ANTI-SEMITES SMOTHER DEMOCRACY IN CRADLE.

Byline: Rabbi Abraham Cooper and Harold Brackman

THE historic incubator of Western democracy and inventor of the Olympic Games, which it is currently hosting, today's Greece fails the Olympic test of tolerance.

Among all European Union nations, it ranks highest in levels of xenophobia or hatred and fear of foreigners. Among the foreigners most vilified by the Greek media are the Israelis, equated with Nazis and granted negligible sympathy for their self-defense against Palestinian terrorism, despite Athenians' own current frustrations in preparing for possible terrorist disruption of the Olympics.

And in Greece, as in too many other European countries, the tiny Jewish community suffers from resurgent anti-Semitism, as well as guilt by association with demonized Israel. When the world came to Los Angeles for the 1984 Olympics, Los Angeles, representing American democratic pluralism, passed the test with flying colors.

Unfortunately, the xenophobic mind-set in Greece today is more reminiscent of a darker era. In 1936, Hitler reluctantly ordered that ``Jews Unwanted'' signs be removed from major public roads in order to avoid making a bad impression on foreign visitors.

In 2004, the Greek government seems deaf or indifferent to overt manifestations of anti-Jewish hate. Greek police seem uninterested in pursuing the perpetrators of hate crimes against Jewish synagogues and cemeteries, or providing security to prevent repeated desecrations. A few months ago, ``Out with the Jews'' and ``Death to Jews'' graffiti were painted in a most conspicuous spot overlooking the Corinth-Tripoli highway, where Greeks battled against great odds to save their national independence.

Thousands of Greeks, including prominent governmental officials, drive by this point every day. But when members of the Greek Helsinki Monitoring Group wrote an open letter to Prime Minister Costas Simitis, to see to it that authorities remove the anti-Semitic graffiti, the only reply they got was silence.

If any lesson was learned from the Holocaust, it is that silence equals complicity. When renowned ``Zorba'' composer Mikis Theodorakis described Jews as the root of evil at a book-signing ceremony heavily covered by the Greek media, Culture Minister Evangelos Venizelos and Education Minister Petros Efthymiou stood beside him, smiling.

Not too long ago, Giorgos Karatzafer, leader of the extreme right Popular Orthodox Party, used the party-owned Piraeus television station to denounce Greek politicians with Jewish origins and to claim that Jews were behind the 9-11 attacks. Cartoons making the same points and also equating Israelis with Nazis are commonplace in Greek newspapers.

The government ignores protests and does nothing despite its obligation under European conventions to act against incitement to racism and violence. Perversely, the Greek state television station did act last year by withdrawing its financial support for a documentary, ``The Evil Dr. Merton,'' exposing the mastermind behind the extermination of Greek Jewry during the Holocaust. By doing this, they robbed younger Greeks of learning about the crimes of those who collaborated with the Nazis during World War II and who gained from the confiscation of the property of their doomed Jewish neighbors.

So as the world's athletes compete on the site of the original Olympics, perhaps they are our best hope to inspire change in Greece. Perhaps their camaraderie, fairness and mutual respect will inspire in the hosts not only tears of joy and national pride, but a rekindling of a new commitment to a level global playing field on which no minority or nation is burdened by prejudice and discrimination.