Madam, - President McAleese is to visit Auschwitz later this month to commemorate the liberation of that extermination camp, according to your edition of January 18th. May I propose that, while there, she formally withdraws, on behalf of the Irish people, the "condolences" on the death of Adolf Hitler which Eamon de Valera, then Taoiseach, offered to the German ambassador in Dublin on May 3rd 1945?
Mr de Valera's policy of neutrality during the second World War was defensible, given that Ireland was defenceless against air and naval attack, and it had the support of the majority of the population.
But his protocol visit to the ambassador, Edouard Hempel, was a shameful action at a time when details of the extermination camps were being revealed to a horrified world. According to one historian, John Duggan, the ambassador himself was embarrassed.
In addition, President McAleese could apologise on our behalf for the State's almost total refusal to accept Jewish refugees, including children, trying to flee from Hitler's Third Reich before war broke out. At this stage, Mr de Valera and his government were fully aware of the appalling treatment by the Nazis of the Jewish population under their rule prior to the "Final Solution". We even had an ambassador in Berlin, Charles Bewley, who defended the persecution of Jews.
In the Dáil in 1943, a newly elected TD, Oliver Flanagan, protesting against Emergency Orders, said: "There is one thing that Germany did and that was to rout the Jews out of their country. Until we rout the Jews out of this country it does not matter a hair's breadth what orders you make." No one present protested.
Dr Dermot Keogh of University College, Cork has pioneered research into the anti-semitism prevalent in areas of the Irish population and of the civil service in the 1930s and 1940s. He unearthed a Department of Justice memorandum written soon after the war which stated: "The immigration of Jews is generally discouraged. As Jews do not become assimilated with the native population, like other immigrants, any big increase in their number might create a social problem."
At this stage, the civil service and their masters were well aware of how Hitler dealt with his "social problem".
One wonders if President McAleese should even be attending the Auschwitz ceremonies, given Ireland's record towards the Jews. But if she does go there, the present Government could at least write her a speech that tries to remove some of the shame at our record. - Yours, etc.,
JOE CARROLL, Blackrock, Co Dublin.