Is Greece really 'the most antisemitic country in Europe?

This posting has these items:
1) EUractiv: Syriza supports recognising Palestine;
2) JTA: Why is Greece the most antisemitic country in Europe?, because the ADL survey measured stereotypes not actions.;
3) Guardian: Who are the Independent Greeks?, Syriza’s right-wing xenophobic coalition partner;
4) The Pappas Post: Don’t Believe What You See in ‘Antisemitism’ Poll Results, Say Greece’s Jews;
5) Guardian: Greek generosity to strangers on the shore, photos of migrants arriving at Kos.;

Supporters of Greece’s neo-Nazi Golden Dawn party celebrating election results in June, 2012. Photo by AP

Syriza supports recognising Palestine

By Sarantis Michalopoulos, Euractiv.com
April 03, 2015

The Greek government is committed to recognising Palestine, said Syriza MEP Sofia Sakorafa.

In an interview with EurActiv Greece, the lawmaker said that 138 countries within the UN are in favour of the request to upgrade the Palestinian Authority to a state, and dozens of national parliaments have already done so.

In the EU, Sweden unilaterally recognized Palestine in October 2014, while similar, non-binding votes have taken place in the parliaments of France, the UK, Ireland and Spain.

“There is a fixed commitment of the Greek government to recognize Palestine as a state […] I estimate that very soon the Greek government will also raise the issue. Schematically-speaking, once it takes a breath from the suffocation,” Sakorafa underlined, referring to the tough negotiations between Athens and the so-called “Troika” on the future of the cash-strapped country.

Last December, the European Parliament approved a non-binding resolution calling for international recognition of Palestinian statehood.

The carefully-worded measure, initially proposed by S&D, ALDE and the Greens, promoted “recognition of Palestinian statehood and the two-state solution,” and “believes these should go hand in hand with the development of peace talks, which should be advanced.”

Coalition partners less enthused

Such a move by Syriza would probably put it at odds with its coalition partner, the right-wing Independent Greeks.

Defence Minister and Independent Greeks chief Panos Kammenos recently spoke in favour of continuing defence cooperation with Israel, as well as trilateral co-operation with Nicosia and Tel Aviv.

“We will continue the cooperation both on a political and military level,” he said in February, after a meeting with Israel’s ambassador to Greece.

Greek Golden Dawn MP Ilias Kasidiaris read out Protocol 19 from the Protocols of the Elders of Zion in parliament: “In order to destroy the prestige of heroism we shall send them for trial in the category of theft, murder and every kind of abominable and filthy crime”. Given the source, he was presumably referring to Jews. YouTube screenshot


Why is Greece the most antisemitic country in Europe?

By Gavin Rabinowitz, JTA
May 20, 2014

When the Anti-Defamation League published its global antisemitism survey last week, Greece, the cradle of democracy, captured the ignominious title of most antisemitic country in Europe.

With 69 percent of Greeks espousing antisemitic views, according to the survey, Greece was on par with Saudi Arabia, more antisemitic than Iran (56 percent) and nearly twice as antisemitic as Europe’s second-most antisemitic country, France (37 percent).

On its surface, the poll suggests that antisemitism is running rampant in Greece. Much of the blame goes to the neo-Nazi Golden Dawn party, which has found fertile ground for its extreme-right ideology in the ruins of Greece’s economic crisis. In elections held Sunday for Athens mayor, for example, 16 percent of the vote went to Golden Dawn spokesman Ilias Kasidiaris, a man notorious for beating a female political opponent during a television interview and for the large swastika tattooed on his shoulder.

But both the ADL and Greece’s small Jewish community caution that the reality is more nuanced than the poll numbers suggest.

“There is a danger of sensationalizing it, a danger of overplaying the psychological impact of the poll,” Michael Salberg, ADL’s director of international affairs, told JTA. “There needs to be real hard internal look at the data and examining what are the forces at play.”
For their part, Greek Jewish leaders took pains to point out that despite widespread bigotry, Greece hasn’t seen the sort of anti-Jewish violence that has cropped up in some other European countries, such as France.

“Despite the poll showing high levels of antisemitism, it must be noted that in Greece over the last four years we have not had any antisemitic violence against people or Jewish institutions,” said Victor Eliezer, the secretary general of the Central Board of Jewish Communities in Greece.

“This is not a poll about violence, but rather a survey on stereotypes, and yes, there are a lot of stereotypes among the Greek public,” he said.

The poll gauged antisemitism based on whether respondents agreed with a majority of 11 statements on Jewish power, loyalty, money and behavior that the ADL says suggest bias. They include such statements as Jews talk too much about what happened to them during the Holocaust; Jews are more loyal to Israel than to the countries they live in; Jews think they are better than other people; Jews have too much power in the business world; and Jews have too much control over global affairs.

Critics have suggested that the survey is deeply flawed because the statements are not fair indicators of real anti-Jewish bias.
Of the 579 Greeks polled, 85 percent said Jews had too much power in the business world, 82 percent said Jews have too much power in the financial markets and 74 percent said Jews have too much influence over global affairs. The margin of error for Greece was plus or minus 4.4 percent.

Member of parliament Dimitris Kammenos, Independent Greeks. He responded on a Tweet by Russian news-site RT about antisemitism in Europe with the question: “Have you recorded the attacks of Jews against all of us?” Other iffy tweets include likening Greece staying in the Eurozone to being sent to Auschwitz.

In Greece, antisemitic viewpoints are aired frequently, particularly the notions that Jews control the global economy and politics. In 2012, when the Golden Dawn’s Kasidiaris read in Parliament from the antisemitic forgery “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion,” the reading drew no condemnation from the other lawmakers present.

Nor was there public condemnation when Golden Dawn slammed the recent visit by the American Jewish Committee’s executive director, David Harris, as a trip to ensure further “Jewish influence over Greek political issues” and safeguard the interests of “international loan sharks.”

Golden Dawn hasn’t been alone in expressing such sentiments.

Earlier this year, the left-wing Syriza party’s candidate for regional governor accused Greek Prime Minister Antonis Samaras* of heading a Jewish conspiracy to visit “a new Hanukkah against the Greeks.” Syriza reluctantly dropped the candidate, Theodoros Karypidis.

At the heart of Karypidis’ theory was a move last year by Samaras to shut the allegedly corrupt Hellenic Broadcasting Authority and replace it with New Hellenic Radio and Television, known by its Greek acronym NERIT. According to Karypidis, NERIT is derived from the Hebrew word for candle, “ner,” which he links to Hanukkah.

Even the mainstream political parties have long histories of using antisemitic tropes.

“Greeks are fond of conspiracy theories, as they are steeped in conspiracy on a personal level,” Euthymios Tsiliopoulos, a journalist and political commentator, wrote on the popular current affairs website The Times of Change in the wake of the Karypidis scandal.
“As so many things are conducted through under-the-table, backroom deals, most naturally assume that the whole world is run in this manner,” he wrote. “As such, there is willingness to believe that the hardships the country and its inhabitants have undergone throughout the centuries is due to the machinations of foreigners. After all, it’s easier to believe this than to fix the perennial ills plaguing Greek society.”

Still, there are some signs of improvement.

Samaras and his government have moved to condemn antisemitic expressions and launched a crackdown on Golden Dawn, jailing many of its leaders. The government also has acted against Holocaust denial and runs school education programs together with the Jewish community.

“From the results of the poll, what is clear is that these stereotypes are very prevalent in Greek society,” Eliezer said. “How do you combat these stereotypes? Only through education.”

The ADL’s Salberg hopes the results of the poll will motivate others to act, too.

“Perhaps,” he said, “these very sobering numbers will raise questions within civil society among religious and civic leaders who don’t hold those views.”

Panos Kammenos, defence minster, “drew condemnation from Greece’s Jewish community in December after he said on television that Greek Jews don’t pay taxes — a remark denied publicly by a government official, who called it ‘conspiracy theories, lies and slander that had become a part of ‘the dark side of the Internet’.

“As defence minister, Kammenos will oversee the military ties with Israel that have become much closer in recent years. Even considering the taxes statement, he is still likely to be more pro-Israel than the Syriza lawmakers, who have taken part in protests against Israel, with some even participating in the flotillas to Gaza.” JTA, Jan. 29th 2015

Who are the Independent Greeks?

Rightwing party differs on many issues with radical leftist Syriza, but they are united by a mutual hatred for bailout programme

Helena Smith in Athens, Guardian
January 26, 2015

Syriza just missed out on the 151 MPs it needed to govern alone after Greece’s election, winning 149 seats with a 36.3% share of the vote. The party has formed a coalition government with Independent Greeks, who took 13 seats.

The populist, rightwing Independent Greeks (Anel) would at first sight make for a strange bedfellow for the radical leftists Syriza and the deal makes an unusual alliance, but they are brought together by a mutual hatred for the bailout programme keeping Greece afloat.

The two parties have vastly diverging world views, standing well apart on issues such as illegal migration, Greece’s ever-fractious relationship with Nato rival Turkey, gay marriage and the role of the Greek Orthodox church.

Under their leader Panos Kammenos, who defected from the centre-right New Democracy party to form Anel at the height of the crisis in February 2012, the group has proved to be rabidly nationalistic in foreign affairs.

The politician is particularly virulent on the issue of the need to reclaim war reparations that he argues were never properly dealt with after the Nazis’ brutal occupation of the country. He was accused of being antisemitic when he claimed last month that Greek Jews paid less tax than other citizens.

His party is part of the European Conservatives and Reformists political group in the European parliament, which was founded at the behest of David Cameron.

Both Syriza and Independent Greeks agree on the need to end austerity. And both hold strident views on the especially sensitive issue of Greek sovereignty having been denuded as a result of six years of stewardship under Athens’ hated “troika” of creditors. Anel, like Syriza, says foreign lenders have turned the debt-crippled country into a “debt colony”.

In opposition, the two political forces collaborated to block the election of a new head of state, which ultimately triggered Sunday’s snap polls. With Syriza and Anel outright rejecting the commitments the previous government signed up to with creditors – outlined in the onerous bailout accords that Athens agreed with the EU, European Central Bank and International Monetary Fund – they will make an extremely tough negotiating team when stalled talks resume this month.

Kammenos’s appointment will not be welcome news to Berlin, which has provided the biggest share of the €240bn (£180bn) in rescue funds to Athens.

Greek composer Mikis Theodorakis, who wrote the music for Zorba the Greek, is pro-communist as well as anti-Israel and antisemitic.


Don’t Believe What You See in ‘Antisemitism’ Poll Results, Say Greece’s Jews

By Gregory Pappas, The PAPPAS Post
May 21, 2014

EXTRACT
In 1982 following the Israeli invasion of Lebanon, in a public statement, Prime Minister Andreas Papandreou, a close friend of Yasser Arafat, openly compared the Israelis to the Nazis.

A front page story in 1987 called the Jewish festival of Hanukkah “a celebration of hatred against Greeks,” while a 1988 cover featured a picture of Israeli soldiers under the title “The Beasts Who Crucified Christ Are Now Exterminating the Orthodox.”

Despite official condemnation of antisemitism from the Greek Orthodox Church of Greece, high-ranking hierarchs with large flocks have been known to go rogue in their statements, most certainly impacting the viewpoints of their faithful and adding to Greek stereotypes of Jews.

The Greek Orthodox Metropolitan of Kalavryta, Amvrossios, published a post on his personal blog, claiming that Jewish “advisors” control the content in Greek schoolbooks, including books for religious studies and history; that 94% of the capital of the National Bank of Greece belongs to Jews; that the Central Board of Greek Jewish Communities, representing Greek Jewry, is a “state within a state,” exempt from paying taxes; and that leftwing Greek politicians, such as Eleftherios Venizelos (Greek PM during World War I) and Kostas Simitis (Greek PM responsible for Greece entering the Eurozone) were secret Jews.

Another high-ranking Metropolitan, Seraphim of Piraeus, caused an international stir when he claimed in an interview on a Greek television station that Jews orchestrated the Holocaust and accused “world Zionism” of a conspiracy to enslave Greece and the Orthodox Church. “Adolf Hitler was an instrument of world Zionism and was financed from the renowned Rothschild family with the sole purpose of convincing the Jews to leave the shores of Europe and go to Israel to establish the new Empire,” Seraphim also said in the interview seen throughout the world.

Antisemitism has even entered popular culture, sports and the arts.

Soccer player Giorgos Katidis giving a Nazi salute during a match (he claimed he didn’t know what it meant). The Hellenic Football Federation gave him a lifetime ban from all Greek national teams and he was fined €50,000.

Mikis Theodorakis, best known for composing the musical score to the film Zorba the Greek, declared on Greek television that he was “anti-Israel and antisemitic. Everything that happens today in the world has to do with the Zionists,” he said, adding that “American Jews are behind the world economic crisis that has hit Greece also.” Back in 2003, The 89-year-old composer said that Israel “is the root of evil.”

Soccer player Giorgos Katidis created an international controversy in 2013, when he gave a Nazi-style salute after scoring the winning goal in a nationally televised match. His action drew condemnation from politicians, fans and the media, forcing him to tears in the dressing room. He later claimed he was unaware of the gesture’s connotations, stating that he just wanted to dedicate the goal to a colleague in the stands. As a result of the salute, the Hellenic Football Federation voted unanimously to give him a lifetime ban from all Greek national teams and he was fined €50,000.

Still, there are some signs of improvement.

Greek Prime Minister Antonis Samaras and his government have moved to condemn anti-Semitic expressions and launched a crackdown on Golden Dawn, jailing many of its leaders. The government also has acted against Holocaust denial and runs school education programs together with the Jewish community.

“From the results of the poll, what is clear is that these stereotypes are very prevalent in Greek society,” Eliezer said. “How do you combat these stereotypes? Only through education.”

Greek generosity to strangers on the shore

All photos from Migrants arrive on Greek island of Kos – in pictures, Guardian June 3rd, 2015.

A group of men, mainly from Syria and Afghanistan, residing in a deserted hotel watch as new arrivals approach. Photo by Yannis Behrakis/Reuters

A member of the Greek coastguard, front left, escorts a group of Syrian refugees to a temporary shelter. Photo by Yannis Behrakis/Reuters

Tourists cycle past an Afghan migrant asleep on a bench outside a local police station. Photo by Yannis Behrakis/Reuters

* Antonis Samaris, New Democracy, was Prime Minister of Greece from 2012 to 2015.