Zacharias Sartzetakis
University of the Aegean.
The Holocaust had a decisive worldwide impact on the formation of the post-war Jewish identity. German persecution against Jews was, also, implemented throughout Greece, but it did not unfold in the same way in all regions of the country. There are significant variances in the survival rates of the different Jewish communities of Greece.
It is widely known that oral testimonies are invaluable for capturing subjective experiences, preserving personal andcollective memory and filling gaps in official and written records. The present paper focuses on the Jewish population of Thessaloniki and Thessaly region and delves into the Holocaust’s impact on Jewish collective memory. More specifically, it is presented a comparative approach, based on oral interviews taken from Greek Jews, on the processes that defined local post-war Jewish identity. The latter provides an alternative viewpoint on exploring the ways that ancestors’ survival path during the Holocaust determines contemporary Jews.
Additionally, this paper aims to highlight the extensive influence of a number of factors on shaping Jewish identity in post-war Greece. These factors are, among others, the bilateral relations with the Christian population, the importance ofthe bonds developed through professional activities, the impact of antisemitism and the participation in the resistance movement during German occupation.
Biographical Note
Zacharias Sartzetakis is a PhD candidate at the Department of Social Anthropology and History of the University of theAegean. The topic of his thesis is “The Intergenerational Transmission of Traumatic Memory; The Case of the First Post-war Generation of Thessaloniki’s Jews”. He completed the Postgraduate Program “Political History, War and StrategicStudies” at the Department of Political Science of the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki.