Greece: Media highlights (alleged) Jewish tax-evaders

Via A Gael in Greece:

In Greece’s, the ICIJ’s local partner in the SwissLeaks project is Ta Nea, one of the country’s biggest mainstream newspapers.

Ta Nea is in possession of the additional Greek names, 41 of which it says have deposits of over €1m euros.

For reasons only known to itself, Ta Nea has decided to specify the religious background of one family and one individual among these large depositors.

The piece refers to a “well-known family of Jewish origin, whose members were born in Athens, Thessaloniki and Tel Aviv” as well as to a “rentier of Jewish origin who was born in Thessaloniki”.

It’s important to point out that the religious affiliation of the other account holders on the list is not provided. So, readers are not informed if the “businessman involved in shipping and born in Chios” or “three brothers born in Greece” are Orthodox, Catholics or atheists. Not that this information would be of any relevance. 

Ta Nea is not the first to deliberately single out the Jewish background of alleged tax evaders on the SwissLeaks/LagardeList files. In October 2012, Pasok leader Evangelos Venizelos told MPs of his “unpleasant impression that three of the names were of Greek Jewish origin” when he looked at print outs from the Lagarde list.