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Greek Jews Win Praise for Role in Rebellion

April 4, 1935
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The Minister of War, General Kondylis, who was in command of the government army which crushed the Venizelist revolt in Macedonia and Thrace, received during his stay in Kavalla the rabbi of the local Jewish community, and expressed his satisfaction with the patriotic attitude demonstrated by the Jews of Salonica and the other Jewish communities of North Greece to an exceptional degree during the uprising.

The Venizelist action in Thrace and Eastern Macedonia was to a considerable extent anti-Semitic in character. The revolutionary agitators recruiting for the rebel army held out the inducement that when Salonica was taken the homes and businesses of the Jews would be given over to the troops to plunder.

In Kavalla, the rebel army commandeered goods from the Jewish shops without payment. When a deputation of the Jewish community complained to the rebel leader, General Kamenos, he justified his action on the ground that the Jews of Salonica were anti-Republicans.

TEMPLE SHELLED

The synagogue in Kavalla was hit by shells during the fighting between the rebel army and the government fleet. The Jewish population of Serres, Drama and Kavalla lived through a very anxious time while the rebels held these towns, and hailed the entry of the regular troops as a deliverance.

Large numbers of Jewish volunteers joined the army in response to the call of the government, in addition to 2,000 Jewish reservists. Most of them have now been demobilized.

Since the revolt was crushed several opposition newspapers have been prohibited, including the anti-Semitic papers in Salonica, Macedonia and Eleutheros Typos. Deputy Peter Levandis, the editor-in-chief of Macedonia, who has been for years carrying on a fierce anti-Semitic agitation in his paper, was found hiding in Salonica, and was arrested and banished.

Nico Fardis, former editor of the Makedonia and now publisher of the Eleutheros Typos, who was the ringleader of the big pogrom in the Campbell Quarter of Salonia in 1929, the Jewish quarter of the city, has also been arrested.

The Governor General of Macedonia, Minister Rhallis, has deprived the Venizelist councillors of Salonica of their offices and has appointed new councillors to replace them. The new councillors include three Jews, Daniel Allaluf, editor and proprietor of the Spagnol newspaper La Prensa; Ely Fraces, director of the Spagnol #aper Accion, and Yomtow Yacoel. Previously there was only one Jewish councillor in Salonica, Advocate Sam Nahmias.

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