Holocaust Remembrance Day

(GREEK NEWS AGENDA) Liberation of Auschwitz Anniversary

“Auschwitz took the lives of many; Greek Jews were dispro­portio­na­tely numerous among them. Greeks of other faiths also paid a heavy price, often in defence of their Jewish brethren.

Many have been declared Righteous among the Nations and their names are engraved at the Holocaust Memorial of Yad Vashem,” Alternate Foreign Minister Dimitris Droutsas said in a statement, issued on January 27, on the 65^th anniversary of the liberation of the concentration camp.
This year also marks the tenth anniversary of the Stockholm Declaration which launched a fertile rethinking of the Holocaust in Europe and Greece is proud to be among the original signatories of this epochal document, said Droutsas.

“Greeks in Auschwitz-Birkenau” 

At a press conference at Greece’s Press and Communication Office in New York, on January 26, the head of the Foreign Ministry’s Diplomatic and Historical Archives, Fotini Tomai presented a series of evidence, documents and testimonies that reveal and highlight the extent of human tragedy as recorded in the book “Greeks in Auschwitz-Birkenau.”
This publication of the Foreign Ministry (in Greek and English) will be presented today at a special event at the Greek Consulate General in New York. 
See also: UN, International Holocaust Remembrance Day;
The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum: International Holocaust Remembrance Day;  Greek News Agenda: Special Issue – The Jews of Greece

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Remembering Greek Jews

(GREEK NEWS AGENDA) A memorial event for the Greek Jews killed during the Holocaust was held yesterday (June 17) at the Zappeion Conference Centre.  The event took place on the occasion of the Foreign Ministry’s publication of “Greeks in Auschwitz-Birkenau” and was attended by the President of the Hellenic Republic, Karolos Papoulias.  Foreign Minister Dora Bakoyannis held meetings with the President of the Central Board of Jewish Communities in Greece (KIS), Moses Constantines, and the President of the Jewish Community of Thessaloniki, David Saltiel. The book “Greeks in Auschwitz-Birkenau” recounts the story of the sixty thousand Greek Jews into the of Auschwitz-Birkenau. Greek News Agenda: Special Issue-The Jews of Greece

The Jews of Greece

(GREEK NEWS AGENDA)   The presence of Jews in Greece traces back to ancient times. These Greek Jews, known as Romaniotes, spoke Greek (Judeo-Greek) and had developed their own culture and customs within the confines of the Byzantine Empire, living on the mainland as well as on some islands, like Rhodes, Chios and Samos. That Jewish population of Greece increased dramatically in 1492, after the Catholic monarchs of Spain – Queen Isabella and King Ferdinand – at the instigation of the Inquisition, issued the decree of Granada, according to which all Jews who refused to convert to Catholicism were to be expelled within 6 months; it is estimated that more than 200.000 Jews were expelled from that “cursed land.”