The Shoah (1939–1945)
Round-up of Athens
24 mars 1944·Athènes
The toll is reproduced exactly as the source states it — never rounded, never added to another. Tolls overlap from one event to the next.
Jews summoned to the synagogue for the distribution of unleavened bread are arrested, along with those whom the community's lists enable to be found.
On March 24, 1944, the eve of the Greek Independence Day celebration, the Jews of Athens were summoned to the synagogue for the distribution of unleavened flour before Pessah. Those who appeared were arrested on the spot; the community's lists, seized, made it possible to fetch the others from their homes. The prisoners were gathered at Haïdari and then deported to Auschwitz.
The chief rabbi Elias Barzilai had refused to hand over the registers and had destroyed them before fleeing to the mountains, where the Greek resistance hid him; Archbishop Damaskinos and the Athens police had issued baptismal certificates and false identity cards. This explains why in Athens, more than elsewhere in Greece, a notable portion of the community survived.
- Period :
- The Shoah (1939–1945)
- Type :
- Shoah
- Region :
- Central and Eastern Europe
- Country :
- Grèce
Archives de la communauté israélite d'Athènes ; documentation grecque sur l'occupation et témoignages des survivants.