"The Jews of Thessaloniki: Legacies of the Past, Shaping of Traditions, Challenges for the Future". The Holocaust: Diachronic and Interdisciplinary Approaches. International Conference, National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Dept. of Social Theology, 5 October 2017 [full citations]

More than 2 millennia of Jewish presence in Thessaloniki have shaped both the city and its Jews. The Jews of Thessaloniki, in most instances, were subject to the fortunes and misfortunes of their coreligionists in the realms of the Kingdom of Macedonia, the Roman Empire, the Eastern Roman Empire – Byzantium and the Ottoman Empire. A new and current chapter in their history is the birth of the modern Hellenic state and its foundation on civil rights. In the second decade of the 20th century the Jews of Thessaloniki finally belong, on equal par with the overwhelming Christian majority, as Hellenes in Greece. The tumultuous events of the previous century, both worldwide and locally, had profound consequences for Jewish Thessaloniki. Still the community is in search of its current identity and of a vision for the future. Our presence here enhances my optimism