Posted on 10/31/2001 1:13:21 PM PST by a_Turk
The assault on America, and the prospect of US military reprisals, is tormenting Greece in a way that, once more, highlights the country's uneasy relationship with the West.
As the Greek Foreign Minister George Papandreou makes an official visit to the US - reassuring Washington of Athens' unstinting support in the fight against terrorism, and touring the smouldering ruins of the World Trade Center - his compatriots are expressing their own views by holding rowdy "anti-war" rallies across Greece.
About 5,000 attended an anti-war protest in Athens .
From the northern port city of Salonika to the southern island of Crete, protestors are participating in demonstrations that have increasingly turned into fervent displays of anti-Americanism.
Not long after the September 11th attack, some 30,000 Greek soccer fans, attending a Uefa match against a Scottish team in Athens, jeered through the moment's silence held in honour of the terror victims.
The Scots looked on aghast as they then tried to burn the Stars and Stripes in the stands.
Organized by the powerful Greek Communist Party (KKE), the protests come less than two years after Greeks expressed similar opposition to Nato's bombing campaign against their co-religionists in Serbia.
With the demonstrators frequently shouting "down with Bush, the killer", analysts say the protests are even more strident than they were in 1999.
"America will use the excuse of a military reaction to settle all its old scores with poor, third world countries. We must try and stop it", said Kostas Kazakos Greece's leading stage actor addressing one such rally in Athens.
Successive opinion polls have showed the Greeks to be, by far, the least sympathetic of all Euro-Alliance nations to post-attack America.
They have also been the least willing to take action against countries harbouring terrorists.
A poll published in Wednesday's authoritative Athenian newspaper Ta Nea noted that as many as 75% of those Greeks voting for centrist or leftist parties were "anti-American" and opposed to the superpower retaliating against the attack, fearing the quest for justice could turn into one of revenge.
Around 58.3% of those who supported right-wing parties were also "anti-American."
Echoing a view first expressed by Archbishop Christodoulos, the country's spiritual leader, most said Uncle Sam was now paying the price for Washington's misguided policies, and other sins of the past.
In trying to explain the opposition, analysts point to the Greeks' delicate geo-political position as citizens of a Christian buffer state, at the crossroads of the east and west.
But the Greeks also cite America's support for the ruthless military regime that ruled them between 1967 and 1974 as the root cause of their reaction.
In addition, they say, Washington is guilty of "double-standards". The Greeks believe the US has failed to pressure Nato ally Turkey to remove some 35,000 Turkish troops from Cyprus, 27 years after Ankara invaded and seized the island's northern third in response to an Athens engineered coup.
The demonstrations, and intense media criticism of US policies in the wake of the suicide bombings, has outraged classics buffs, dyed-in-the wool philhellenes and Greeks living abroad.
"What have we done to the Greeks to deserve such antipathy?" Professor Stephen Miller, one of America's most eminent classical archaeologists, railed in a letter published in the the Greek daily Kathimerini.
Greek-Americans, who lobby tirelessly on Athens' behalf in Washington, have also been unable to contain their rage.
Some have even said they will be cancelling plans to attend the 2004 Olympics in the Greek capital.
"We condemn and reject the shameless and baseless insults and blatant slander of fellow Greeks in the motherland," snapped the Federation of Greek Associations of Greater New York in a blistering statement.
I'm a little tired of all the Pope-bashing and America-bashing I'm hearing from them. I'm also tired of hearing about how the Greeks are a "Christian" country when Communism seems to completely dominate their political and social discourse.
The Greek left say their excuse is US support for the Colonels. The Greek "right" (such as it is) say their excuse is Cyprus or the NATO bombing.
In reality, they're angry because their country is a backward, impoverished hole which exists mainly as an appendage to the Greek Islands tourism industry. They're envious of America and Americans and envy makes people petty.
Perhaps they should look to their illustrious forebears and imitate their creative example, instead of idolizing Marx.
Yeah that's what I was thinking, envy is the first emotion that motivates leftist "thought" before any other. After all how dare anyone have anything that someone else doesn't have (even if they've earned it)
BTW are you still a big Palestinian supporter. I wonder what their polls would say they think of us and Osama?
(1) It was preceded by the massacre of all Latin Christians in the city (specifically a few thousand Venetians).
(2) It was preceded by the closure and desecration of all Latin churches in the city.
(3) The scummers who carried out the sack of the city were not actually Crusaders - they were a Flemish prince acting on his own, a German prince who was under excommunication from the Pope and a Greek prince who was attempting to regain his lost crown.
(4) The army which carried out the sacking was composed of both Westerners and Greek Christians.
The unforgivable atrocity was planned, funded and executed in large part by Greeks with Greek money and Greek soldiers. Modern-day Greeks conveniently leave out those details when whining about it.
My suggestion, on many threads, was that since Israel negotiated on the basis of "land for peace" that they should simply take back land piece by piece for each act of terror. No peace, no land - just as both sides had agreed.
But I did give the Palestinians the benefit of the doubt - saying they should not be presumed to be terrorists unless they were proven to be members of a terrorist organization.
I'll say now that they've forfeited my goodwill by dancing in the streets in the wake of the WTC atrocity. At this point, I could care less what happens to their miserable carcasses.
Fine, I blame the greeks for supporting the traitor Clinton, who ruled us from 1992 to 2000. Let's laugh at their civilian dead and burn their flags at NFL games.
As a German-American who watched the various "peace rallies" happening in Germany I couldn't help but feel that all the worthwhile Europeans with backbones emigrated to the US years ago - leaving the dregs behind in the mother countries.
You obsviously know your history. And Dare I say if their grievance goes back that far they sure must be a petty bunch of little buggers.
And BTW your slamming the greeks for not liking us I applaud. But as I seem to recall you were a supporter of the Palestinians on another thread. And dare I say, I bet they have an even lower opinion of us than the Greeks do. Yet that didn't seem to bother you too much. And I'm wondering just why that is?
I hope you'll be kind enough to explain.
Of course, it's also fashionable to call Mumia Abu Jamal a "political prisoner" in Europe as well.
YOu have my sincerist apologies for misunderstanding you. And I agree totally. Best regards. FreeP on.
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