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Comments (0)A public rally against anti-Semitism will be held in Greece.
The rally, scheduled for Friday, is being organized by The Citizen Initiative for the Defense of the Jewish Cemetery of Ioannina, and will be held outside the Ioannina Jewish cemetery, which has been vandalized four times so far this year.
The incidents were met with general indifference by city officials, state authorities and the political parties, amid allegations of police involvement in the vandalism, according to reports.
The systematic and intense anti-Semitic violence in Ioannina has driven a small but important group of Ioannina citizens to band together. The Citizens Initiative is an organization of more than 100 intellectuals, professors and professionals that live in the city of Ioannina with no political backing or affiliation that decided to act against anti-Semitism.
The organization was founded at the beginning of 2009 “to combat racism and elevate the Jewish cemetery as an inseparable part of the Ioannina history.”
The Jewish Community of Ioannina is the oldest branch of Greek Jewry—the Romaniote Jews—who trace their ancestry in Greece back to the Babylonian exile.
The local Jews believe that the vandals are members of an openly neo-Nazi group who have publicly demonstrated in the city and are known both to the police and the city.
At the time of the last incident in July, Jewish community head Moysis Elissaf accused the police “of criminal negligence since the attacks on the cemetery were incessant.” The tomb of Elissaf’s mother was destroyed in that attack. Elissaf called for the city of Ioannina to come together in solidarity against the vandalism, a plea which was met with indifference and mockery.
When the local bishop was asked to denounce the vandalism, he stated that he “did not want to get political.” The mayor has kept a low-profile on the issue.
Roundup of Tunisian Jews Remembered
Holocaust memorial institutions in France and Israel commemorated the roundup 67 years ago of Tunisian Jews.
Ceremonies Wednesday at Yad Vashem and Sunday at the Memorial de la Shoah in Paris marked the Dec. 9, 1942 roundup of Tunisian Jews as part of an effort to raise awareness of Jewish suffering in Nazi-occupied North Africa during the Holocaust.
Jews in Tunisia were forced to wear yellow stars and work in labor camps; some were deported to Auschwitz. Jews in other Vichy France colonies in Algeria and Morocco, as well as in Italian-occupied Libya, suffered similar fates.
Martin Gilbert, the pre-eminent Holocaust historian, also marked the anniversary with a statement.
“In my historical work over the past 50 years, I have been struck by the neglect of the story of the Jews of North Africa and the dangers facing them under Vichy French and Italian Fascist rule,” Gilbert said in his statement, released Wednesday.
“The story of the persecution of the Jews in North Africa during the Second World War is an integral part of the history of the Holocaust in France; the fate of the Jews living in French North Africa was directly connected to the fate of the Jews living in Metropolitan France. The collaborationist Vichy France extended its anti-Jewish laws—passed in France—to its three North African colonies. Thousands of Jews were sent to camps for slave labor between 1940 and 1943.”
Brazil to Donate Land for Palestinian Reps
Brazil’s senate passed a bill to donate an area in the country’s capital city for a building to house Palestinian representation to the country.
Senators at the foreign affairs and national defense commission declared last Friday that the area in Brasilia must be used for a building to host the Palestinian Special Delegation.
“The bill has not approved land for an embassy,” Sen. Cristovam Buarque clarified.
The donation has been discussed for 10 years. The special delegation members now work out of a house in the capital.
Palestinian representative Ibrahim Al-Zeben, who has ambassador status conferred by the Brazilian government, is enthusiastic about the donation.
“We hope to launch the cornerstone of a new embassy by March,” Al-Zeben said to Brazilian reporters.