New report maps attacks on religious sites in 2015
A report conducted by the government’s Secretariat for Religious Affairs – the first study of its kind to be conducted in Greece – found that religious sites were the target of 147 attacks in 2015, with the majority being connected to the Greek Orthodox faith.
According to the figures compiled by the secretariat’s Department for Religious Freedoms, of the total, 137 attacks were against Greek-Orthodox churches, five targeted Muslim community centers, four were against Jewish sites and one at a Catholic church.
However, the majority of the attacks on Orthodox sites concerned thefts from churches, while those at Muslim sites – mostly makeshift mosques – were acts of vandalism or intimidation, such as firebombings.
All four of the attacks against Jewish sites involved anti-Semitic slurs being graffitied on graves and monuments.
