Holocaust Memorials - Monuments, Museums and Institutions in Commemoration of Nazi Victims

in detail

The monument is on Plateia Martyron Evreon (Jewish Martyrs' Square) between Papanastasiou, Priamou and Karakassi Streets.

 

Between 15 March and 2 August 1943, the Jewish residents of Thessaloniki were loaded into cattle cars and taken to the Auschwitz-Birkenau extermination camp. More than 50.000 people were deported in 19 trains. After the war, the city's Jewish community, once the largest in Greece, numbered just 1.950 members.

 

Until 1997 the story of the Jews of Thessaloniki scarcely registered in the city's collective memory; the only monument commemorating the victims of the Holocaust was in the new Jewish cemetery, hidden behind high walls and locked gates.

 

The monument in the shape of a 'burning menorah`, which was unveiled by the Greek president in November 1997, caused heated debate, and it has been repeatedly daubed with graffiti and defaced since then.

More than 50.000 Jewish residents of Thessaloniki were deported to Auschwitz-Birkenau between March and August 1943. The memorial in the shape of a 'burning menorah' was unveiled in November 1997 on Jewish Martyrs' Square.

15 March to 2 August 1943
More than 50,000 Jewish residents of Thessaloniki arrested and deported to the Auschwitz-Birkenau extermination camp

November 1997
Holocaust monument on a square open to the public unveiled in Thessaloniki