[00:00] Israel issued a rare warning to its citizens in Greece last week. Avoid advertising your nationality in public. The warning came before a nationwide pro Palestine Day of Action. These rally rallies have become a fixture of the Greek summer as 2026 polling finds 65% of the population oppose a partnership with Israel. Tourists have been targeted. The Israeli cruise ship Crown Iris has been met repeatedly with port protests and being forced to leave under riot police cordon. For decades, Greece
[00:32] was a haven for many Israelis as a tourist destination, a place to invest, and even a place to move to. That image is now cracking. But at the very same time, Athens is rapidly becoming one of Israel's key partners in the Mediterranean. Earlier this month, Saudi Arabia, Turkey, and Pakistan signed a joint defense agreement in Mecca, framed by many Israeli officials as a threat. Diaspora Affairs Minister Amitai was among others who said Israel's clear counterpoint was the Hellenic Axis. This
[01:02] means Greece and Cyprus. In turn, Greece is buying Israeli weapons on a huge scale. In July, it approved the purchase of a 3.5 billion euro air defense system, just one part of the biggest military overhaul in modern Greek history. And Israel is at the heart of it. Greek protesters frame this as a moral problem with taxpayers money spent on weapons they say were battle tested in Gaza. But hostilities extend beyond Gaza. Rent has soared and many Greeks blame Israeli buyers for pricing them
[01:33] out of their own property. Elite strategy is pulling Athens closer to Israel just as public opinion is pushing it away. Can this alliance survive its own unpopularity? To discuss, I'm joined by two guests, former CIA counterterrorism officer, US Greek citizen and previous adviser to the Greek government, John Kuryaku, and US Greek journalist and me reporter Shawn Matthews, whose recent book, The New Baantines, explores the rise of Greece and return of the Near East. Welcome
[02:03] both of you to ME Live. John, I'm going to start with you. You spent years inside the CIA's counterterrorism world. In plain security terms, what is the quidd proquo of the Israel Greece partnership? >> Well, at its most basic level, the Greeks are looking for protection from the Turks and the Turks and the Israelis have absolutely terrible uh bilateral relations. In fact, the Israeli defense minister said just four weeks ago that
[02:33] Israel's next war would be against Turkey. The the Israelis don't believe that even if the Turks invoke article 5 of the NATO charter, an attack on one being an attack on all, that the United States would would fight Israel on behalf of Turkey. And so, um, I think they're trying to force everybody's hand here. The truth is that the Greeks are afraid of the Turks. The Greeks don't know where to run, so they run to the Israelis. The Greek people want none of this. And so there's going going to have
[03:04] to be a reckoning day probably sooner rather than later between the Greek government and the Greek people. >> I'm curious just how how afraid of Turkey because Greek defense spending has risen from 5.5 billion in 2019 to over 8 billion a year with nearly 28 billion euros of modernization planned by 2036. Is there is there a real fear of of military confrontation in Athens? >> There there really is. Uh and you hear it all the time. My family happens to be
[03:34] from the the glorious island of roads and I I was in roads a couple of uh two months ago visiting family and I was at our ancestral house. It was built by my great great greatgrandfather in the village of Yalisos. And I noticed behind my cousin there was a machine gun against the wall. So I said to my cousin, "Reisto, is that a machine gun?" He said, "Yes." I said, "What are you doing with a machine gun?" He said, "All you have to do is look out the door. You can see the mountains of Turkey. We have
[04:05] to protect ourselves somehow." So even down to the most basic level of the average Greek citizen, this isn't just the Greek government screaming this from the rooftops, every Greek citizen fears Turkey. Now at the same time, you have Turkish newspapers as recently as two days ago publishing maps that show all of the Greek Aian islands as Turkish. You have the Turkish defense minister threatening uh an invasion of Greece. you have Turkish uh fighter jets
[04:37] violating Greek airspace literally every single day. And so the Greeks really are worried. Now, with that said, the Greek people recognize a genocide when they see one and they don't want to do business with Israel, but the government is forcing it. That's why I say there's there's going to be a reckoning. There's going to be Greek national elections in 2027, next year. And um and I think this is going to be a major issue. It's not all economics in Greece anymore.
[05:09] >> But if if if the um if the everyday citizen is is afraid of Turkey, as you say, and Athens is sort of partnering with Israel in in response to that Turkish threat, doesn't that translate to to a popular level? Don't people who fear Turkey accept Israel as a necessary evil? No. >> No. Because it's my experience that the Greeks believe that the Israelis are taking over. The Israelis asked the Greek government if uh if they could have permission, for example, to purchase an entire island that would just be a Jewish island. And and Greek
[05:39] citizens see what's happening in Cyprus where the Israeli government and Israeli investors are buying entire villages or entire neighborhoods in cities like Bafos and Larnica. There's an Israeli military base that there now. There's a Mossad base in Cyprus where there never was one, at least publicly, ever before. And so, it's not just that the Greek government has asked the Israeli government to protect it against Turkey. It's that the Greek government is opening the doors for the Israelis to
[06:10] come and become a permanent presence in Greece. You made a point in your intro that is important and I think bears repeating. Israeli investors [clears throat] are buying vast amounts of real estate to the point where in cities like Athens and Thessaloniki um they've bought up so much of the otherwise affordable real estate to the point where the average working Greek can no longer afford to live in the center of Athens. You can only afford it
[06:41] if you're Israeli, Russian or Chinese because they're the ones spending the money there and the Greeks don't want it. Sean, let's bring you in here because Greece wasn't always in the pro-Israel camp. It voted against the UN partition plan for Palestine in 1947. It was one of the last Western states to formally recognize the state of Israel, which it only did in 1990. What changed when, and why? >> Yeah. Well, John and I are kindred spirits because I'm also from the Eastern Nian. So, I'm from Inus, which
[07:12] is one of the islands that the Turkish jets buzz. Um so we are from the lands of New Greece let's say um which are kind of the territories that uh joined Greece last uh before the collapse of the Ottoman Empire. But um look I I think John really uh he was spot on there and the history is fascinating. You know one of the things I mean you have the images of the protests here in in Greece that I want to say is that it's a very bipartisan issue in Greece. I mean Greece is kind of this country that was defined for many decades by the civil war right this kind of left- on right battle. But the sympathy for the Palestinian cause is very much something
[07:43] that kind of connects people, your traditional conservative voter and your voter on the left. For the conservative voters, it's because of the Orthodox Church. Don't forget there is a very very deep bond between Palestinian Orthodox Christians and Greek Orthodox Christians. Um, and that is a bond that really transcends centuries. On the left, of course, you had this kind of fervent um support for the Palestinians in terms of anti-colonialism. um and you know kind of the Greeks who took on the cause of Arab nationalism in the 1950s and the 1960s. So this is a bipartisan issue. Um you know one of the
[08:14] things that Israel has tried to done throughout Europe and the US right is kind of raise the spectre of Islamophobia and you know kind of this sphere of of the Muslim world in order to kind of gain allies in the region. And that held for a little bit I think in Greece maybe in 2015 especially with voters on the right. But one thing that we're starting to see broader within Europe in general and in the US, but especially in Greece, is that voters on the right really don't buy it that, you know, the Israelis are their allies and that there is a deep sympathy, I think, with the Palestinian people, especially because of the genocide in Kaza. Um, but
[08:45] yeah, that history of support for the Palestinians is there um really going back centuries. I mean, again, Palestinians and Greeks lived under the Ottoman Empire or the Byzantine Empire even. You had alliances during the time of the Byzantine Empire between Orthodox Christians and Palestine, historic Palestine. And so so very very deep roots there. Um and Greece was the last country at the time to normalize relations with Israel and establish a full diplomatic relationship in 1990. Um but as John said, right, it's this Turkish relationship um I think this Turkish threat that kind of has propelled this uh relationship forward.
[09:16] One thing that I should add though, and again this kind of goes back to the issue of how populations kind of see Israel and how where Israel's public image is. The other reason that the Greeks have really doubled down on this relationship is because they're scared about an American retreat from the Eastern Mediterranean. And the Greek American lobby is playing a very very dangerous game PC and DC. And I know John is very aware of this. You you've seen kind of the Greek American lobby latch on to the Zionist lobby to Apac into these groups because they are betting on an America that's in retreat trying to stay engaged in the Eastern
[09:46] Mediterranean through its closest ally which is Israel. So, so there's another angle to this. There's the Turkish angle. There's the American angle which is the easiest route to the US in Washington and Congress and the Senate is oftentimes through the Israeli lobby. But again, that is changing, right? We've seen public perceptions of Israel in the US decreasing amongst all voters, especially young Republicans. Obviously, the Democratic party has moved against them. So, so there are myriad of factors here, I think, that the Greeks are betting on or have bet on in the last decade, let's say, regarding Israel and why they feel they need that alliance, but that is changing rapidly.
[10:17] >> And let's look at this then from the the Israeli perspective. What are the factors driving their friendship with with Greece? People point to the Mecca agreement on one hand. There's also the the Iran war. Netanyahu talks talks about this hexagon of alliances, Greece, Cyprus, India, the UAE, Morocco. Many of these sit on on maritime choke points. Just talk us through John if you will um the Israeli motivations driving this friendship. >> This this is actually quite a complicated issue. So, there are several
[10:50] factors at play. The most obvious one, I think, is the absolutely enormous gas field that Cyprus has discovered off of its uh southern coast. It's lifting the gas or in the process of lifting the gas along with the governments of Greece and Israel. Uh there was talk about involving the Egyptians and certainly diplomatic discussions have taken place, but it's more than just the gas. It's it's Turkey and um and it's uh as Sean
[11:23] correctly pointed out, it's the fact that a lot of countries believe that the Eastern Mediterranean and the Middle East are getting away from the United States. It started with Barack Obama's so-called pivot to Asia. Nobody in the region wanted to see a pivot to Asia. They want American leadership there and now American leadership is is lacking. The Israelis also are very very happy to establish relations with any country that they think that they can influence
[11:53] or purchase or who might say a nice thing about what they're doing in Iran or Gaza or, you know, anybody anywhere else, southern Lebanon, Syria. The Israelis were confident, for example, that if they bombed a Turkish base in Syria, but just 20 miles from the Turkish border, that nobody would do anything about it. And they were right. It's the same thing with with Iran. Attack Iran for us. Attack, attack, attack, attack. We finally attack.
[12:25] Nobody does anything about it. Uh Sean made another important point, and I see it here in Washington all the time. I spoke at the uh the SECA conference a couple of months ago. It's the uh whatever it is, the Greek criate, you know, diaspora organization here in the United States. And the Israeli ambassador was front and center sitting with the Greek ambassador, the Armenian ambassador, uh I forget who else was there, the Georgian maybe. But uh but
[12:55] what about the Greek Orthodox Church? Or what about panory? Right? The way I was raised was to support my my Orthodox brethren, no matter where they were in the world, right? Whether they were in in Palestine or in uh Alexandria or Moscow or Kiev or Tiblisi or wherever, because we're all one. We're all one one faith until now. [snorts] And now we're supposed to say, "Well, those
[13:25] Palestinians, yeah, they're orthodox, but but there's a lot of gas money at play here and bigger uh uh international issues. We're just going to walk away from the Palestinians." >> This was >> and I don't think most Greeks are ready to do that. Willing to do that. >> Was this diaspora event? This was in the US. Yes, it was in the US and it came one week after the big diaspora event in uh in Cyprus which I also attended. >> But the funny thing there is and again
[13:57] this comes to Sean's excellent point. The funny thing there is everybody complained about the Israelis but in Washington everybody lauded the Israelis. How grateful we were that the Israelis are paying attention to our longstanding issues with Turkey. It's like, "No, that's today, but wait until they take over or they own half of your real estate. Then we'll see what they do for you." >> Because right in Washington, you've long argued that the US is pursuing an Israel
[14:31] first policy, but you say in Cypress, the event had a slightly different tone. Would you go so far as to say that Athens is now importing that Israel first policy, or is is that not quite on the same level as the US? I would say that. Yes, I would say that. And and I think the only thing that's holding them back from going whole hog is the fact that so many Greeks are in the streets protesting this kind of thing. We're seeing so many news reports, for example, of Israelis not being able to disembark from cruise ships because
[15:02] people are protesting. I was in Athens just until two days ago. And I love I love to stay in this neighborh neighborhood called CD. It's kind of rundown, semi-industrial, but a lot of great uh cafes and coffee shops and restaurants and things like that. I was with my son and we were sitting in a in a cafe and I'm I'm frequently recognized on the street and I'm very happy to take selfies with whomever wants one. And one guy said, "I know you. You're the CIA guy," which I get all the time. And I
[15:33] said, "Yes, how are you? Nice to meet you." And he says, "I don't like you at all. you better shut up about Israel. And then of course I noticed the Hebrew accent and I said, "Oh, I'll never ever stop talking about the genocide that you're committing in Gaza and in the West Bank and in Syria and in Lebanon and in Iran. So no, you're not going to silence me." >> I want to talk more about that tension on the street right now that is emerging
[16:04] between Greeks and Israelis. Sean, you you for your book, you were traveling all around Greece, compiling these conversations with all sorts of demographics. Israel is now warning its citizens to hide their identity. How real is that tension on the ground? Is it anger at a government or is it anger at Israelis themselves? >> You know, Greeks face a double-edged sword, Manitoba, because the Greek economy is really this hot, you know, Greece had this horrible financial crisis. It's still emerging out of the
[16:36] financial crisis. And if you come to Athens with Esaniki or the islands, what you see is, and I say in the book, The New Byzantines, you see kind of this entropo, this booming kind of Eastern Mediterranean city, right? Gourmet restaurants, you hear a lot of Lebanese, snappy Lebanese Arabic, you hear a lot of Egyptian Arabic on the street, you hear Hebrew. It's attracting a lot of hot foreign money. So the Greeks on one hand, they have kind of courted the Israelis for investment, right? Especially real estate investment. And I'm not talking about big businessmen. I'm talking about people selling maybe their grandparents apartment, right? or their uncle's their uncle's house and they needed a buyer and the only one who
[17:06] can buy that is an Israeli. So I think what we saw in the relationship especially in 2015 2016 2017 when really it was unclear whether Greece would leave the euro or not and there was a deep deep economic uncertainty. The Greeks really welcomed the Israelis because they had no one else to sell to basically and the Israelis swooped in and they really came in. Now what we're seeing is that that investment as John had said you know so eloquently uh at the in the beginning that investment has compounded an extraordinary cost of living crisis for ordinary Greeks in which you have houses apartments in
[17:37] Athens that are priced higher than apartments in the cont in the US um and there's a massive salary differential. I mean it's it's uh it's impossible really to understate to overstate that is how expensive Athens is um and how expensive real estate in cities like Teslani and Athens city center are and a lot of that is because of his rally investment. So there's a personal story here for sure. Um an economic story here that that that people are feeling. I think also again the genocide in Gaza has been covered a lot in Greek in Greek media to its credit. People see it on in on Instagram, they listen to Middle East
[18:08] eye, they see the content, they are aware of the reality of the genocide in Gaza. And remember, look, this is a very small region in the Eastern Mediterranean. Um you know, for somebody in Chicago, maybe Gaza feels a thousand miles away because it kind of is. But if you're in Athens, you know, Palestine is a 2-hour flight. Egypt is a two-hour flight. It's very very close. It's easier to get to um to from Athens than it is to go from, you know, New York City to Washington DC. To be quite honest with you, if there was a direct connection, it's it's nothing. Um so I think that tangible feeling is very much
[18:39] there. Um and the tension is on the street right because of this. You have the genocide, you have the conflict, and then you have kind of the economic crisis. One other thing that I think is important um that that we that we should kind of think about looking forward here is that 2015 2016 when the Greeks wanted a partner. They went to the Israelis and this does feed back into the the popular opinion about Israel today. Um the Israelis seemed like a steady hand maybe to many Greeks I think at the time right remember this was before the Iran war. It was before the genocide. Israel looked very powerful. In 2020 what did
[19:10] we have? We had the Abraham Accords agreements. So the Israelis went to the Amiratis. Greece desperately wants Gulf money from all the Gulf states. They want Qatari money. They want Iraqi money. They want Saudi money. They want to partner with all these Gulf states. So 2016 through 2020, Israel kind of looked like, if you're Greece and you're thinking mccurially, the country to bet on in order to get these good ties. Now what have we seen? We've seen a f a failing war in Iran. We've seen Saudi Arabia distance itself from Israel. We've seen Qatar obviously have has uh you know stood by the Palestinian people. The only ally that Israel really
[19:41] has in the Gulf is the UAE. one country basically every other country has turned on the Israelis even now the Egyptians right and this is very important Greece and Egypt have very historic ties I'm here in Athens I know John comes to Athens a lot the Egyptian embassy in Athens is literally a stones throw from the parliament building that's a historic embassy that goes back to the fact that when Greece was proclaimed in the 19th century the Egyptians were one of the first country under Muhammad Ali Pasha to recognize the Greeks and there are deep trade ties between them so you know the historic ties between Greece
[20:12] and Egypt there were hundreds hundreds of thousands of Greeks who lived in Egypt. The ties between Greece and Egypt have always been very good. Okay? And the Greeks have always kind of courted the Egyptians in their competition with the Turks. Today, what we're seeing is Egypt moving closer to Turkey because of its concerns about a militaristic and expansionist Israel. So, in the Greek street, Israel no longer looks like the steady-handed ally that can help. It looks like a potential threat that is pulling your allies, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, potential allies away from you. So I think all these factors are
[20:43] combining and Greeks are getting a second opinion of Israel. >> I suppose these strands sort of come together as well because if um economically there's a cost of living crisis, there's you know crumbling public services in a lot of areas in Greece, then you have the genocide in Gaza and you have this this crumbling image of Israel as a reliable partner. If you see your government spending loads on on Israeli arms and techs and defense deals while you think it's not spending enough on, I don't know, firefighting, hospitals, pensions, there's those tensions sort of come together in that way as well. Um, John, I I'm really curious about this property
[21:15] issue. But I want to ask a little bit more about it because very often when we have um tensions around migration uh and tensions around the housing and and housing crisis, they really intersect and often you'll see immigrants being sort of scapegoed or or becoming a really easy excuse for why the housing sector is in crisis. Greece also is on the front line of Europe. The borders are hardening and attitudes towards migration are hardening with it. Does the this attitude towards Israeli migration and Israeli property
[21:45] purchasing is it really distinct from from the overall sort of anti-migrant sentiment? >> Oh, that's a great question. And the answer is yes, it is different because it's at a different economic level. I I'll tell you the honest to God's truth, and Sean and I talked about this last time we got together for coffee. I'm looking to buy a place in Athens right now. And when I started looking about 2 years ago, things were affordable in the center of Athens, the historic center, the area essentially around the
[22:17] Acropolis and then stretching north about uh a mile, let's say, uh 1 and a half km. And now it's not affordable. It's because so many um Israeli investors have come in and bought up the properties in the historic center. They're not out where the refugees are. They're not in Omnia Square, which is, you know, a little bit seedy when the sun goes down, where there are a lot of refugees, especially Arab and South Asian refugees. They're in the very
[22:48] center, the very heart of touristic Athens. Um, I mentioned a few minutes ago, I like to stay in the neighborhood of CD. So, I was in CD, I'm going to say in March, and it was a building with six floors, two apartments on each floor. And it turned out that I was the only person in the building for the week that I was there. And there was a cleaning lady that came in and I said, I said, "It's like a ghost town in this
[23:19] building. What's going on?" And she said, "Oh, um, Israelis bought all the apartments and made them all Airbnb. The problem though is while those buildings are sitting empty, Greeks cannot afford to live in their own capital because all of this outside money has come in and pushed prices higher. >> We have the same problem in London, not specifically with Israeli purchasing, but vacant houses, you know, occupying the center of of the city. And really
[23:49] interestingly, there was a poll uh YUGV poll in the UK here on attitudes towards migration. And it found that while in general attitudes towards migration have fallen, they have fallen above all for two populations. One is Russian and the other is Israeli, Russian is is probably one of the key buyers in in this property story. But the the connection between them are both of course these invasions that people have been seeing unfold on the news. And I think that that was an interesting revelation about what drives these these migration debates because it's it's not so much in
[24:20] the media when you when you talk about migration. >> No. And there are famous stories about entire blocks in Mayfair and Nightsbridge where there are buildings without a single light on at night because these units are all owned by Russian, Chinese, Israeli cuttery investors and there are there's nobody living in these buildings, not on a permanent >> basis. [snorts] Same thing in Athens now. >> Yeah. Now, just to close this conversation, I'm going to ask you each a final question. Sean, with your book,
[24:50] The New Bisantines, the framing, right, is that today is a period of rejuvenation for Greece in terms of its global and its regional relevance. But how key is Israel to that growing relevance? Does Greece retain its its growing relevance, as you say, at the intersection between the West and and the Middle East without this alliance with Israel? >> No, Greece Greece very much does. And the reason Israel wants Greece is because of its geography because the borders although they're hardening and attitudes toward immigration are
[25:21] hardening in Europe, the wider trend is the borders are shrinking and the space between Europe in the Middle East is a lot smaller than it's ever been probably in the last 200 years and Greece has a very very good geography. That's why so many investors are coming here to be quite honest with you because it's two or three hours from everywhere in the world basically and it has a very very envious geography. the islands of Cree. Look at where the US military is based in Cree. Look at Alexander, the base in northeastern Greece, which the US has used to supply Ukraine with arms. Greece's geography is extremely important. And it's it's important for
[25:51] any country, for the Gulf States, for Egypt, even for Turkey, honestly, the cooperation that that if Greece and Turkey can have a solid economic um cooperation, and we see some of this on the Eastern Aian Islands, there there's lots of win-win solutions for both countries there. So Greece very very much is still relevant um to all these countries and more important than ever because that space between Europe and the Middle East is shrinking and we're kind of seeing this return to an eastern Mediterranean region in part honestly because of the collapse of US power in the region. That's the greatest irony. >> And John, you say that if the government of Greece pushes forwards with its
[26:23] alliance with Israel, it will face a reckoning of public opinion. If you were advising the Greek government how to navigate this, the threat of Turkey about the unpopularity of Israel, what would you advise the government? >> I think the government should be forceful in its public statements in support of uh human rights and civil rights and civil liberties and they should not pretend that none of these things are being violated in Palestine.
[26:55] I think look the the Greek government a as Sean said the Greek government historically had very close longterm relations with the Palestinians and with the Egyptians as well. My own grandfather's brother spent 20 years in Alexandria before immigrating to the United States. So I think that the Greeks can be honest about this long history of support for for the Arab uh people of the region. The Greeks can be
[27:25] the honest broker in this uh in this bilateral or trilateral relationship. The Greeks can still seek, you know, Israeli assistance against Turkey, whether it's, you know, actual military assistance or it's a friendly statement at the United Nations, but the Greeks should not just jump into bed with the with the Israelis blindly and hope for the best. You know, they they teach you in business school, hope is not a strategy. And this is a complicated
[27:56] issue that the Greeks are not taking terribly seriously. >> This has been a highly enlightening conversation. John Kuryaku, Sha Matthews, thank you so much for joining us. >> Thank you.