2018_Framework and Historical Context of Jewish Greeks and Jews in Occupied Greece: Indicative localities Thessaloniki, Athens, Corfu, Xanthi & Zakynthos, International Scientific Conference "Nations of Occupied Europe Facing the Holocaust", Warsaw, 6-8 December 2017

2018_Framework and Historical Context of Jewish Greeks and Jews in Occupied Greece: Indicative localities Thessaloniki, Athens, Corfu, Xanthi & Zakynthos, International Scientific Conference "Nations of Occupied Europe Facing the Holocaust", Warsaw, 6-8 December 2017

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1AQWaN7SXLm5aogpv6CQmAInMEunhu-bL/view?usp=sharing  

 From its beginnings, Greece was founded and based on the principle and constitutional dictate of full emancipation and freedom of Religion for all its citizens.  Greece was attacked by Italy in 1940 and beat her in the field.  The German Reich invaded and occupied all of Greece on April 1941.  The country was divided in 3 occupation zones:  German, Italian (up to September 1943) and Bulgarian.  The Quisling governments supported the Jewish Greek citizens, albeit with no success.  The Church supported fully the Jews.  Also many were saved by joining the Resistance in the mountains.  The overwhelming majority of the non-Jewish population was sympathetic to the plight.  The Holocaust proceeded differently in various localities and not simultaneously.  In smaller cities-communities full integration of the Jews into them coupled also with historical tolerance was instrumental in rescue.

 

 

"The Jews of Thessaloniki: Legacies of the Past, Shaping of Traditions, Challenges for the Future". The Holocaust: Diachronic and Interdisciplinary Approaches. International Conference, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Dept. of Social Theology, 5 October 2017 [full citations]

"The Jews of Thessaloniki: Legacies of the Past, Shaping of Traditions, Challenges for the Future". The Holocaust: Diachronic and Interdisciplinary Approaches. International Conference, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Dept. of Social Theology, 5 October 2017 [full citations].

 https://drive.google.com/file/d/1pzBcHuPoXN7HkQc60j5LMDYe7QZf11WS/view?usp=sharing 

 More than 2 millennia of Jewish presence in Thessaloniki have shaped both the city and its Jews.  The Jews of Thessaloniki, in most instances, were subject to the fortunes and misfortunes of their coreligionists in the realms of the Kingdom of Macedonia, the Roman Empire, the Eastern Roman Empire – Byzantium and the Ottoman Empire.  A new and current chapter in their history is the birth of the modern Hellenic state and its foundation on civil rights.  In the second decade of the 20th century the Jews of Thessaloniki finally belong, on equal par with the overwhelming Christian majority, as Hellenes in Greece.  The tumultuous events of the previous century, both worldwide and locally, had profound consequences for Jewish Thessaloniki.  Still the community is in search of its current identity and of a vision for the future.  Our presence here enhances my optimism.