AJC Calls on Greek Orthodox Church to Condemn Priest's Anti-Semitic Libels

NEW YORK, Dec. 22, 2010 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- AJC is calling on the head of the Greek Orthodox Church in Greece, Archbishop Ieronymos II, as well as Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, to condemn unequivocally the blatant anti-Semitic libels expressed by Metropolitan Seraphim of Piraeus, one of the church's highest officials.

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"Metropolitan Seraphim's horrendous lies on Greek TV demonstrate that anti-Semitism is alive and well within the Greek Orthodox Church," said Rabbi David Rosen, AJC's International Director of Interreligious Affairs. "It is the responsibility of the church leadership to condemn and uproot anti-Semitism."

Metropolitan Seraphim's comments came during an interview on the morning show of the largest Greek TV station.

"Adolf Hitler was an instrument of world Zionism and was financed from the renowned Rothschild family with the sole purpose of convincing the Jews to leave the shores of Europe and go to Israel to establish the new Empire," said Seraphim. He also charged that Jews such as "Rockefeller, Rothschild and Soros control the international banking system that controls globalization."

Rabbi Rosen said, "Jews worldwide had hoped that this kind of outrageous bigotry, which in the past was sustained and nurtured by the Christian world, had been consigned by the Church to the dustbin of history."

AJC, the premier global advocacy organization, has long maintained close relations with the Greek government and Jewish community, and is a pioneer worldwide in building interreligious understanding.

SOURCE American Jewish Committee