The "Memorial Day for Greek Jewish Martyrs and Heroes of the Holocaust" was commemorated in Thessaloniki on January 27, with an event at Eleftherias Square. This was the site where, in July 1942, 9,000 Jewish males aged between 18 and 45, were ordered to gather and register with Nazi officials.

The event was used to publicly humiliate the Jews and put them through physical strain. From those lists composed over a period of five days, men were selected and sent to various labour camps around Greece. In March 1943, the majority of Thessaloniki Jews were shipped to Auschwitz – most of them never to return.

The International Holocaust Remembrance Day, which marks the anniversary of Auschwitz-Birkenau's liberation by Soviet troops, was adopted by the Greek parliament in 2004 by a unanimous decision. Speakers at the event included the minister of Macedonia-Thrace, the prefect of Central Macedonia, the Mayor of Thessaloniki, the ambassador of Israel, the president of the Central Jewish Council of Greece and the Thessaloniki Jewish community. 

• In search of Thessaloniki’s "kehilot" 

According to the census data and records of the time, at the beginning of 1917, the centre of Thessaloniki hosted 52 Kehilot (Jewish parishes). The devastating fire of 1917 destroyed the greatest part of the Kehilot, along with several synagogues and other Jewish public buildings.


These "invisible" monuments of the Jewish legacy are the object of a new exhibition at the Jewish Museum of Thessaloniki, which was inaugurated on January 27. The exhibition, titled A city in search of its kehilot, was based on an extensive survey of property deeds and old maps, pinpointing these lost monuments on modern city maps.