter of the Helsinki Human Rights Monitor and the Anti-Nazi initiative. And after a long trial was found innocent of incitement to violence against Jews. Even the prosecutor referred to his screed “Jews: The Whole Truth.” as “a scientific work.”

In 2009 the Jewish cemetery of Ioannina was vandalized four times. Greaves and a Holocaust memorial were destroyed and body parts were unearthed. A high-ranking police officer caught in the cemetery immediately after one of the incidents was not questioned by authorities. Neither the mayor, the governor nor the highest-ranking priest in the city condemned the outrage.

George Karatzaferis, the leader of the far-right political party LAOS wrote an article in his weekly newspaper calling the Jews “Christ killers” and saying that the “blood of the Jews stinks.” Left-wing leaders refused to condemn the anti-Semitic incidents or even join Greece’s commemoration of Holocaust Memorial Day in late January. “There are no good Jews,” Jimmy Panousis, a well-known liberal radio personality said on his show. “Jews are pigs and murderers, but fortunately their days are numbered.”

The newspaper Avriani, blames American Jews for causing the global economic crisis, warning that American Jews were plotting to set off World War III. Piraeus Serafim of the Greek Orthodox Church warned of “Zionist monsters with sharp claws.” Salonica Anthimos, another church official known for his anti-Jewish statements said Jews were being punished for killing Christ.

A whole nation cannot be condemned for the rantings of a few. But let’s keep an eye on Greece, whose glory days are long gone, but whose ancestors even then were not above a massacre of innocents.