Of the approximately 800 Greeks surveyed by the polling company VPRC, more than three-quarters said they felt Germany is hostile to Greece. Some 69 percent even believe that German politicians are genuinely pursuing the goal of establishing a “Fourth Reich.” When asked what they associated with Germany, one in three respondents used terms like “Hitler,” “Nazism” and “Third Reich.” Before the crisis, the Greeks were generally enamored of the Germans.
The editor-in-chief of Greece’s best-selling newspaper, the left-liberal Ta Nea, is a levelheaded man. Notis Papadopoulos, 50, studied in Essex and has worked as a journalist for over two decades. He has no interest in drawing parallels to the Nazi era. “We don’t like such exaggerations,” he says. Until recently, his paper supported the government’s policies and, by extension, those of the international creditors. Nevertheless, he believes that a line was crossed when the idea of an austerity commissioner for Athens was leaked — a German idea. “It made everyone think of Nazi officials,” he says.
After that, Ta Nea printed on its cover page a drawing of a disgruntled-looking Merkel holding an anxious-looking Greece by chains. The words “Nein! Nein! Nein!” — in German — were printed above the caricature.
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