Scandal or “oversight”? Greek Tourism video “communicates” Nazi Olympic Games

A scandal?  A gaffe? A documented of officials’ inadequacy? Or just an “oversight”? The original video clip of which the Greek Tourism Ministry and the Greek National Tourism Organization (EOT) have been so proud of, contained footage from the Nazi Olympic Games in 1936. The inexcusable footage showed a blond “aryan” German athlete taking the Olympic torch to the Olympic Stadium of Hitler’s Berlin. It is certainly a fact that the Nazis introduced the idea of Olympic torch relay flame to Olympic Games but yet…  the bunch of Greek Tourism officials, Minister Kefalogianni include,  who apparently saw the video clip and approved it, found nothing wrong in promoting not only …Greece’s Tourism but also … the Nazis’ Olympics.

     screen shot from EOT’s original video clip

Screen shot from Hitler’s Olympic Games director Leni Riefenstahl

British  daily The Guardian brought the issue to the attention of EOT that rushed to take down the video clip form YouTube, edit it and remove the scandalous footage replacing it with a shot of the torch lighting ceremony from Ancient Olympia.

       edited version – pict by DamianMacConUladh

Greek Tourism General Secretary Panos Livadas told the Guardian

“This was a commemorative video marking 100 years of the Greek tourism organization, that was shown in the UK for the first time, and we wanted to include footage from the Olympic games.” adding  “In the sequence, a scene from the 1936 Olympics was mistakenly included which we will immediately remove and rectify.”

Officials attributed the error to a technical oversight, saying it should not be given undue emphasis,” The Guardian notes.

Nevertheless, the edited video clip s up on YouTube again, however, journalist Damian Mac Con Uladh notes on his blog that “there are still some seconds of the Nazi footage on the new video clip.” Mac Con Uladh was also the first who spotted the Nazi Olympic Flame footage two days ago.

Video: original version

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Screen shot from edited video

    same quality as Nazi Olympic Flame in new edited version?

Video: edited version controversial part 8:25 – 8:25

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PS of course, a  technical mistake, an oversight in the heads of Greek officials whose history reflexes are either much to slow to react or they don’t exist at all.

…and No, nobody from the Greek officials shows any sign of resignation. Thanks for asking!