Pro-government newspapers in Greece are engaged in an unparalleled anti-Semitic campaign, such as a charge that Jews are behind vast forest fires that have plagued Greece, according to the Athens correspondent of NRC Handlesblad, the leading Dutch daily.
Correspondent Franz van Hasselt also reported that Israel’s military campaign in Lebanon has brought an intensification of the anti-Semitic reports. The charge of Jewish “complicity” in the forest fires appeared in “Avriani,” a popular daily, in a page one article.
The correspondent reported that “Elefterotypia,” another daily, was conducting an anti-Semitic campaign even before the Lebanese action. Van Hasselt reported that the daily complained last year that the director of the Greek Electricity Co. was of Jewish origin. Currently the newspaper is demanding that Jules Dassin, the Jewish husband of movie star and Culture Minister Melina Mercouri, should publicly protest Israel’s military thrust into Lebanon.
The newspaper also suggested that “the Zionists” may have been behind three railway disasters that occurred in Greece in a five-day period, van Hasselt reported.
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
