{"id":263785,"date":"2026-01-25T21:33:09","date_gmt":"2026-01-25T21:33:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/263785\/"},"modified":"2026-01-25T21:33:09","modified_gmt":"2026-01-25T21:33:09","slug":"taoiseach-criticises-shocking-level-of-ignorance-about-holocaust-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/263785\/","title":{"rendered":"Taoiseach criticises \u2018shocking\u2019 level of ignorance about Holocaust \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Taoiseach Miche\u00e1l Martin<\/a> has said the public should be \u201coutraged and offended\u201d by the growing number of people in Ireland who do not believe the Holocaust happened. <\/p>\n

A survey last week by the Claims Conference, a New York-based organisation involved in Holocaust remembrance, found that almost 10 per cent of Irish people<\/a> between the ages of 18 and 29 thought the Holocaust was a \u201cmyth\u201d. <\/p>\n

Speaking at the annual Holocaust Education Ireland remembrance event in Dublin, Mr Martin said the Holocaust was \u201cthe most clearly documented crime in world history\u201d. <\/p>\n

\u201cIts savagery and scale are undeniable, as are the identities of its victims. This level of ignorance and denial is shocking and must be opposed,\u201d he added. <\/p>\n

\"TánaisteT\u00e1naiste Simon Harris and Taoiseach Mich\u00e9al\u00a0Martin with Holocaust survivor Suzi Diamond at the National Holocaust Memorial event at the Royal Hospital\u00a0Kilmainham. Photograph: Bryan O\u2019Brien <\/p>\n

The Taoiseach said the Department of Education<\/a> was working with the Department of Foreign Affairs<\/a> to develop an educational programme with the Auschwitz-Birkenau Foundation.<\/p>\n

The Jewish community in Ireland has come forward with a proposal to give schools access to Holocaust survivors via video conference to discuss and learn from their experiences. <\/p>\n

Minister for Education Hildegarde Naughton<\/a> is examining ways of ensuring that young people are reminded of what happened to Jews at the hands of the Nazis during the second World War<\/a>. <\/p>\n

Mr Martin expressed solidarity with the Jewish community in relation to the massacre during Hanukkah celebrations in Sydney last month in which two gunmen killed 15 people. <\/p>\n

He went on to criticise attempts by members of Dublin City Council to rename Herzog Park<\/a> in Rathgar, which is called after former Israeli president Chaim Herzog, who spent his early childhood in Dublin. The motion did not go forward to a full city council meeting because of a regulatory technicality. <\/p>\n

The Taoiseach highlighted the lack of consultation with the local Jewish community about the plan. <\/p>\n

\u201cWhen a group of people decide that they will seek to rename the only part in our capital named after an Irish Jew without any consultation with the Jewish community \u2013 and when they announce later that they will find a Jew they deem worthy enough to provide a new name \u2013 then frankly the community has every right to be deeply concerned and to express that concern,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Some 600 people attended the memorial event at the Royal Hospital Kilmainham<\/a>. <\/p>\n

Last year, a small number of attendees at the event in the Mansion House turned their back on President Michael D Higgins during his speech when he mentioned the war in Gaza. Some were forcibly removed from the venue.<\/p>\n

Members of the Jewish community in Ireland held a smaller event at the Irish Jewish Museum at which second and third generation survivors shared their experiences. <\/p>\n

\"ChiefChief Rabbi of Ireland Yoni Wieder at the Holocaust Memorial Day Commemoration at the Royal Hospital Kilmainham in Dublin. Photo: Bryan O\u2019Brien <\/p>\n

Chief Rabbi of Ireland Yoni Wieder described the results of the survey about the Holocaust as \u201cshocking\u201d. He said any attempt to minimise the scale of it played down the level of systemic genocide and slaughter that happened. <\/p>\n

Suzi Diamond, one of the few Holocaust survivors remaining in Ireland, said young people visit the death camps in Europe to see what happened. She said she \u201clost everything\u201d in the Holocaust and arrived in Ireland without a word of English. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe past can actually happen again in the future, and you need events like this to bring it to people\u2019s attention.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"HolocaustHolocaust Survivor Suzi Diamond\u00a0 at the National Holocaust Memorial Day Commemoration. Photo: Bryan O\u2019Brien <\/p>\n

Others in attendance at the year\u2019s event included T\u00e1naiste Simon Harris<\/a> and the Minister for Justice Jim O\u2019Callaghan, who took a firm stance against the campaign to rename Herzog Park. <\/p>\n

In advance of the event, Mr Harris described the findings of the Claims Conference survey as \u201cprofoundly disturbing\u201d. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt reflects how powerful disinformation has become in battling historical education, and how exposure to lies on social media has such a hugely destructive and insidious effect,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Taoiseach Miche\u00e1l Martin has said the public should be \u201coutraged and offended\u201d by the growing number of people…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":263786,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[6466,1844,42,2989,1843,43,130159,45210,70,40,38,41,39],"class_list":["post-263785","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-headlines","tag-department-of-education","tag-department-of-foreign-affairs","tag-headlines","tag-hildegarde-naughton","tag-micheal-martin","tag-news","tag-royal-hospital-kilmainham","tag-second-world-war","tag-simon-harris","tag-top-news","tag-top-stories","tag-topnews","tag-topstories"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/263785","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=263785"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/263785\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/263786"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=263785"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=263785"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=263785"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}