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ThoughtCrime: 10/15/96

Bookstore Bombed for carrying Revisionist title

A Greek bookstore, 'Nea Thesis' was attacked by armed hoodlums for openly selling the new Greek edition of Roger Garaudy's book, The Founding Myths of Israeli Politics.
 
    On the afternoon of October 15, 1996 the 'Nea Thesis' bookstore was open for business as usual. There were three people on the ground floor and four more on the first floor. Two of them were employees of the bookstore. At 7:40 p.m., 10 people wearing hoods to conceal their identities threw 6 molotov bombs at the bookstore. Four of them blew and started a fire that was extinguished quickly.
 
    Of the five major Greek television channels, only one (Antenna) referred briefly to the attack. On the day following the attack, a virtual media blackout occurred with only two newspapers Elephtherorypia and Adesmeftos Typos even mentioning it.
 
    The publishing house 'Nea Thesis' organised an interview to be given on the 7th of November by Mr. Garaudy at the hall of foreign press correspondents. Two days before the interview the owners of the hall cancelled the scheduled interview. Mr. Garaudy arrived the 6th of November and finally the interview was given at the hotel 'Amalia' at the central square of Syntagma.
 
    All major newspapers had articles about Garaudy's interview and the comments were generally very good, except the newspaper TA NEA, which is probably the largest newspaper in Greece. No national TV networks showed any interest in the interview. A few small local stations broadcast the story in the region of Athens. The newspaper Ethnos had an article of 8 pages written by Mr. Raphaelides which featured large portions of the book Founding Myths of Israeli Politics .
 
    Mr.Garaudy was interviewed by the large Sunday newspaper, To Bhma but his interview has not yet been published. The Central Israelitic Council and the Israelitic Youth of Greece sent a letter of protest that was published in the newspaper Ethnos.
 
    On Saturday the 9th of November Mr.Garaudy was at the bookstore 'Nea Thesis' where he signed copies of his book. According to an employee, the bookstore was very crowded and the situation could be characterized as 'chaos'!