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Anastasia Balezdrova

Over the past month, the anti-Semitic speeches of representatives of the extreme right Golden Dawn party, including in parliament, have become more frequent. The provocative speech of party spokesman Ilias Kasidiaris, in which he said that there had been no Holocaust, has only brought to the fore the true ideology of the Nazi and xenophobic party.

GRReporter has sought comments from Lea Cohen – a writer, musicologist, diplomat and politician who, late last year, published the book "You believe: Eight views on the Holocaust in the Balkans." In it the author describes the tragic events connected with the persecution of Jews in the Kingdom of Bulgaria and its neighbouring countries.

Lea Cohen presents historical facts about the fate of Jews in the Balkans during World War II and comments on the rise of far-right parties over the past few years.

Mrs. Cohen, the far-right Golden Dawn party in Greece openly denies the Holocaust. The party spokesman had explicitly stated in parliament that such a thing had never happened. What are the historical facts with regard to Greece?

Since the pro-Nazi Golden Dawn party entered the Greek parliament in 2012, unpleasant things have been happening there:

Party leader Nikolaos Michaloliakos had said, "the ovens and gas chambers of the Holocaust had never existed. That's a lie."

Another representative, namely deputy Ilias Kasidiaris, had allowed himself to read in parliament excerpts from "The Protocols of the Elders of Zion", which is a forged document prepared by the tsarist police in Russia around 1870 to justify the massacre of the Jewish population. Ilias Panagiotaros, another member of the party, had related to an Australian broadcaster that the party was preparing a military wing similar to the Hezbollah.

The scandalous acts of Golden Dawn whose members are using Nazi symbolism, quoting "Mein Kampf" (“My Struggle”) and preparing lists of Jews are, however, resisted by all democratic parties in Greece that have put Golden Dawn in isolation. There are numerous international responses, including calls from the Council of Europe, that the party should be banned. There is an appeal to the Greek parliament, signed by world famous intellectuals, Nobel laureates, writers and more, which calls for a ban on the party, as it is anti-Semitic, xenophobic and inhuman.

The latest developments related to the party's anti-Semitic acts date back to the memorial celebration of the 70^th anniversary of the deportation and extermination of Salonica Jews. Representatives of the most influential Jewish organizations in the world had arrived in Thessaloniki for the celebration who were met with outrageous demonstrations of Golden Dawn.

Claiming that there was no Holocaust in the territory of Thessaloniki, whose Jewish population had been almost completely destroyed by the Germans, is not just a breach of etiquette. This is a crime, desecration of the memory of the deceased, this is mean tainting of a tragedy that Greece will always remember.

Recently, my book, "You believe: Eight views on the Holocaust in the Balkans" has been released. It was translated into English and Macedonian almost immediately. I have put on the cover of the book a picture of a four-year old girl who is a symbol of the Balkan Holocaust for me. The girl’s name is Eti Pardo Testa and she comes from the well-known Thessaloniki family Pardo Testa which was entirely destroyed in the gas chambers of Auschwitz. Only Eti’s brother David Pardo had miraculously saved himself. Greek neighbours of the family had kept the picture taken a month before the deportation along with some other family papers and gave them to David later. He settled in the U.S. and some circumstances related to the research on my book had taken me to his son Theodore Pardo in Florida, who allowed me to use and publish the picture.
 
The main theme of my book is the persecution of Jews in the Kingdom of Bulgaria and in its affiliates in Northern Greece and Macedonia as well as the Holocaust against Jews in the so-called "new Bulgarian territories".

My book addresses the issue of the fate of Greek Jews which varies across the country. Greece was divided between Germans, Italians and Bulgarians, and the Jews were respectively subjected to different regimes in these three areas. In the Italian part, including Athens, they had been saved from deportation because of the policy of the Italian administration which had not delivered them to the Germans and which had helped many of them emigrate (it is claimed that the Italians and Spaniards had issued over 18,000 exit visas to Greek Jews).

In the part occupied by the Germans, the retribution was brutal, especially in Thessaloniki which was once called the "Balkan Jerusalem" where 50,000 Jews had been brutally mistreated and deported to Auschwitz, from where only a few returned.

The fate of the Jews in the part occupied by Bulgaria, namely Drama, Kavala, Xanthi, Komotini, Serres was not happy either. There were small Jewish communities there with a rich cultural tradition. A total of about 4,200 Jews that had been “collected” by the Bulgarian authorities, police and army had been transported by trucks to Bulgaria. They were held in temporary camps there for some time and then subsequently taken to the port of Lom on the Danube River from where they were transported to Vienna by ship. In Vienna, the Bulgarian police delivered them to the German authorities and the Jews were directly transported to Auschwitz and Treblinka, where they were almost immediately liquidated. 98% of this population died.

It is simply unacceptable to say that there was no Holocaust against Greek Jews in the face of these horrific facts.

What is Bulgaria's involvement in these events as an ally of Nazi Germany?

Bulgaria has a seemingly differentiated attitude to the Jews from the "old" and "new" territories and an essential part of my book is dedicated to this issue.

It must be emphasized that the official Bulgarian state in the period 1940-1944 was completely hostile to Jews and persecuted them in different ways: after the vote on the Law on Protection of the Nation (along with a series of laws and regulations for the destruction of all civil and economic rights of Jews) and the establishment of the Commissariat for Jewish Affairs, it had begun a systematic persecution of the Jewish population throughout the old and new Kingdom of Bulgaria, whose ultimate goal was the camps in occupied Poland. The completion of this plan, agreed between the Government of Bogdan Filov and the Germans, and approved by Boris III, Tsar of Bulgaria, had begun from the "peripheral" areas of the Kingdom. Therefore, the first victims were the Jews in the occupied territories of northern Greece, Macedonia and Pirot. They had been "collected" in order to be deported on 4 and 11 March 1943 according to a schedule agreed between Germany and Bulgaria and, respectively, between Filov and Ribbentrop in August 1942 (Bogdan Filov had even then insisted on "solving the issue of deportation of all Jews from the Kingdom of Bulgaria" but the German government had a busy schedule after the Wannsee Conference on the "final solution" and replied that the order of Bulgaria was scheduled for March 1943).

However, being aware of the plan of the deportation and therefore of the probable destruction of the Jewish population, parts of Bulgarian society and the Bulgarian Orthodox Church stood for the Jews from the "old" land, whose deportation should have started on 10 March 1943 according to schedule. It was initially "postponed" because of their protection and logistical problems, but the subsequent attempts to implement it had also been hampered. After the death of Boris III, Tsar of Bulgaria, in August 1943 (when the last date of deportation was), there were significant disturbances in the ruling of the country and the issue was abandoned.

Had Bulgarian Jews been saved through the delivery of Jews from Macedonia and Thrace? Do you agree with this statement?
 
No, I have always been opposed to this thesis. It is artificial and a serious examination of documents and events shows that it is untenable. The deportation of all Jews from the Kingdom of Bulgaria was a well considered government plan, coordinated at all levels, prepared for two years with the help of "legal" provisions and a number of concrete actions for which there are documents and significant evidence. The process had started but it was not completely finished inside the country due to disorders in the system, including logistics and because of the unusual intervention of some prominent figures, including deputies, clergymen and public figures. We must not forget that Bulgaria was a small country and in the absence of political parties suspended by Boris III, Tsar of Bulgaria, it was governed through the intervention of individual authorities. At one point, they had played a positive role as regards the delay of fatal decisions on the fate of Jews which, until the last moment of the collaboration between Bulgaria and Nazi Germany, was not guaranteed. However, these same authorities had not helped as regards the salvation of the Jewish population from the "new" territories, 98% of which was destroyed in the death camps.

How would you comment on the rise and increase in popularity of Golden Dawn in Greece?

Unfortunately, the case with Golden Dawn is not isolated. There are recurrences of nostalgia for Nazism in other former communist countries as well. The SS march is held in Latvia, they celebrate a Nazi general in Lithuania, the Jobbik party in Hungary exhibits definite xenophobic and anti-Semitic behaviour which has made several prominent Jewish intellectuals, including Nobel Prize winner Kertesh leave the country, the Ustasha Party has been re-established in Croatia which is known as the party that had committed the Holocaust against Croatian Jews. In Bulgaria, the so-called Lukov march has been conducted for 10 years already, which is a neo-Nazi march, involving several far-right organizations. Unfortunately, the authorities and the municipality of Sofia are not taking a serious view of this provocative event that has been taking place undisturbed.

I would not say that far-right parties enjoy great popularity but they definitely infect society with hatred. Probably, the democratic tradition in the former communist countries, which is still fragile, allows the discontented and idiots to openly preach hatred. Furthermore, the unambiguous vindication of all the "victims" of communism, including representatives of Fascist and Nazi parties and associations that were active during World War II, has allowed the resumption of a party structure which is openly anti-Semitic in nature. In these countries, because one dictatorship replaces another, an amalgam between anti-communist and pro-Nazi ideas has been increasingly allowed which is extremely dangerous and contagious. As for Greece, it is clear that the shock of the economic crisis has played a role in the radicalization of some of its citizens.
 
In Bulgaria, the Attack party has also failed to increase its number of seats in the new parliament. How would you explain that? Do you think that the public support will continue after Volen Siderov’s decision to participate in the coalition government along with the Bulgarian Socialist Party (BSP) and the Movement for Rights and Freedoms (MRF) and his attitude to the protests?

Bulgaria is not an exception to this process, it is observed there in all its manifestations - from the "amalgam" and denial of the Holocaust to anti-Semitism and all other forms of xenophobia and intolerance. Volen Siderov is one of the caricature incarnations of this phenomenon, recognized by society as an extravagant caricature of any kind of negationism. Since the BSP and MRF which identify themselves as leftist and liberal structures are not such as they are based on the clan-cartel principle, an unprincipled formal coalition with Siderov’s clan of "mad dogs" is quite possible. However, the fact that more extreme movements than that of Siderov are emerging, for which anti-Semitism is becoming a major paradigm, is even more dangerous.

There is low tolerance towards different people throughout the world, whether we are speaking about religion or simple behaviour such as smoking. What do you think is the cause for the growth of intolerance towards other people's opinions?

I do not agree with that thesis of yours at all. To the contrary, civilized societies are continuously working on improving the tolerance in this world which is increasingly mixed in terms of communities. The results of this work are obvious in most places in Europe. Moreover, it is completely wrong, not to say unacceptable, for differences in a habit such as smoking to be defined as significant problems of tolerance.

Our personal habits have nothing to do with the political trends of society and when it considers them inappropriate it is entitled to put them under control.

What elements of the political, economic and social model of Switzerland can serve as good practice in the Balkans, particularly in Bulgaria and Greece?

The Swiss model is not applicable in the Balkans for many reasons. It is difficult to mention them here: it is the oldest European republic and the oldest democracy in Europe from the time of Christ to nowadays. Switzerland has never been a monarchy and its citizens have always felt responsible for their policies. Direct democracy is their life. The people there have 700 years of democracy behind them whereas we have only 23. Maybe this answers the question.