Deconstructing the right to freedom of religion or belief in human rights : a multidisciplinary approach on antisemitism towards the Jewish Community of Thessaloniki

Abstract

Religious rights have always been in the eye of the international community on whether they should be protected by Human Rights Institutions. Freedom of Religion or belief has been castigated by critics for its nature as a non-secular right and its clash with other rights such as the Right to Freedom of expression or Freedom of Speech. This thesis focuses in analyzing the right to Freedom of Religion or belief within an interdisciplinary and global context and being applied to a specific case. Such case is the one of The Jewish Community of Thessaloniki and its history throw time and suffering with the hate prejudice of antisemitism. Greece, and specially Thessaloniki has a rich Jewish heritage which seems to have been forgotten by some spheres of the Greek society. This aspect contributes to the prejudice against this community and their freedom to express themselves religiously in the public and private sphere. Incorporating firsthand evidence from bibliography, interviews with members of the Jewish community, and other fieldwork methods, this study demonstrates the correlation between the intrinsic antisemitism in some spheres of the Greek society and the limits of the enjoyment of the religious rights by the Jewish community of Thessaloniki.