The ESPO ( el, Ελληνική Σοσιαλιστική Πατριωτική Οργάνωσις, translation=Hellenic Socialist Patriotic Organization) was a

collaborationist Wartime collaboration is cooperation with the enemy against one's country of citizenship in wartime, and in the words of historian Gerhard Hirschfeld, "is as old as war and the occupation of foreign territory". The term ''collaborator'' dates to t ...

, pro-

Nazi Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in ...

organization created in the summer of 1941 in German-occupied Greece, under the leadership of Georgios Vlavianos and later Dr. Spyros Sterodimas. Its members were ultra-nationalists, Nazis, and fascists aiming to help the Axis occupation forces against

Communism Communism (from Latin la, communis, lit=common, universal, label=none) is a far-left sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology and current within the socialist movement whose goal is the establishment of a communist society, a s ...

and

Jews Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...

. One of their main actions was the ransacking of the synagogue on Melidoni Street, Athens, by the ESPO's youth section.

The bombing

Dr. Sterodimas, meanwhile, was trying to recruit Greek youth to create a Greek division of the Waffen SS, but was killed together with other 28 members of ESPO (and 48 German soldiers) when the

PEAN The Panhellenic Union of Fighting Youths ( el, Πανελλήνιος Ένωσις Αγωνιζόμενων Νέων, ''Panellínios Énosis Agonizómenon Néon'', ΠΕΑΝ, PEAN) was a Greek Resistance organization during the Axis Occupation o ...

resistance Resistance may refer to: Arts, entertainment, and media Comics * Either of two similarly named but otherwise unrelated comic book series, both published by Wildstorm: ** ''Resistance'' (comics), based on the video game of the same title ** ''T ...

group blew up the organization's headquarters in central Athens. His death meant the abandonment of these plans, and the effective end of ESPO. During the

Day of Atonement Yom Kippur (; he, יוֹם כִּפּוּר, , , ) is the holiest day in Judaism and Samaritanism. It occurs annually on the 10th of Tishrei, the first month of the Hebrew calendar. Primarily centered on atonement and repentance, the day's ...

services, on September 22, 1942, the

Gestapo The (), abbreviated Gestapo (; ), was the official secret police of Nazi Germany and in German-occupied Europe. The force was created by Hermann Göring in 1933 by combining the various political police agencies of Prussia into one organi ...

seized ten prominent Jews in retaliation for this explosion.Markos Vallianatos, The untold history of Greek collaboration with Nazi Germany (1941-1944) After the death of Sterodimas, the leadership passed to Aristeides Andronikos, who left to Austria in September 1944 with other collaborators. Today there is a small monumento to PEAN's leader,

Kostas Perrikos Kostas Perrikos ( el, Κώστας Περρίκος; 23 April 1905 – 4 February 1943) was a Greek Air Force officer and leader of the PEAN resistance movement in World War II. He is the father of the UN arms control Commissioner Dimitris Perri ...

at the place.

References

1941 establishments in Greece 1942 disestablishments in Greece Political parties established in 1941 Political parties disestablished in 1942 1940s in Greek politics Defunct nationalist parties in Greece Fascism in Greece Greek collaborators with Nazi Germany Athens in World War II Nazi parties Collaboration with the Axis Powers Antisemitism in Greece Anti-communist parties Far-right political parties in Greece Greek Orthodoxy in Greece {{Greece-stub