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ARCHBISHOP






Letters


From the Central Board of Jewish Community in Greece (About the issue of writing faith on identity cards)

20/3/2001

CENTRAL BOARD OF JEWISH COMMUNITY IN GREECE



To His Beatitude

Archbishop of Athens and of all Greece

Mgr. Christodoulos

Archdiocese of Athens


20 of March 2001

Your Beatitude,

Your statement on 15 0f March's "VIMA" about the issue of writing of faith on identity cards asks for a plain clarification:

The Greek Jews as well as the faithful of other creeds are opposed the writing of their faith on their identical cards for various reasons. We, Jews, are against it because as it has been explained by a number of experts , and as Mr. Karkayiannis wrote in "KATHIMERINI" on 16th of March 2001, "In older times, if you carried, since the day of your birth, the seal of curse, and at the place that your faith was meant to be the word 'Jew' was written then you, automatically and without good cause, were to take the road to crematories". The opposition of ours we have been explicitly wording since '90s, that is since the subject first arose, to all political authorities of the country.

That position of ours has been crystalline, has been expressed in public, and cannot be susceptible of misunderstanding that supposedly concern secret or other type of proceedings.

Likewise, we are also unable to understand another point in your interview where you have mixed up -as you shouldn't- the subject of identity cards with that of the Memorial in Salonica which was erected for the 60.000 Greek Jews who perished in Nazi's concetration camps. That Memorial was a polity's delayed debt to its unjustly lost citizens.

By the way, we would like your Beatitude to take into account that statements of the kind as " Do you know who are behind the subject of identity cards? The Jews. And it is the first time that we have data for it", may cause a general anti-semitic climate. And such a climate might result in potential acts of vandalism at Jewish graveyards and institutions. Acts that You Yourself are obliged to condemn.

Most respectfully

The President, Moses Konstadinis; The General Secretary Abraham Raytan



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