Sir, - I refer to Frank Callan's review (May 16th) of Dermot Keogh's book Jews in Twentieth- Century Ireland: Refugees, Anti-Semitism and the Holocaust. The author of the book uses quotation marks around the word pogrom when he discusses what he describes as the Limerick "pogrom". Why then does Mr Callan use the word pogrom (without quotation marks) to describe the shameful treatment of Jews in Limerick City in 1904?
It was not a pogrom. This is a misuse of the word. One might as well call it the Limerick Holocaust. A pogrom as defined in Webster's New Dictionary is "an organised massacre of a minority group, esp. Jews (from Russian "Like Thunder", Devastation)". The Jews were assaulted and run out of town and this was completely wrong. But it was not a pogrom.
We can't do anything to change 1904 or the period of the second World War when we allowed the grand total of 25 Jews to find refuge here (some of that 25 had converted to Christianity). But we can offer sanctuary to people who are in danger of being murdered if they return to their country of origin. I read with interest a letter (May 14th) by Ms Agnes Bernelle who had found refuge from Hitler in Britain in 1936 in which she pleaded on behalf of a Burundian family that faces deportation.
We all look back with some shame at how this state treated the Jews fleeing Hitler's pogrom. Will we do something for the fleeing refugees of today? - Yours, etc., Michael McGuire,
Foylesprings, Derry.