Letter from Thessaloniki
As the new year starts, a vision is titillating Greece: the vision of a Europe menaced by a threat coming from the east – Islam. Claims by 28 Pakistanis that they were abducted and interrogated by Greek and British security officers have jolted forgotten worries in the country – worries about the Islamic threat to the good old Greek civilization – and have awakened inborn ancient hatreds. Once again, in December and January, when the Epiphany story of the three mystic pilgrims, those illustrious Three Wise Men, carrying gold, frankincense and myrrh, is being retold in churches, one can find Westerners asking themselves: Where, of all places, were those dignified magicians coming from? Persia or some Arab country? And why? They certainly did not share the same religion as the Jews of their time, did they? And what is almost certain is that they came a long way from the east. Then as now, «from the East» is the significant part of the tale – and the suspicious part. One cannot find many details about them in the Gospel according to Matthew. If we go along with T.S. Eliot’s thoughts, we discover that those wise men were changed by their meeting with another faith: «No longer at ease here, in the old dispensation, with an alien people clutching their gods…» and «just the worst time of the year for a journey, and such a long journey…» (T.S. Eliot, «The Journey of the Magi»). Almost an integral part of European culture now, there are some 25 million Muslims in Europe. They certainly have much to teach us. As far as Greece is concerned, the Muslims – initially a mortal enemy of the Byzantines – were later welcomed when they agreed to help Byzantium tame the troublesome Serbs. They came and stayed here as an occupying force for five-and-a-half centuries. After the post-World War I Treaty of Lausanne rearranged frontiers and populations, nearly 350,000 Greek Muslims had to leave in exchange for 600,000 Greek Orthodox Christians. Nowadays, the Muslim presence in Greece is mostly concentrated in Thrace, where some 108,000 live. The Muslims of Greece were largely passive until the 1970s, when they formed such organizations as the Western Thrace Turkish Solidarity Association to protect their interests. Greece has not had any real «Islamic problems» yet. But the question remains as to how much longer this will this be the case. Now that Europe has become the prime target for al-Qaida action, how does one protect the subway, trains and buses from attack? And what can the police and intelligence services do to stop suicide bombers who no longer come from outside, but are members of the community who never stood out until the moment of the explosion? These are questions which, in all probability, will have to be answered in 2006. Along with a colleague of mine, TV journalist Pandelis Savidis, I am already working on a documentary program titled «Islam in the Balkans.» The main goal is to trace the development of Muslim communities in Greece’s immediate neighborhood – that is, Bulgaria, Albania, Kosovo, the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM) – a region where we have both worked and know only too well. Yet the main trouble is not there. It is instead on Western European soil, where the established political groups are skeptical and mistrustful of Muslims; it is in countries that are still undecided about whether to have Muslims elected to political office and promoted to positions of leadership, if not on the political stage, at least in youth groups. One exception to that rule is Sweden, where the trade unions and other political groups have really encouraged young Muslims to get involved. Another indisputable problem is that Europeans – and certainly Greeks – have a problem with pluralism. One can often hear European politicians expressing themselves in ways that would be completely unacceptable in the United States. Worse, a Danish newspaper recently ran a competition for cartoonists as to who could draw the best caricature of the Prophet Mohammed. If this is not considered an insult, what is? Is it simply that the West doesn’t like Islam and rejects Muslims? There is much to be done this year: Bridges must be built faster than ever between the Muslim world and the West. More bridges should be also be constructed among Muslims themselves, because the most decisive confrontation is between Islamic extremists and moderates. If Greece, a country with an Islamic minority, wants to wage an efficient war on terrorism, it should overcome its fears and suspicions of Muslim citizens. And we Greeks need to break out of our intellectual ghettos.
