The Greek Community of Jerusalem: A Presentation

On 18 September 2025, I gave a presentation entitled “The Greek Community of Jerusalem until 1948 (Nakba and Diaspora)” in Nicosia, Cyprus. 

The presentation was organised by the Cyprus Peace Council (Παγκύπριο Συμβούλιο Ειρήνης) and the Thursday Coffeeshop (Καφενείο της Πέμτης) (a discussion group for members of the Socialist Expression) along with the Centre of Visual Arts & Research (CVAR) which hosted the event. 

Upon arriving in Cyprus this summer, on my annual migration to warmer climes, my friend Maria Chrysanthou asked if I would give a presentation on the Greeks of Palestine. A secondary-school teacher and a playwright, Maria is also an active member of the Cyprus Peace Council and a pro-Palestine activist. With a full-scale genocide taking place right next door, the Council had been organising events to support Palestine and raise awareness of this modern-day atrocity. 

Having followed for years my work on this blog and the Jerusalem, We Are Here interactive documentary (where I’m a participant and associate producer), Maria suggested to her colleagues in the Cyprus Peace Council that it would be interesting to learn more about this unknown aspect of the Palestinian issue which has a Cyprus connection (the Cypriots of Palestine having been part of the Greek community). We narrowed down the topic to the Greeks of Jerusalem up to 1948 simply because that’s the focus of my research and consequently what I felt more qualified to talk about. 

It was only when I began working on the draft that I realised what a huge task I’d undertaken. Firstly, the talk was to be in Greek. Although that is my native tongue and both my primary and secondary education were in Greek, I have lived in the English-speaking world for more than half my life (gulp!) and all the writing I do, for this blog and elsewhere, is in English. I haven’t spoken or written in Greek at length since I finished school. Moreover it’s only in the last few years that I’ve learnt to type in Greek at a somewhat respectable speed. 

However, being neither a historian nor an academic (as I stressed in my talk) freed me from the burden of making a speech that called for a higher language register. I decided to draft it the way I speak—only a touch more articulately! It was an interesting exercise which I admit I enjoyed. It also introduced the idea that I could perhaps translate some of my blog posts into Greek at some point. 

The next challenge was how to tie together the personal stories that I have been gathering for decades, and of which consequently I could speak at length, with real history, of which I know less, and package them together in one coherent and engaging talk of 45 minutes.  

Much has been written about the Greek community of Egypt. It was a significantly larger community than that of Palestine, and wielded power and influence. By contrast, there is a paucity of publications on the history of the Greeks in Palestine. The only academic I found in my research to have written at some length about the topic is Konstantinos Papastathis, assistant professor in the Political Science department of the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, Greece. I found his articles, which focus mainly on the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Jerusalem, along with a smattering of other academics’ writings, quite educational. As the length of my presentation didn’t allow for the inclusion of much of the interesting information I gleaned, I am hoping to write a series of posts to expound on the topic in this blog for the benefit of my English-speaking readers (and perhaps even translate to Greek.)

Finally, the pressure of public speaking was alleviated by the fact that I was intimately familiar with the venue. Rita Severis, Executive Director of the Severis Foundation/Centre of Visual Arts & Research (CVAR), generously offered to host us in this space where not only I had presented before but I also have a strong connection with. CVAR is the only bicommunal museum in Cyprus, its mission being one which I firmly support: the peaceful coexistence of all ethnic communities on our troubled island. I became one of its first volunteers when it opened its doors in 2014, after being introduced to Rita by a mutual friend. I set up their social media, created their quarterly (at the time) newsletter Peregrinations which I edited and produced for nearly seven years, and assisted in other ways during that period. Although my other projects have pulled me away, CVAR remains close to my heart. 

The Presentation

And so on Thursday 18 September, I gave my presentation to an audience of about fifty people which included many friendly faces and notably four “original” Jerusalemites:

• my aunt Jenny Gaitanopoulou, retired grande dame of Cypriot theatre;
• Ellie Savvidou, née Louisidis, old family friend (and mother of my oldest friend);
• Stephanos Laurentziades, a surprise appearance, which I owe to a mutual friend who alerted him to this event and accompanied him to it; and
• Andreas Seraphim. Ellie Savvidou had introduced me to his sister Anna many moons ago and the three of us had spent a lovely day in Limassol talking about their Jerusalem days. Sadly Anna didn’t feel well enough to attend but I was pleased to meet her brother. 

We were particularly honoured by the attendance of the Ambassador of the State of Palestine, HE Mr Abdalla Attari. (Cyprus recognised the State of Palestine in 1988 which makes my home country’s current policies even more confounding – but I won’t get into that here since we don’t discuss politics in this blog.) 

“We preserve the memories in order to salvage history.“

Following a most gracious introduction by Rita Severis, Maria Chrysanthou, speaking on behalf of the Cyprus Peace Council, stressed the importance of “preserving memories in order to salvage history”. Representing the Thursday Coffeeshop, Elli Mozora, a long-time staunch Palestine supporter, spoke about how the Nakba (ie the catastrophe) of 1948, which resulted in the expulsion of thousands of Palestinians including members of minority communities such as the Greek one, set the stage for the current situation in both Gaza and the West Bank: “… the occupation, the restrictions and the violence continue to shape” Palestinians’ daily lives. 

My presentation stretched to fifty minutes and included photographs, maps, as well as three very short clips filmed by my great-uncle Nando in Jerusalem in 1945-46. Nando, who in our family is synonymous with films, ran the Regent cinema in Jerusalem in the 1940s and always had a camera in his hands.

Upon the conclusion of my presentation, we asked the “originals” if they would share their thoughts. 

Ellie Louisidis Savvidou, articulate and thoughtful as always and undaunted by her 90 years, thought the presentation was “an excellent memorial” for those who lived in the Greek community of Jerusalem and not only survived but thrived—for which they are proud. She talked about the support the community received from the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate, and shared reminisces of the teachers as well the cultural events organised by the Greek consulate. “I am very very lucky to have lived those childhood years and I am also lucky to be here tonight to hear your kind words”, she concluded. 

Jenny Gaitanopoulou was deeply moved by this presentation of her family’s story. She added: “I have set roots in Cyprus by now, I married a Cypriot and I live here now with the memories of the past.”

Finally Stephanos Laurentziades talked about his life as a small child in Jerusalem. He also related an incident that took place on the fateful day of Monday 22 July 1946 when he happened to be visiting his father in his office at NAAFI (the Navy, Army, and Air Force Institutes) where the senior Laurentziades was the accountant. Little Stephanos happened to be looking out of the office window at the very moment the King David Hotel was blown up by the terrorist Jewish organisation Irgun: he watched the building crumble right before his eyes.   

The evening ended with a moving gesture of gift giving. The Cyprus Peace Council offered me and each of the Jerusalemites framed pictures. Mine was a painting aptly entitled “Refugees” by the courageous artist George Gavriel whose satirical works condemn acts of cruelty and expose the hypocrisy of our political and religious leaders. I was truly touched. 

Scenes from the audience (Photos by Elena Fitikidou Alonefti)

The Recording

The presentation was recorded and livestreamed by the Thursday Coffeeshop. Unfortunately it suffered some technical hiccups – it kept breaking up and the slides didn’t show very well. Thankfully George Dimoglou, CVAR’s tech guru (ie Digital Technology, Culture and Events Coordinator), had the foresight to set up my computer to record the whole event directly. He was thus able to cobble the two recordings together to create a hybrid video that covers the event quite well. In this montage, we inserted some of the photos taken by my dear friend Elena Fitkidou Alonefti in spots where the image of the livestream froze. 

My enormous appreciation and thanks to George for his technical expertise, eager collaboration, and flawless professionalism throughout – from the preparation stage to the completion of the montage; and to Elena who was kind enough to cover the event with her camera.

I’m most grateful to the Cyprus Peace Council for giving me this opportunity, to the Thursday Coffeeshop for supporting it as co-organisers and for broadcasting, and of course to CVAR and Rita Severis for hosting us.  

Greek speakers can watch the video below. I hope you find it interesting! ❖