Zorba can kiss my ass.

[Az]

Yep, don't believe the hype. It's not an antisemitical remark, AT ALL.

[Tripledoc]

I would not agree with Mikis Theodorakis. It is not the Jews who are evil. It is the sexual-monotheistic brand of totalitarianism that is evil.

[Drake Tungsten]

Why do you care what this guy thinks? He's less than irrelevant...

[Az]

I think he's a real-life troll. What saddens me is the fact that no condemnation of this came from the greek government.

[Drake Tungsten]

What saddens me is the fact that no condemnation of this came from the greek government.

I can understand being upset by the comments, but do you really expect the Greek government to apologize for the statements of a private citizen? That's a little silly, I think. You don't expect the US government to apologize for all the horribly anti-Semitic crap Louis Farrakhan spits out, do you?

[SlowwHand]

Look no further than MarkG and paiktis.

[Mercator]

Why the hell does the paranoid Israeli government have to jump on things like this? I bet they think that German babyfood thing is also part of the grand anti-semitic conspiracy. Isn't Israel supposed to be a secular state anyway?

[Drake Tungsten]

Isn't Israel supposed to be a secular state anyway?

What does this have to do with religion? The Greek idiot said that Israel itself was a "root of evil"...

[axi]

You have no idea who Mikis Theodorakis is, have you?

Accusing him of being antisemite is kinda like accusing lord Byron as an anthellene.

Go to his site: http://www.mikis-theodorakis.net/

and specifically look for "Mauthausen"

Here are some lyrics for you.

1 - SONG OF SONGS

My love, how beautiful she is
In her everyday dress.
With a little comb on her hair.
Nobody know how beautiful she was.
Young girls of Auschwitz.
Young girls of Dachau.
Have you seen my love?
We saw her on a long journey
She no longer had her everyday dress
Or the little comb on her hair.

My love, how beautiful she is.
Fondled by her mother
And the kisses of her brother
Nobody knew how beautiful she was
Young girls of Mauthausen,
Young girls of Belsen,
Have you seen my love?
We saw her in the frozen square
A number in her white hand
And a yellow star on her heart.


2 - ANDONIS

There, on the great staircase,
On the staircase of tears.
In the dark sentry of death,
In the quarry of lamentation.
Jews and partisans are marching.
Jews and partisans are falling,
They carry a rock on their backs.
A rock, a cross of death.

It's there that Andonis hears a voice.
The voice
"Oh comrade, oh, comrade.
Help me climb the stairs."
But there, on the great staircase.
On the staircase of tears.
Help is an insult.
Compassion is a curse.

The Jew falls on the stair,
And the staircase turns red
"And you, my boy, you, come this way
Get hold of a second rock."
I lift two rocks.
I lift three rocks.
Me, my name is Andonis.
And if you are a man, well then, come here
On this marble threshing-floor.


3 - THE FUGITIVE

Yannos Ber who comes from the North
Cannot stand the barbed wire.
He takes heart he takes wing,
He runs through the villages of the valley.

Good lady, give me a piece of bread.
Give me some clothes to change.
l have to go on a long journey.
And over lakes to fly.

Wherever he goes, wherever he stops
Terror and fear beat their wings,
And a terrible voice is heard.
"Hide from the fugitive."

Christians, I am no murderer.
No wild animal to eat you
I have escaped from prison
To go back to my home.

Ah! What solitude of death
In this country of Bertolt Brecht!
Yannos is handed over to the SS
They take him now for execution.


4 - WHEN THE WAS IS OVER

Girl with the weeping eyes,
Girl with the frozen hands.
Forget me not when the war is over.

Joy of the world. come to the gate
So that we could embrace in the street.
So that we could kiss in the square.

So that we could make love in the quarry.
In the gas chambers,
On the staircase, in the observation post.

Love in the middle of noon
In all the corners of death
Till its shadow will be no more.

He wrote the music for these songs. Is that man an antisemite?

[Drake Tungsten]

Is that man an antisemite?

Apparently...

[axi]

As for what he said about Israel...

I don't get it, what is to respect and admire in the state of Israel? It's a terrorist state. a state that opresses a whole nation and it's arguably the root of all the troubles in the Middle East. Barring the US, it is now the most aggressive state in the world, specially if we consider it's size. It is a state run by fascistoids and if the Israeli people are coerced by the blind violence of the bombings into supporting them, then too bad for them, since they have failed miserably in seeing what the only viable option for peace in Palestine is.

Now, all this has nothing to do with the Jews in general. Many Jews do not support the state of Israel and quite a few of them believe that it should not have been created. The state of Israel does not represent all Jews, albeit having proclaimed itself their protector and vanguard. Saying that everyone who accuses Israel is an antisemite is something like saying that condemning the crimes of Saddam Hussein makes you an arab-hater.

[Lefty Scaevola]

How does he imagine that the Greeks have more history than the Jews? unless he is adopting the the Mycenaeans and Minoans as Greeks.

[Cruddy]

I'm not sure there are really "evil" people.

Some people - for whatever "reason", including being insane - do evil things, for sure.

I agree with you Az, this pillock is talking out of his arse.

[axi]

How does he imagine that the Greeks have more history than the Jews? unless he is adopting the the Mycenaeans and Minoans as Greeks.

Since we have included them into our mythology and they lived in our country, well, I guess we are adopting them.

As for Theodorakis: he's definitely not a saint and he's very old, so old that dementia probably makes him not so careful of what he's saying.

Regardless of that, let's think a little bit about modern history, since that's what's most relevant to the character of both nations. Greece and Israel have alot of similarities since both are ancient peoples curturally disconnected from their neighbours. Both have had historically very dispersed populations (although Greeks were more concentrated around the Aegean sea) which made them live along with other nations and (in the most recent centuries) as subjects to foreign empires. We Greeks however were subject to nationalism much earlier than the Jews and through a revolution and subsequent wars managed to consolidate our nation-state and put and end into our expansionism some 80 years ago. The Zionists only begun in 1903 and after 3 wars, they have still unsettled differences. This means that they have not ended their quest for "lebensraum" and this makes them openly aggressive. This is happening with other nations too, f.e. the Albanians. They are still in an earlier historical stage.

However it's about time that the world leaves nationalism behind and progresses to the next stage.

[DinoDoc]

nm