Based on your interpretation of the texts that follow, determine if each alternative is true of false.

THE level of debate between Germany and Greece, protagonists in a drama that could make or break the euro zone, could hardly be called edifying. Take, for example, the YouTube video from 2013 which shows Yanis Varoufakis, then a left-leaning economics professor, arguing that Greece should simply default on its debts and “stick the finger to Germany”, and making an appropriate hand gesture for emphasis. When Mr Varoufakis, now Greece’s finance minister, was confronted with the clip on March 15th during a talk show on German television, he claimed the footage was doctored. The ensuing “Fingergate” lasted days, as the German media proved that the video was genuine, albeit taken out of context. Germany’s pundits spluttered with rage: the Greeks were mendacious as well as impertinent.

Arguments over a tactless hand gesture might be called a childish spat. But historically based threats to seize German assets carry a heavier payload because they recall some dark spectres that have never ceased to haunt both countries. Between 1941 and 1944 the Nazis occupied Greece with a brutality exceeded only in Slavic countries. Greece has never formally dropped claims on Germany which date from that time. Now, in the midst of a debate about recently incurred Greek debts, the government in Athens suddenly wants Germany to settle some much older obligations, both financial and moral, as well.

Germans don’t like being reminded of the past by others, because they have their own very formal rituals of recollection. Remembering and drawing lessons from the past is baked into the German approach to politics, psychologically and even physically. When legislators walk to debates in Berlin’s Reichstag building, they see walls covered in Cyrillic graffiti. These were scribbled by Red Army soldiers after they stormed to victory in 1945, and meticulously preserved as silent exhortations to responsible governance. Germany’s politicians generally go out of their way to be sensitive to countries which the Nazis invaded or occupied.

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