WWII Greek resistance icon Manolis Glezos died on Monday at the age of 98 in Athens. He was born on Sept. 9, 1922 on the large Cyclades island of Naxos.
A month after the German occupation of Greece began in April 1941, Glezos, along with Apostolos Santas, sneaked atop the Acropolis and took down the swastika-adorned Nazi flag.
The two were convicted to death in absentia, with French general and statesman Charles de Gaulle referring ot the “first partisans” in occupied Europe.
Glezos was particularly active in the wartime resistance, jailed repeatedly before escaping in September 1944, a month before the German occupation of mainland Greece ended.
After the war, he was a well-known leftist activist, politician and Parliament deputy, recording multiple arrests and jail sentences for his political activity.
In the last decades of his life, Glezos’ reputation continued to grow, graduating from a leftist icon to a revered and acknowleged national figure in the country.
