Greeks, what do you think of Lebanese or Syrians who are Greek Orthodox ?

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Fepotili@reddit

We should protect them and ensure their safety. Unfortunately Greece is very inactive in the region of Middle East. We have soo many cultural and religious connections to the Orthodox people there. We are all descendants of the Eastern Roman Empire.

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johndelopoulos@reddit

And why should Greece care about "Eastern Roman empire's descendants" in particular?

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BodybuilderQuirky335@reddit

For the reason he just said

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johndelopoulos@reddit

Both the reasons and the arguments he just said are wrong. We have no reason to care about Arabs who share nothing more with us than common church

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CypriotGreek@reddit

I think we as Greeks have the obvious requirement to protect them, they are under a very existing threat and should be protected at all costs from any possible active aggression from Turkish mercenaries or jihadists. I know that technically most of them aren’t actually Greek, but that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t help them, they need help and help they shall receive

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usernamisntimportant@reddit

Greek is an identity, they can choose to adopt it or not. Formerly the it used to be more common, now it is rarer, but they can be "actually Greek" as much as the rest of us.

Also not that genetics is that big of a factor, but still relevant studies have shown the local Orthodox to have DNA more related to Greece's population, indicating at least some descendance from Ancient Greek/Byzantine colonists.

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Lothronion@reddit

They already consider themselves as "Rum". While they have been partly Arabized, and some do view themselves as Arabs, this identity of "Rum" is the very same one with the one of "Romioi" and "Romiosyne" among the Modern Greeks. They are as Greeks as the Turkophone "Rum" of Pontus and Cappadocia were Greeks, who arrived in Greece one century ago and today are impossible do differentiate from other Greeks.

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StamatisTzantopoulos@reddit

Don't think most of them consider themselves Rum (maybe some), plus a big number, perhaps the majority, belong to different branches of the Orthodox faith, not the one presided by the Ecumenical Patriarch. They are essentially Christian Arabs.

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StamatisTzantopoulos@reddit

We sympathise, although I don't think many people would consider them Greeks. Very distant cousins at best as you said, besides most of them feel Syrian, Lebanese etc.

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LektikosTimoros@reddit

we dont give a fuck?

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-Mystikos@reddit

You* dont. Speak for yourself

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Axil_GR@reddit

Actually 90% of Greeks don't. It's solely the overly religious Greek minority which acknowledges those Christian Arabs.

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Lothronion@reddit

Average reaction of Athenian Greek about the Greeks of Pontus in the 1910s.

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Axil_GR@reddit

He's right though, those people are not our business. They barely have any connections with their old homeland.

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LektikosTimoros@reddit

But am i wrong?

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Medical_Wallaby_7888@reddit

Yes

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Axil_GR@reddit

We don't think much of them, but honestly from a geopolitical viewpoint, it would benefit Greece if they became active with the minorities in the region.

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Unlikely-Elk-8316@reddit

Do you mean all those decedents of christian people living there in the middle-ages and felt more comfortable to be under the Muslim rule instead of Eastern Roman Empire's, due to their heretic religious beliefs were not tolerated by the ERA plus lower taxes?

I think nothing.

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Medical_Wallaby_7888@reddit

What?

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Unlikely-Elk-8316@reddit

Just a little history lessons

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Medical_Wallaby_7888@reddit

What About Eastern Orthodox Christians there?

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Unlikely-Elk-8316@reddit

To be honest, I care for all people safety. It's their religion I don't care about.

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usernamisntimportant@reddit

Few people in both communities know that in the not too distant past (as late as a century ago) we mutually considered each other part of the same nation. There were even some limited migrations both ways and these people weren't considered foreigners, and their descendants are know native members of both communities.

It was mostly Russia that broke this link, trying to get leverage over the Orthodox Arabs, and then the Arab movement lead to the spread of Arab nationalism among the community, which I think was overall was a good thing both for them and the wider region, but it didn't have to lead to the loss of Greek identity. You can be both Arab and Greek, as the former is mostly language-based and the latter religion-based, at least historically.

The identity has survived much longer among the Palestinians, whose priests often still originate from or are educated in Greece, and whose older population (very few of whom remain sadly, as life expectancy is incredibly low) occasionally still maintains a Greek identity.

It's part of the reason Greece has historically been fairly friendly with the Arabs, but people are slowly forgetting this link and the attitude is changing. I still view them as compatriots, should any one of them choose to identify such. I support their self-determination and security regardless, and I think Greece could do more to help (or something at least, the state is currently doing nothing).

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johndelopoulos@reddit

I and any Greek i know never considered any orthodox Arab as "part of the same nation" with us. It would be at least funny to hear such a thing

They have about as much in common with Greece as a Roman Catholic Arab has with an Austrian

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usernamisntimportant@reddit

I did start my comment stating that few people know about this so it's not surprising. Go back a few decades and you'd get a very different answer.

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johndelopoulos@reddit

Being part of "the same nation"'s most important criterion is RECOGNIZING someone else as such. Greeks never even knew that Orthodox people exist in the levant. Forget considering them Greek.

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usernamisntimportant@reddit

I did start my comment stating that few people know about this so it's not surprising. Go back a few decades and you'd get a very different answer.

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johndelopoulos@reddit

you typed the same comment one line above

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usernamisntimportant@reddit

Yes because your second comment essentially said the first thing as the first one, and the first answer was still applicable. Why rewrite essentially the same thing? You said you don't consider them Greek, I said it's a matter of time and that I already addressed it, and then you said that considering them Greek is important, so I said it's a matter of time and that I already addressed it.

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johndelopoulos@reddit

but you were already wrong, because in NO period Greeks considered Christian Orthodox of the Levant as "fellow Greeks", than never happened

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usernamisntimportant@reddit

It was the case from the formation of the Roman identity in Byzantium until the mid-19th century. Like I said there were a few immigrants here and they weren't considered foreigners, similarly to the Turkish-speaking Cappadocians. During the Revolution Greek ships tried to appeal to the local Greeks of the Levant, but the uprising failed like in the other remote regions it was attempted such as Cyprus, after some fighting and support from the local population however. Even before that, the Sultan had ordered punitive massacres of the Levantine Greeks due to the revolt in the Peloponnese, as he did for the rest of the Greeks of the Empire.

They were considered Greeks.

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johndelopoulos@reddit

Both them and Turkish speaking Cappadokians (I would suggest even some Greek-speaking as well) were not even seen as Greek by the native Greek people, I know it from first hand as a Cappadokian group was living in my father's ancestral area before moving to Kavala. Any narrative that "they are Greek" belongs to the official Greek state which for its own interests had to hellenize both

But no, they were not considered Greeks, by the people that would declare them as Greeks in the end. The Greek people themselves

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usernamisntimportant@reddit

It wasn't a decision of expedience. Yes localism always existed and different kinds of Greeks often hated each other. Even in Ancient Greek times Demosthenes had said that the Macedonians weren't Greek. But at the end of the day these people so themselves as Greek as did the Greek state and institutions, long before they arrived in Greece. This was the reason they were expelled from Turkey after all. It was kind of similar with the Arvanites, and with the Vlachs.

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johndelopoulos@reddit

I think you really misunderstood. They did not hate them as "other Greeks", they considered them NON-GREEKS. This has nothing to do with what you said, and Greek speakers of Anatolian origins were not perceived the same ways. Needless to say that the area has a lot of Vlachs, who, despite speaking a different language were never seen as foreigners

Orthodox Arabs are not even in question

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-Mystikos@reddit

The friendliness should continue and strengthen to be honest, at least with the Levant Arabs. The two cultures are very similar (of course more so the Christians of the Levant) and also the History was very strong together with the Greeks and Pheonicians

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Significant_Neck_200@reddit

I like Syrians and Lebanese independently of their religion, and I wish the best for their beautiful countries that the two great powers have taken so much advantage of them. Free Syria, Lebanon, and Palestine

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Brdngr@reddit

I don't think of them.

They'll have tough times ahead like everyone else there, but the whole area is fucked for ages now, so it's not like it's anything new.

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-Mystikos@reddit

I'm half Greek half Lebanese Greek Orthodox, you'd be surprised how much in common Greeks have with all Lebanese people in general. I notice no difference between my Greek side and my Lebanese side at family gatherings apart from the obvious language difference. And even both languages have a lot of similar words and pronunciations

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usernamisntimportant@reddit

Greek was historically used in the liturgy (and still is sometimes), so people often got some very basic understanding from there, and it could influence the community's Arabic. It's not much different than the ancestors of Greece's current population, many of whom originally spoke Greek-influenced dialects of Albanian, Slavic, Aromanian or Turkish before learning Greek.

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-Mystikos@reddit

You might find it interesting that the Maronites in Cyprus created a language called Sanna, it's an Arabic dialect written with Greek letters and uses some Greek words mixed in. It almost sounds like Cypriot Greek with the rhythm and the way they speak it

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usernamisntimportant@reddit

The Cypriot Turks also spoke Cypriot Greek natively before the Turkish invasion.

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-Mystikos@reddit

Yup and some still do, the older generation

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usernamisntimportant@reddit

Pretty much everyone at least in their 50's, and therefore born before the invasion.

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johndelopoulos@reddit

I will go with the majority of non-nationalists/non-imperialists of Greek people, and say Nothing. Why should we think something more about them than we would think about Russians or other orthodox people? yes, we share a Church with them, a Church that 90% of Greek youth will remember only 2-3 days in a whole year (Xmas and Easter), so what?

We have nothing to "protect" that other people suggest in the comments. They are Christian Orthodox Arabs, having about as much to do with us as Roman Catholic Arabs have to do with Poland

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kodial79@reddit

I think we should help them. If we can't ensure their safety there, then we should bring them here in Greece. I would have preferred the first but the second is more realistic. If it was entirely up to me, I would already have our navy sailing to Cyprus.

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Lothronion@reddit

If their safety is not guaranteed, indeed we should relocate them here (if they want of course), though in that case they should learn to speak Greek, as they are mostly Arabophones (like how many Pontic Greeks and Karamanli Greeks were Turkophones a century ago). And in that case should settle them mostly in Macedonia and Western Thrace, for they are mostly a rural people, so urbanized lifestyle of Athens and Thessaloniki would not be suitable for them.

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CabbageInMacedonia@reddit

Nothing.

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GoHardLive@reddit

Good for them ? Idk🤷‍♂️