Tom Ellis

On Thursday, President Joe Biden will host a ceremony at the White House celebrating Greek independence. Some have questioned the usefulness of these annual gatherings, claiming that they lack substance and serve only public relations purposes.

This year New Democracy, Greece's ruling party, is celebrating its 50th anniversary. As the main political force of the center right, ND had been at the forefront of re-establishing democracy in 1974, under the leadership of Konstantinos Karamanlis who returned from exile that year and founded the party.

For the first time in years, there is concern in the Greek diaspora, among many of its members in Washington at least, about political developments in Greece.

As a strategic partner of Israel, and also a country with traditional ties with the Muslim world, Greece, a NATO and European Union member in close proximity to the Middle East, is monitoring the latest developments in the region and is ready to play any role that may be deemed necessary. Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis stated that Greece “will support in any way every effort to de-escalate this new round of tension.”

Iran’s failed missile attack against Israel offers the latter an opportunity to reverse the negative environment on the public relations front.

We often talk of Israel as an example we should learn from in a number of areas. One of them, and an extremely important one, is defense.

The number of successful women assuming prominent roles in the Greek business world is rapidly on the rise.

The already difficult US-Turkey relationship has entered an even more delicate phase with the cancellation of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's visit to Washington.

Developments at Columbia University and other campuses in the United States and the arrest of protesting students cannot but cause alarm – regardless of whether or not one agrees with their point of view – about the freedom of speech. The arrests also hark back to behavior and actions that we believed, perhaps naively, were well behind us.

It’s been a constant theme of past decades but the situation has dramatically deteriorated during the last 10 years as the economic crisis took its toll.