Did the President really say that?

[Rabbit]

Re: Missing the main event

Purple said "Dev had many faults but his high standing within the Jewish community both before and after the war speaks for itself."

This comment would be funny if it was not such a serious topic. The Jews literally begged for their lives to be let in here, and Dev' government refused in practically all cases.... what makes you think he had a high standing in the Jewish community ? Which itself was hunted / burnt out of Limerick in the thirties for example.


Quote by Purple " Remember that the full story of what was happening in Nazi occupied Europe was not known at the time" Everyone, including the 120,000 men from Ireland who volunteered from North and South knew about Hitlers invasion of his neighbouring countries, and Jews were being badly treated in the Germany of the late thirties.
By the time Dev signed the book of condolences for Hitler some of the Nazi concentration camps like Auchwitz had been liberated a matter of months, had they not.

 

[purple]

Re: Missing the main event

Rabbit;

what makes you think he had a high standing in the Jewish community ?

He was a friend of the then chief rabbi and was a supporter of the establishment of a Jewish state in the middle east. A Jewish friend of my father remembers the period as a small boy and he said that the Jewish community felt much more nervous about the fascist blue shirt movement at the time. Sorry for supporting my point with conjecture but I can't give you detail at the moment. Do remember that the public, the church and the civil service were strongly against letting any Jewish refugees in. Dev did get a boat load of Jewish children in at one stage but only because they were in transit, again I can't remember where to.
Dev's signing of the book of condolences was the strict interpretation of protocol as a neutral country. You correctly pointed out that by that time the world knew what Hitler had unleashed in his death camps and in that context I think that his signing of the book was deeply offensive and stupid and even in the context of the time is inexcusable.