User:Calthinus/The Holocaust in Greece

The Holocaust in Greece refers to the systematic elimination of most of Greece's pre-World War II Jewish population by Nazi Germany and its allies.

Background

Prior to World War II, there existed two main groups of Jews in Greece: the scattered Romaniote communities which had existed in Greece since antiquity; and the approximately 56,000-strong Sephardi Jewish community of Thessaloniki, originally Jews fleeing the Spanish Inquisition who were guaranteed safe shelter by Ottoman Sultan Bayazid II, who ordered all regional governors to welcome Jewish refugees onto their shores, with later Ottoman governments continuing the policies of granting citizenship and shelter to Jews fleeing persecution by Christian rulers. The Jews of Greece were originally mostly Romaniote Jews who spoke a Greek dialect but with the mass arrival of Sephardim from Spain, many of these became assimilated into the newly dominant Sephardic culture among the Jewish community, adopting also the Ladino language. Jews had been the majority in Thessaloniki for centuries, and remained so at the end of Ottoman rule on the eve of the Balkan Wars, although this majority was lost as the Jewish community declined from 90,000 down to 56,000 after the collapse of the Ottoman Empire, including anti-Jewish discrimination, land confiscations, the Great Fire of Thessaloniki, and the reconstruction afterwards which displaced the Jewish community. The Jewish communities of Athens, the islands and Epirus were integrated into Greek public life, while the picture was more complicated in the traditionally Ladino-speaking Thessaloniki community.

Although the Greek Jewish community was used to Jewish-Christian tensions that often had origins in the economic rivalries and the Ottoman millet system which pitted religious groups against one another, they were completely unprepared for the forms of anti-Semitism which had matured in Germany.

In the German zone

Registration of the male Jews by Nazis at the center of Thessaloniki (Eleftherias square), July 1942.

When the occupation zones were drawn up, Thessaloniki came under German control, while Thrace came under Bulgarian control. The Greek army evacuated Thessaloniki in early 1941, and the population was urged to stock up on supplies in preparation for the hard times ahead; before the arrival of Germans, local anti-Semites began posting warnings on Jewish businesses saying "Jews Not Welcome Here".

The German occupation of Thessaloniki began on 8 April 1941. On the 15th of April the Jewish leadership within the city was arrested, and in June, the Rosenburg Commando began confiscating Jewish cultural property including manuscripts and art, and sending it back to Germany. Significant hardship occurred in the winter of 1941-1942, as refugees streamed in from the hinterlands of Greek Makedonia and Thrace, straining food supplies beyond their limit and causing starvation and typhus outbreaks, combined with summary executions of the Jewish population during the situation by the Germans; during some parts of the winter, 60 Jews died each day. The Germans made an effort to spread anti-Semitic sentiments among the local population, and revived local anti-Semitic publications that had been banned under the Metaxas regime.

For the first year of the German occupation, neither the Nuremberg Laws nor any specific anti-Semitic measures were applied, although there were some unorganized incidents by local anti-Semites. However, since 1937 but especially during this year, the Germans undertook a systematic investigation of the Jewish community and its assets, which included having Hans Reegler, a half-Greek half-German agent who pretended to be a British Jew named William Lions, assemble a comprehensive network of informants that compiled all the necessary information on individuals and assets of value.

In July 1942, forced labor was imposed on the Jewish population by Doctor Max Merten, the German chief civilian administrator of Thessaloniki. Merten ordered all Jews between the ages of 18 and 45 to report to Eleftherios Square at 8 in the morning. In a "ritual humiliation" in extreme heat, fully clothed, the 9,000 men were forced to take part in a "gymnastics drill" lasting six and a half hours, under the threat of being beaten, whipped, shot or set upon by dogs if they did not do as they were told. They were forced to gaze straight at the sun the whole time, and if their eyes moved, they would be whipped or otherwise punished. The "drill" also included running long distances, moving about on all fours, rolling in dust and performing somersaults. In the following days, several of the men died from brain haemorrhages or meningitis.

In October 1942, Merten implemented measures to extract any and all objects of value (jewelry, etc) from the Jewish community. Merten, 28 years old at the time, was "above all an extortionist". He allowed exemptions from his forced labor programme for large amounts of money, paid in cash stuffed in sacks brought to his office by wheelbarrow. Salonica's Chief Rabbi, Zevi Koretz was a "naïve partner" of Merten; he acquiesced to all of Merten's demands, thinking that by doing so he was saving his people from extermination; however despite his good faith, he made it easier for the Germans to implement their plans.

In December 1942, Jewish cemeteries were looted. The Germans demolished the old Jewish cemetery in Thessaloniki, which dated back to the 15th century Spanish expulsions of Sephardim so the ancient tombstones could be used as building material for sidewalks and walls. They were also used to build a public baths and a swimming pool in the city. The site of the old cemetery is today occupied by the campus of the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki.

In 1943, Jews in the German zones were forced to wear the Star of David, and their residences were similarly marked, so they could be easily identified and further isolated from the rest of Greek society. Jewish families were kicked out of their homes and arrested while the Nazi-controlled press turned public opinion by spreading anti-Semitism against them. As spring approached, Jews were shoved into ghettos, the largest of which was called Baron Hirsch, after a Jewish railroad builder in the Habsburg Empire. In this camp, by early March, 2500 Jews were squeezed into 593 small rooms. Signs written in Greek, German and Ladino warned Jews not to exit, and the non-Jewish population to not enter, on pain of death. Throughout the night, German officers forced the Jewish inmates to perform traditional dances for their "entertainment". At the end of their stay, the railroad to Salonica that had been built by the historical Baron Hirsch, originally intended to help Jews escape from Russian pogroms, was used to send Salonica's Jews north to Auschwitz.

Despite warnings of impending deportations, most Jews were reluctant to leave their homes, although several hundred were able to flee the city. The Germans and Bulgarians began mass deportations in March 1943, sending the Jews of Thessaloniki and Thrace in packed boxcars to the distant Auschwitz and Treblinka death camps. By the summer of 1943, the Jews of the German and Bulgarian zones were gone and only those in the Italian zone remained. Jewish property in Thessaloniki was distributed to Greek 'caretakers' who were chosen by special committee, the "Service for the Disposal of Jewish Property" (YDIP). Instead of giving apartments and businesses to the many refugees, they were most often given to friends and relatives of committee members or collaborators.

In the Italian zone

A young woman weeps during the deportation of the Romanoite Jews of Ioannina on 25 March 1944. Almost all of the people deported were murdered on or shortly after 11 April 1944, when the train carrying them reached Auschwitz-Birkenau.

In September 1943, after the Italian collapse, the Germans turned their attention to the Jews of Athens and the rest of formerly Italian-occupied Greece. There their propaganda was not as effective, as the ancient Romaniote Jewish communities were well-integrated into the Orthodox Greek society and could not easily be singled out from the Christians, who in turn were more ready to resist the German authorities' demands. The Archbishop of Athens Damaskinos ordered his priests to ask their congregations to help the Jews and sent a strong-worded letter of protest to the collaborationist authorities and the Germans. Many Orthodox Christians risked their lives hiding Jews in their apartments and homes, despite the threat of imprisonment. Even the Greek police ignored instructions to turn over Jews to the Germans. When Jewish community leaders appealed to Prime Minister Ioannis Rallis, he tried to alleviate their fears by saying that the Jews of Thessaloniki had been guilty of subversive activities and that this was the reason they were deported.

At the same time, Elias Barzilai, the Grand Rabbi of Athens, was summoned to the Department of Jewish Affairs and told to submit a list of names and addresses of members of the Jewish community. Instead, he destroyed the community records, thus saving the lives of thousands of Athenian Jews. He advised the Jews of Athens to flee or go into hiding. A few days later, the Rabbi himself was spirited out of the city by EAM-ELAS fighters and joined the resistance. EAM-ELAS helped hundreds of Jews escape and survive (especially officer Stefanos Sarafis), many of whom stayed with the resistance as fighters and/or interpreters.

In the Bulgarian zone

In March 1943, 4,058 of the total 4,232 Jews were rounded up and sent to local warehouses by the Bulgarian occupation authorities, as well as concentration camps in Bulgaria. Kept under inhumane conditions, they were informed by the Bulgarians that they would be sent to Mandate Palestine. However, the deportees could not be convinced. Except for five who died in the Bulgarian camps, they were sent to Treblinka extermination camp where they died in the following days. By the end of March, 97% of the local Jewish community in this zone was exterminated.

Effects

Despite some assistance from the surrounding Greek population, the Jewish community in Thessaloniki, already reduced by a wave of emigration in the prior decades, would be almost entirely annihilated by the Holocaust. Only 1950 individuals survived Only one Jewish family from Thessaloniki, once called the "mother of Israel", had all its members survive.

In total, at least 81% (around 60,000) of Greece's total pre-war Jewish population perished, with the percentage ranging from 91% in Thessaloniki to 50% in Athens, and less in other provincial areas such as Volos (36%). The low rate in Volos was because of coordination by Rabbi Pesach with the island's bishop, who was tipped off by the island's German consul, and the actions of the local Greek community that provided them with resources during their time in hiding. In the Bulgarian-occupied zone, death rates surpassed 90%. In Zakynthos, all 275 Jews survived, hidden in the island's interior.