http://www.lse.ac.uk/europeanInstitute/ ... eeSE06.pdfThere is a vast literature on the subject of how Greek public opinion reacted to the 11-S, especially in the Greek language. To summarize, I will use the title of a famous book on that subject: Καλά Να Πάθουν, that is to say, ‘they had it coming’. Its cover represents a drawing of a plane smashing into one of the Twin Towers with the word ‘CIA’ written across its fuselage. In brief, for Greek public opinion, the whole 11-S was an American plot (Vasilakis 2002).
The casualty figures were only mentioned initially to claim that it was rather horrific (after all many Greeks use planes and/or have visited the USA, and the Twin Towers in particular), before adding in the same breath ‘but of course one could expect such a thing, couldn’t one?’. Meaning as a result of ‘US power, policies and imperialism’. Vasilakis’ book contains many very clear illustrations of what was reproduced in the Greek media at the time. There was a plethora of cartoons representing the USA as Nazis, fascists, totalitarian and dictatorial. Vasilakis (2002) also recalls at least instances where the minute silence for the 11-S victims was booed and turning into shouts in favour of … Bin Laden (at a concert and at two European Cup football games).
He also shows a picture of a demonstration in Greece with a placard stating that ‘terrorism = CIA + NATO’, next to one saying ‘no involvement in imperialist aggressive plans’.
Further evidence can be found in a number of opinion polls that were made at
that time. What follows presents an overview of these surveys:
Survey No 3: A poll from the daily Eleftherotipia dated 16.09.01 (reproduced in Vasilakis 2005: 31) shows that 25% of Greeks felt that justice had been done on 11th September 2001. Split into political party preferences, the results are as follows (from Right to Left): New Democracy 19.2%; Socialist Party PASOK 25.2%; Left Coalition SYN 34.6%; Communist Party KKE 36.4%. That is to say that there is no big Left-Right divide, nor between the bulk of the Greek electorate and the more ‘fringe parties’. Thus, SYN leader Alavanos said that, following the 11-S, the ‘New York stock exchange yuppies now felt like the Cypriots, the Palestinians, the Israelis, the Serbs in Kosovo or Belgrade’ (cited in Vasilakis 2005: 31). Communist Party KKE activists argued that NATO means ‘North Atlantic Terrorist Organization’, and that the CIA was to blame because it was obviously not possible for anyone so far away and in the middle of the desolated lands of Afghanistan to organize something as big as 11-S (Vasilakis 2005: 29).
In addition to the above, Vasilakis (2005) provides a number of other instructive examples:
- p.16: Ocalan, Karadic and Bin Ladin are described as ‘freedom fighters’
(in Greek AGONISTES); and, ´NATO and the USA are the chief
terrorists, and the EU are the criminals´.
- pp 28-29: a New Democracy youth party event was advertised on a
poster depicting the two burning towers, and the event was labelled ‘the
party of the year’.
In brief, Greek public opinion considered that the 11-S was justified. One should contrast this finding to how the same attacks were considered to be totally unjustified in Indonesia (74%), Lebanon (61%), or even Iran (51%). Greek reactions were closer to, but still more critical than, those in Morocco (48%), Pakistan (40%) and Kuwait (26%). Thus, the 11-S was overwhelmingly deemed to be justified in Greece. This reaction led Vasilakis, one of the few Greek critics of such a reaction, to label Greece (HELLAS in Greek), the ‘Helleban’, as a reference to the Taliban. He also described the dominant view in Greece where any diverging opinion was heavily criticized as having simply created ‘a politico-spiritual gulag´
Περιμένω τους γνωστούς φιλοτρομοκράτες να συνεισφέρουν στο νήμα με τη βλακεία τους
σήμερα δεν θα γινόταν σε καμμία περίπτωση.To 2001 είχαν μόλις περάσει δύο χρόνια από τους βομβαρδισμούς της Σερβίας που είχαν εξοργίσει όλο τον ελληνικό λαό για τους δύο λόγους που λέει ο Όργι : χριστιανορθόδοξοι και αριστεροί σοβιετόφιλοι.
