A pogrom () is a violent riot incited with the aim of massacring or expelling an ethnic or religious group, particularly

Jews Jews ( he, יְהוּדִים, , ) or Jewish people are an ethnoreligious group and nation originating from the Israelites Israelite origins and kingdom: "The first act in the long drama of Jewish history is the age of the Israelites""The ...

. The term entered the English language from Russian to describe 19th- and 20th-century attacks on Jews in the Russian Empire (mostly within the

Pale of Settlement The Pale of Settlement (russian: Черта́ осе́длости, '; yi, דער תּחום-המושבֿ, '; he, תְּחוּם הַמּוֹשָב, ') was a western region of the Russian Empire with varying borders that existed from 1791 to 19 ...

). Similar attacks against Jews which also occurred at other times and places retrospectively became known as pogroms. Sometimes the word is used to describe publicly sanctioned purgative attacks against non-Jewish groups. The characteristics of a pogrom vary widely, depending on the specific incident, at times leading to, or culminating in,

massacre A massacre is the killing of a large number of people or animals, especially those who are not involved in any fighting or have no way of defending themselves. A massacre is generally considered to be morally unacceptable, especially when per ...

s. Significant pogroms in the

Russian Empire The Russian Empire was an empire and the final period of the Russian monarchy from 1721 to 1917, ruling across large parts of Eurasia. It succeeded the Tsardom of Russia following the Treaty of Nystad, which ended the Great Northern War. ...

included the

Odessa pogroms A series of pogroms against Jews in the city of Odessa, Ukraine, then part of the Russian Empire, took place during the 19th and early 20th centuries. They occurred in 1821, 1859, 1871, 1881 and 1905. According to Jarrod Tanny, most historians ...

Warsaw pogrom (1881) The Warsaw pogrom was a pogrom that took place in Russian-controlled Warsaw on 25–27 December 1881, then part of Congress Poland in the Russian Empire, resulting in two people dead and 24 injured. Warsaw pogrom Simon Dubnow, a contemporary Jew ...

Kishinev pogrom The Kishinev pogrom or Kishinev massacre was an anti-Jewish riot that took place in Kishinev (modern Chișinău, Moldova), then the capital of the Bessarabia Governorate in the Russian Empire, on . A second pogrom erupted in the city in Octob ...

(1903),

Kiev pogrom (1905) The Kiev pogrom of October 18-October 20 (October 31-November 2, 1905, N.S.) came as a result of the collapse of the city hall meeting of October 18, 1905 in Kiev in the Russian Empire. Consequently, a mob was drawn into the streets. Among the perp ...

, and Białystok pogrom (1906). After the collapse of the Russian Empire in 1917, several pogroms occurred amidst the power struggles in

Eastern Europe Eastern Europe is a subregion of the Europe, European continent. As a largely ambiguous term, it has a wide range of geopolitical, geographical, ethnic, cultural, and socio-economic connotations. The vast majority of the region is covered by Russ ...

, including the

Lwów pogrom (1918) The Lwów pogrom ( pl, pogrom lwowski, german: Lemberger Pogrom) was a pogrom perpetrated by Polish soldiers and civilians against the Jewish population of the city of Lwów (since 1945, Lviv, Ukraine). It happened on 21–23 November 1918, du ...

and Kiev Pogroms (1919). The most significant pogrom which occurred in

Nazi Germany Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...

was the 1938

Kristallnacht () or the Night of Broken Glass, also called the November pogrom(s) (german: Novemberpogrome, ), was a pogrom against Jews carried out by the Nazi Party's (SA) paramilitary and (SS) paramilitary forces along with some participation fro ...

. At least 91 Jews were killed, a further thirty thousand arrested and subsequently incarcerated in

concentration camps Internment is the imprisonment of people, commonly in large groups, without charges or intent to file charges. The term is especially used for the confinement "of enemy citizens in wartime or of terrorism suspects". Thus, while it can simply ...

, a thousand synagogues burned, and over seven thousand Jewish businesses destroyed or damaged. Notorious pogroms of

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

included the 1941

Farhud ''Farhud'' ( ar, الفرهود) was the pogrom or "violent dispossession" carried out against the Jewish population of Baghdad, Iraq, on June 1–2, 1941, immediately following the British victory in the Anglo-Iraqi War. The riots occurred in a ...

in Iraq, the July 1941

Iași pogrom The Iași pogrom (, sometimes anglicized as Jassy) was a series of pogroms launched by governmental forces under Marshal Ion Antonescu in the Romanian city of Iași against its Jewish community, which lasted from 29 June to 6 July 1941. Accordin ...

in Romania – in which over 13,200 Jews were killed – as well as the

Jedwabne pogrom The Jedwabne pogrom was a massacre of Polish Jews in the town of Jedwabne, German-occupied Poland, on 10 July 1941, during World War II and the early stages of the Holocaust. At least 340 men, women and children were murdered, some 300 of whom ...

German-occupied Poland German-occupied Poland during World War II consisted of two major parts with different types of administration. The Polish areas annexed by Nazi Germany following the invasion of Poland at the beginning of World War II—nearly a quarter of the ...

. Post-World War II pogroms included the 1945 Tripoli pogrom, the 1946

Kielce pogrom The Kielce pogrom was an outbreak of violence toward the Jewish community centre's gathering of refugees in the city of Kielce, Poland on 4 July 1946 by Polish soldiers, police officers, and civilians1947 Aleppo pogrom.

Etymology

First recorded in

English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England ** English national ide ...

in 1882, the

Russian Russian(s) refers to anything related to Russia, including: *Russians (, ''russkiye''), an ethnic group of the East Slavic peoples, primarily living in Russia and neighboring countries *Rossiyane (), Russian language term for all citizens and peo ...

word (, ) is derived from the common prefix () and the verb (, ) meaning 'to destroy, wreak havoc, demolish violently'. The noun ''pogrom'', which has a relatively short history, is used in English and many other languages as a

loanword A loanword (also loan word or loan-word) is a word at least partly assimilated from one language (the donor language) into another language. This is in contrast to cognates, which are words in two or more languages that are similar because th ...

, possibly borrowed from

Yiddish Yiddish (, or , ''yidish'' or ''idish'', , ; , ''Yidish-Taytsh'', ) is a West Germanic language historically spoken by Ashkenazi Jews. It originated during the 9th century in Central Europe, providing the nascent Ashkenazi community with a ver ...

(where the word takes the form ). Its modern widespread circulation began with the

antisemitic Antisemitism (also spelled anti-semitism or anti-Semitism) is hostility to, prejudice towards, or discrimination against Jews. A person who holds such positions is called an antisemite. Antisemitism is considered to be a form of racism. Antis ...

violence in the Russian Empire in 1881–1883. Hep Hep Krawalle 1819

Historical background

The first recorded anti-Jewish riots took place in Alexandria in the year 38 CE, followed by the more known riot of 66 CE. Other notable events took place in Europe during the

Middle Ages In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the late 5th to the late 15th centuries, similar to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire a ...

. Jewish communities were targeted in the

Black Death Jewish persecutions There were a series of violent attacks, massacres and mass persecutions of Jews during the Black Death. Jewish communities were falsely blamed for outbreaks of the Black Death in Europe. Violence were committed from 1348 to 1351 in Toulon, Barcelo ...

of 1348–1350, in

Toulon Toulon (, , ; oc, label= Provençal, Tolon , , ) is a city on the French Riviera and a large port on the Mediterranean coast, with a major naval base. Located in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region, and the Provence province, Toulon is th ...

in 1348, the

Massacre of 1391 The Massacre of 1391, also known as the pogroms of 1391, was a display of antisemitism and violence against Jews in Spain. It was one of the Middle Ages' worst antisemitic outbreaks; Jews were ultimately given the choice of converting or leaving ...

Barcelona Barcelona ( , , ) is a city on the coast of northeastern Spain. It is the capital and largest city of the autonomous community of Catalonia, as well as the second most populous municipality of Spain. With a population of 1.6 million within ci ...

as well as in other Catalan cities, during the

Erfurt massacre (1349) The Erfurt massacre was a massacre of the Jewish community in Erfurt, Germany, on 21 March 1349. Accounts of the number of Jews killed in the massacre vary widely from between 100 and up to 3000. Any Jewish survivors were expelled from the city. ...

, the

Basel massacre Between the 12th century and modern times, the Switzerland, Swiss city of Basel has been home to three Jewish quarter (diaspora), Jewish communities. The medieval community thrived at first but ended violently with the Basel massacre of 1349. As w ...

, massacres in Aragon and in Flanders, as well as the "Valentine's Day"

Strasbourg massacre The Strasbourg massacre occurred on February 14, 1349, when several hundred Jews were publicly burnt to death, and the rest of them expelled from the city as part of the Black Death persecutions. Starting in the spring of 1348, pogroms aga ...

of 1349.Stéphane Barry and Norbert Gualde, «La plus grande épidémie de l'histoire» ("The greatest epidemic in history"), in ''

L'Histoire ''L'Histoire'' is a monthly mainstream French magazine dedicated to historical studies, recognized by peers as the most important historical popular magazine (as opposed to specific university journals or less scientific popular historical magaz ...

'' magazine, n° 310, June 2006, p. 47 Some 510 Jewish communities were destroyed during this period, extending further to the

Brussels massacre The Brussels massacre was an anti-Semitic episode in Brussels (then within the Duchy of Brabant) in 1370 in connection with an alleged host desecration at the Brussels synagogue. A number of Jews, variously given as six or about twenty, were ex ...

of 1370. On

Holy Saturday Holy Saturday ( la, Sabbatum Sanctum), also known as Great and Holy Saturday (also Holy and Great Saturday), the Great Sabbath, Hallelujah Saturday (in Portugal and Brazil), Saturday of the Glory, Sabado de Gloria, and Black Saturday or Easter ...

of 1389, a pogrom began in

Prague Prague ( ; cs, Praha ; german: Prag, ; la, Praga) is the capital and largest city in the Czech Republic, and the historical capital of Bohemia. On the Vltava river, Prague is home to about 1.3 million people. The city has a temperate ...

that led to the burning of the Jewish quarter, the killing of many Jews, and the suicide of many Jews trapped in the main synagogue; the number of dead was estimated at 400–500 men, women and children. The brutal murders of Jews and Poles occurred during the

Khmelnytsky Uprising The Khmelnytsky Uprising,; in Ukraine known as Khmelʹnychchyna or uk, повстання Богдана Хмельницького; lt, Chmelnickio sukilimas; Belarusian language, Belarusian: Паўстанне Багдана Хмяльніц ...

of 1648–1657 in present-day

Ukraine Ukraine ( uk, Україна, Ukraïna, ) is a country in Eastern Europe. It is the second-largest European country after Russia, which it borders to the east and northeast. Ukraine covers approximately . Prior to the ongoing Russian inv ...

. Modern historians give estimates of the scale of the murders by Khmelnytsky's

Cossacks The Cossacks , es, cosaco , et, Kasakad, cazacii , fi, Kasakat, cazacii , french: cosaques , hu, kozákok, cazacii , it, cosacchi , orv, коза́ки, pl, Kozacy , pt, cossacos , ro, cazaci , russian: казаки́ or ...

ranging between 40,000 and 100,000 men, women and children, or perhaps many more. The outbreak of violence against Jews (

Hep-Hep riots The Hep-Hep riots from August to October 1819 were pogroms against Ashkenazi Jews, beginning in the Kingdom of Bavaria, during the period of Jewish emancipation in the German Confederation. The antisemitic communal violence began on August 2, ...

) occurred at the beginning of the 19th century in reaction to

Jewish emancipation Jewish emancipation was the process in various nations in Europe of eliminating Jewish disabilities, e.g. Jewish quotas, to which European Jews were then subject, and the recognition of Jews as entitled to equality and citizenship rights. It in ...

in the

German Confederation The German Confederation (german: Deutscher Bund, ) was an association of 39 predominantly German-speaking sovereign states in Central Europe. It was created by the Congress of Vienna in 1815 as a replacement of the former Holy Roman Empire, w ...

Russian Empire

The

, which previously had very few Jews, acquired territories in the

Russian Partition The Russian Partition ( pl, zabór rosyjski), sometimes called Russian Poland, constituted the former territories of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth that were annexed by the Russian Empire in the course of late-18th-century Partitions of Po ...

that contained large Jewish populations, during the military

partitions of Poland The Partitions of Poland were three partitions of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth that took place toward the end of the 18th century and ended the existence of the state, resulting in the elimination of sovereign Poland and Lithuania for 12 ...

in 1772, 1793 and 1795. In conquered territories, a new political entity called the

was formed in 1791 by

Catherine the Great , en, Catherine Alexeievna Romanova, link=yes , house = , father = Christian August, Prince of Anhalt-Zerbst , mother = Joanna Elisabeth of Holstein-Gottorp , birth_date = , birth_name = Princess Sophie of Anhal ...

. Most Jews from the former Commonwealth were allowed to reside only within the Pale, including families expelled by royal decree from St. Petersburg, Moscow and other large Russian cities. The 1821

marked the beginning of the 19th century pogroms in Tsarist Russia; there were four more such pogroms in

Odessa Odesa (also spelled Odessa) is the third most populous city and municipality in Ukraine and a major seaport and transport hub located in the south-west of the country, on the northwestern shore of the Black Sea. The city is also the administrativ ...

before the end of the century.Heinz-Dietrich Löwe, ''Pogroms in Russia: Explanations, Comparisons, Suggestions'', Jewish Social Studies, New Series, Vol. 11, No. 1 (Autumn 2004), pp. 17–. Quote: "''Pogroms were concentrated in time. Four phases can be observed: in 1819, 1830, 1834, and 1818-19."''
Excerpt.
nbsp; Following the assassination of Alexander II in 1881 by

Narodnaya Volya Narodnaya Volya ( rus, Наро́дная во́ля, p=nɐˈrodnəjə ˈvolʲə, t=People's Will) was a late 19th-century revolutionary political organization in the Russian Empire which conducted assassinations of government officials in an att ...

, anti-Jewish events turned into a wave of over 200 pogroms by their modern definition, which lasted for several years. ''Also in:'' For further information, see: Jewish self-governing '' Kehillah'' were abolished by

Tsar Nicholas I , house = Romanov-Holstein-Gottorp , father = Paul I of Russia , mother = Maria Feodorovna (Sophie Dorothea of Württemberg) , birth_date = , birth_place = Gatchina Palace, Gatchina, Russian Empire , death_date = ...

in 1844. The first in 20th-century Russia was the

of 1903 in which 49 Jews were killed, hundreds wounded, 700 homes destroyed and 600 businesses pillaged. In the same year, pogroms took place in

Gomel Gomel (russian: Гомель, ) or Homiel ( be, Гомель, ) is the administrative centre of Gomel Region and the second-largest city in Belarus with 526,872 inhabitants (2015 census). Etymology There are at least six narratives of the o ...

(Belarus), Smela,

Feodosiya uk, Феодосія, Теодосія crh, Kefe , official_name = () , settlement_type= , image_skyline = THEODOSIA 01.jpg , imagesize = 250px , image_caption = Genoese fortress of Caffa , image_shield = Fe ...

and

Melitopol Melitopol ( uk, Меліто́поль, translit=Melitópol’, ; russian: Мелитополь; based on el, Μελιτόπολις - "honey city") is a List of cities in Ukraine, city and List of hromadas of Ukraine, municipality in Zaporizhz ...

(Ukraine). Extreme savagery was typified by mutilations of the wounded. They were followed by the

Zhitomir Zhytomyr ( uk, Жито́мир, translit=Zhytomyr ; russian: Жито́мир, Zhitomir ; pl, Żytomierz ; yi, זשיטאָמיר, Zhitomir; german: Schytomyr ) is a city in the north of the western half of Ukraine. It is the administrative ...

pogrom (with 29 killed), and the Kiev pogrom of October 1905 resulting in a massacre of approximately 100 Jews. In three years between 1903 and 1906, about 660 pogroms were recorded in Ukraine and Bessarabia; half a dozen more in Belorussia, carried out with the Russian government's complicity, but no anti-Jewish pogroms were recorded in Poland. At about that time, the

Jewish Labor Bund The General Jewish Labour Bund in Lithuania, Poland and Russia ( yi, ‏אַלגעמײנער ייִדישער אַרבעטער־בונד אין ליטע, פּױלן און רוסלאַנד , translit=Algemeyner Yidisher Arbeter-bund in Lite, Poy ...

began organizing armed self-defense units ready to shoot back, and the pogroms subsided for a number of years. According to professor

Colin Tatz Colin Tatz AO (18 July 1934 – 19 November 2019) was the director of thAustralian Institute for Holocaust and Genocide Studies Professor of Politics at the University of New England, Armidale, and at Macquarie University, Sydney. Biography Co ...

, between 1881 and 1920 there were 1,326 pogroms in Ukraine (''see:

Southwestern Krai Southwestern Krai (russian: Юго-западный край, Yugo-zapadny kray), also known as Kiev General Governorate or Kiev, Podolia, and Volhynia General Governorate ( rus, Киевское, Подольское и Волынское г ...

parts of

the Pale The Pale (Irish: ''An Pháil'') or the English Pale (' or ') was the part of Ireland directly under the control of the English government in the Late Middle Ages. It had been reduced by the late 15th century to an area along the east coast st ...

'') which took the lives of 70,000 to 250,000 civilian Jews, leaving half a million homeless. This violence across Eastern Europe prompted a wave of Jewish migration westward that totaled about 2.5 million people.

Eastern Europe after World War I

Large-scale pogroms, which began in the Russian Empire several decades earlier, intensified during the period of the

Russian Civil War , date = October Revolution, 7 November 1917 – Yakut revolt, 16 June 1923{{Efn, The main phase ended on 25 October 1922. Revolt against the Bolsheviks continued Basmachi movement, in Central Asia and Tungus Republic, the Far East th ...

in the aftermath of World War I. Professor

Zvi Gitelman Zvi Gitelman is a Professor of Political Science, and Professor of Judaic Studies at the University of Michigan. Career Gitelman received a Ph.D., an M.A., and a B.A. degree from Columbia University. He has usually written about the connection of ...

(''A Century of Ambivalence'') estimated that only in 1918–1919 over 1,200 pogroms took place in Ukraine, thus amounting to the greatest slaughter of Jews in Eastern Europe since 1648.

Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn Aleksandr Isayevich Solzhenitsyn. (11 December 1918 – 3 August 2008) was a Russian novelist. One of the most famous Soviet dissidents, Solzhenitsyn was an outspoken critic of communism and helped to raise global awareness of political repres ...

in his book ''

Two Hundred Years Together ''Two Hundred Years Together'' (russian: links=no, Двести лет вместе, ) is a two-volume historical essay by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn. It was written as a comprehensive history of Jews in the Russian Empire, the Soviet Union and moder ...

'' provided additional statistics from research conducted by Nahum Gergel (1887–1931). Gergel counted 1,236 incidents of anti-Jewish violence and estimated that 887 mass pogroms occurred, the remainder being classified as "excesses" not assuming mass proportions. The Kiev pogroms of 1919, according to Gitelman, were the first of a subsequent wave of pogroms in which between 30,000 and 70,000 Jews were massacred across Ukraine; although more recent assessments put the Jewish death toll at more than 100,000. Of all the pogroms accounted for in Gergel's research: *About 40 percent were perpetrated by the

Ukrainian People's Republic The Ukrainian People's Republic (UPR), or Ukrainian National Republic (UNR), was a country in Eastern Europe that existed between 1917 and 1920. It was declared following the February Revolution in Russia by the First Universal. In March 1 ...

forces led by

Symon Petliura Symon Vasylyovych Petliura ( uk, Си́мон Васи́льович Петлю́ра; – May 25, 1926) was a Ukrainian politician and journalist. He became the Supreme Commander of the Ukrainian Army and the President of the Ukrainian Peop ...

. The Republic issued orders condemning pogroms, but lacked authority to intervene. After May 1919 the Directory lost its role as a credible governing body; almost 75 percent of pogroms occurred between May and September of that year. Thousands of Jews were killed only for being Jewish, without any political affiliations. *25 percent by the Ukrainian Green Army and various

Ukrainian nationalist Ukrainian nationalism refers to the promotion of the unity of Ukrainians as a people and it also refers to the promotion of the identity of Ukraine as a nation state. The nation building that arose as nationalism grew following the French Revol ...

gangs, *17 percent by the

White Army The White Army (russian: Белая армия, Belaya armiya) or White Guard (russian: Бѣлая гвардія/Белая гвардия, Belaya gvardiya, label=none), also referred to as the Whites or White Guardsmen (russian: Бѣлогв� ...

, especially the forces of

Anton Denikin Anton Ivanovich Denikin (russian: Анто́н Ива́нович Дени́кин, link= ; 16 December Old_Style_and_New_Style_dates">O.S._4_December.html" ;"title="Old_Style_and_New_Style_dates.html" ;"title="nowiki/>Old Style and New St ...

, *8.5 percent of Gergel's total was attributed to pogroms carried out by men of the

Red Army The Workers' and Peasants' Red Army (Russian: Рабо́че-крестья́нская Кра́сная армия),) often shortened to the Red Army, was the army and air force of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic and, after ...

(more specifically Semyon Budenny's First Cavalry, most of whose soldiers had previously served under Denikin). These pogroms were not, however, sanctioned by the Bolshevik leadership; the high command "vigorously condemned these pogroms and disarmed the guilty regiments", and the pogroms would soon be condemned by

Mikhail Kalinin Mikhail Ivanovich Kalinin (russian: link=no, Михаи́л Ива́нович Кали́нин ; 3 June 1946), known familiarly by Soviet citizens as "Kalinych", was a Soviet politician and Old Bolshevik revolutionary. He served as head of st ...

in a speech made at a military parade in Ukraine. Gergel's overall figures, which are generally considered conservative, are based on the testimony of witnesses and newspaper reports collected by the ''Mizrakh-Yidish Historiche Arkhiv'' which was first based in Kiev, then Berlin and later New York. The English version of Gergel's article was published in 1951 in the

YIVO YIVO (Yiddish: , ) is an organization that preserves, studies, and teaches the cultural history of Jewish life throughout Eastern Europe, Germany, and Russia as well as orthography, lexicography, and other studies related to Yiddish. (The word '' ...

Annual of Jewish Social Science titled "The Pogroms in the Ukraine in 1918–1921". On 8 August 1919, during the

Polish–Soviet War The Polish–Soviet War (Polish–Bolshevik War, Polish–Soviet War, Polish–Russian War 1919–1921) * russian: Советско-польская война (''Sovetsko-polskaya voyna'', Soviet-Polish War), Польский фронт (' ...

, Polish troops took over

Minsk Minsk ( be, Мінск ; russian: Минск) is the capital and the largest city of Belarus, located on the Svislach and the now subterranean Niamiha rivers. As the capital, Minsk has a special administrative status in Belarus and is the admi ...

Operation Minsk Operation Mińsk was a military offensive of the Polish Army during the Polish–Soviet War. It resulted in the capture of Minsk from the Red Army around 8 August 1919. The victory allowed the Polish troops to advance further into Russian-contro ...

. They killed 31 Jews merely suspected of supporting the Bolshevist movement, beat and attacked many more, looted 377 Jewish-owned shops (aided by the local civilians) and ransacked many private homes.. The "Morgenthau's report of October 1919 stated that there is no question that some of the Jewish leaders exaggerated these evils." According to Elissa Bemporad, the "violence endured by the Jewish population under the Poles encouraged popular support for the Red Army, as Jewish public opinion welcomed the establishment of the

Belorussian SSR The Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic (BSSR, or Byelorussian SSR; be, Беларуская Савецкая Сацыялістычная Рэспубліка, Bielaruskaja Savieckaja Sacyjalistyčnaja Respublika; russian: Белор� ...

." After the

First World War World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

, during the localized armed conflicts of independence, 72 Jews were killed and 443 injured in the 1918 Lwów pogrom.Herbert Arthur Strauss (1993). ''Hostages of Modernization: Studies on Modern Antisemitism, 1870–1933/39''.

Walter de Gruyter Walter de Gruyter GmbH, known as De Gruyter (), is a German scholarly publishing house specializing in academic literature. History The roots of the company go back to 1749 when Frederick the Great granted the Königliche Realschule in Be ...

p. 1048.
/ref> The following year, pogroms were reported by the '' New York Tribune'' in several cities in the newly established Second Polish Republic.

Rest of the world

Adana massacre in Le Petit Journal (1909)

In the early 20th century, pogroms broke out elsewhere in the world as well. In 1904 in

Ireland Ireland ( ; ga, Éire ; Ulster Scots dialect, Ulster-Scots: ) is an island in the Atlantic Ocean, North Atlantic Ocean, in Northwestern Europe, north-western Europe. It is separated from Great Britain to its east by the North Channel (Grea ...

, the

Limerick boycott The Limerick boycott, also known as the Limerick pogrom, was an economic boycott waged against the small Jewish community in Limerick, Ireland, between 1904 and 1906. It was accompanied by assaults, stone throwing and intimidation, which caused m ...

caused several Jewish families to leave the town. During the 1911 Tredegar riot in

Wales Wales ( cy, Cymru ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is bordered by England to the Wales–England border, east, the Irish Sea to the north and west, the Celtic Sea to the south west and the ...

, Jewish homes and businesses were looted and burned over a period of a week, before the

British Army The British Army is the principal land warfare force of the United Kingdom, a part of the British Armed Forces along with the Royal Navy and the Royal Air Force. , the British Army comprises 79,380 regular full-time personnel, 4,090 Gurk ...

was called in by the then-

Home Secretary The secretary of state for the Home Department, otherwise known as the home secretary, is a senior minister of the Crown in the Government of the United Kingdom. The home secretary leads the Home Office, and is responsible for all national s ...

Winston Churchill Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill (30 November 187424 January 1965) was a British statesman, soldier, and writer who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom twice, from 1940 to 1945 Winston Churchill in the Second World War, dur ...

, who described the riot as a "pogrom". In 1919 there was a pogrom in

Argentina Argentina (), officially the Argentine Republic ( es, link=no, República Argentina), is a country in the southern half of South America. Argentina covers an area of , making it the second-largest country in South America after Brazil, th ...

, during the Tragic Week. It had an added element, as it was called to attack Jews and

Catalans Catalans (Catalan, French and Occitan: ''catalans''; es, catalanes, Italian: ''catalani'', sc, cadelanos) are a Romance ethnic group native to Catalonia, who speak Catalan. The current official category of "Catalans" is that of the citize ...

indiscriminately. The reasons are not clear, especially considering that, in the case of

Buenos Aires Buenos Aires ( or ; ), officially the Autonomous City of Buenos Aires ( es, link=no, Ciudad Autónoma de Buenos Aires), is the capital and primate city of Argentina. The city is located on the western shore of the Río de la Plata, on South ...

, the Catalan colony, established mainly in the neighborhood of Montserrat, came from the foundation of the city, but could have been the result of the influence of

Spanish nationalism The creation of the tradition of the political community of Spaniards as common destiny over other communities has been argued to trace back to the Cortes of Cádiz. Revisiting the history of Spain, after 1812 Spanish liberalism tended to take fo ...

, which at the time described Catalans as a Semitic ethnicity. In the north of

during the early 1920s, violent riots which were aimed at the expulsion of a religious group took place. In 1920,

Lisburn Lisburn (; ) is a city in Northern Ireland. It is southwest of Belfast city centre, on the River Lagan, which forms the boundary between County Antrim and County Down. First laid out in the 17th century by English and Welsh settlers, with ...

and

Belfast Belfast ( , ; from ga, Béal Feirste , meaning 'mouth of the sand-bank ford') is the capital and largest city of Northern Ireland, standing on the banks of the River Lagan on the east coast. It is the 12th-largest city in the United Kingdo ...

saw violence related to the Irish War of Independence and

partition of Ireland The partition of Ireland ( ga, críochdheighilt na hÉireann) was the process by which the Government of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland divided Ireland into two self-governing polities: Northern Ireland and Southern Ireland. ...

. On 21 July 1920 in Belfast, Protestant

Loyalists Loyalism, in the United Kingdom, its overseas territories and its former colonies, refers to the allegiance to the British crown or the United Kingdom. In North America, the most common usage of the term refers to loyalty to the British Cro ...

marched on the Harland and Wolff shipyards and forced over 11,000 Catholic and left-wing Protestant workers from their jobs. The sectarian rioting that followed resulted in about 20 deaths in just three days. These sectarian actions are often referred to as the

Belfast Pogrom Belfast ( , ; from ga, Béal Feirste , meaning 'mouth of the sand-bank ford') is the capital and largest city of Northern Ireland, standing on the banks of the River Lagan on the east coast. It is the 12th-largest city in the United Kingdom ...

. In Lisburn, County Antrim, on 23–25 August 1920 Protestant loyalist crowds looted and burned practically every Catholic business in the town and attacked Catholic homes. About 1,000 people, a third of the town's Catholics, fled Lisburn. By the end of the first six months of 1922, hundreds of people had been killed in sectarian violence in newly formed Northern Ireland. On a per capita basis, four Roman Catholics were killed for every Protestant. In Mandatory Palestine under British administration, Jews were targeted in the 1929 Hebron massacre and the 1929 Safed pogrom. In 1934 there were pogroms against Jews 1934 Thrace pogroms, in Turkey and 1934 Constantine Pogrom, Algeria.

Germany and Nazi-occupied Europe

The first pogrom in

was the ''

'', often called ''Pogromnacht'', in which at least 91 Jews were killed, a further 30,000 arrested and incarcerated in Nazi concentration camps, over 1,000 synagogues burned, and over 7,000 Jewish businesses destroyed or damaged. During

, Einsatzgruppen, Nazi German death squads encouraged local populations in German-occupied Europe to commit pogroms against Jews. Brand new battalions of ''Volksdeutscher Selbstschutz'' (trained by Sicherheitsdienst, SD agents) were mobilized from among the German minorities. A large number of pogroms occurred during the Holocaust at the hands of non-Germans.Jack Fischel, Fischel, Jack (1998). ''The Holocaust'', Greenwood, p. 41. Perhaps the deadliest of these Holocaust-era pogroms was the

in Romania, perpetrated by Ion Antonescu, in which as many as 13,266 Jews were killed by Romanian citizens, police and military officials. On 1–2 June 1941, in the two-day

pogrom in Iraq, perpetrated by Rashid Ali al-Kaylani, Rashid Ali, Al-Muthanna Club#Yunis al-Sabawi, Yunis al-Sabawi, and the Futuwa, al-Futuwa youth, "rioters murdered between 150 and 180 Jews, injured 600 others, and raped an undetermined number of women. They also looted some 1,500 stores and homes". Also 300-400 non-Jewish rioters were killed in the attempt to quell the violence.Kaplan, Robert. D. "In Defense of Empire." ''The Atlantic'' Apr. 2014: 13-15 Lviv pogrom (June - July 1941)

In June–July 1941, encouraged by the ''Einsatzgruppen'' in the city of Lviv the Ukrainian People's Militia Lviv pogroms, perpetrated two citywide pogroms in which around 6,000 Polish Jews were murdered, in retribution for alleged collaboration with the Soviet NKVD. In Lithuania, some local police led by Algirdas Klimaitis and Lithuanian partisans (1941), Lithuanian partisans – consisting of Lithuanian Activist Front, LAF units reinforced by 3,600 deserters from the 29th Lithuanian Territorial Corps of the

promulgated anti-Jewish Kaunas pogrom, pogroms in Kaunas along with occupying Nazis. On 25–26 June 1941, about 3,800 Jews were killed and synagogues and Jewish settlements burned. During the

of July 1941, ethnic Poles burned at least 340 Jews in a barn (Institute of National Remembrance) in the presence of Nazi Germany, German ''Ordnungspolizei#Police Battalions, Ordnungspolizei''. The role of the Germany, German ''Einsatzgruppe B'' remains the subject of debate.

After World War II

After the end of

, a series of violent antisemitic incidents occurred against returning Jews throughout Europe, particularly in the Soviet-occupied East where Nazi propagandists had extensively promoted the notion of a Judeo-Bolshevism, Jewish-Communist conspiracy (see Anti-Jewish violence in Poland, 1944–1946 and Anti-Jewish violence in Eastern Europe, 1944–1946). Anti-Jewish riots also The Sergeants affair#Reactions in Britain, took place in Britain in 1947. In the Arab world, anti-Jewish rioters killed over 140 Jews in the 1945 Anti-Jewish Riots in Tripolitania. Following the start of the 1947–48 Civil War in Mandatory Palestine, a number of anti-Jewish events occurred throughout the Arab world, some of which have been described as pogroms. In 1947, half of Aleppo's 10,000 Jews left the city in the wake of the 1947 Anti-Jewish riots in Aleppo, Aleppo riots, while other anti-Jewish riots took place in 1947 Aden riots, British Aden and 1948 Anti-Jewish Riots in Oujda and Jerada, the French Moroccan cities of Oujda and Jerada.

Usage

According to Encyclopædia Britannica, "the term is usually applied to attacks on

in the

in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, [and] the first extensive pogroms followed the assassination of Tsar Alexander II in 1881", and the ''Wiley-Blackwell Dictionary of Modern European History Since 1789'' states that pogroms "were

disturbances that periodically occurred within the tsarist empire." However, the term is widely used to refer to many events which occurred prior to the Anti-Jewish pogroms in the Russian Empire. Historian of Russian Jewry John Klier writes in ''Russians, Jews, and the Pogroms of 1881–1882'' that "By the twentieth century, the word 'pogrom' had become a generic term in English for all forms of collective violence directed against Jews." Henry Abramson, Abramson wrote that "in mainstream usage the word has come to imply an act of antisemitism", since while "Jews have not been the only group to suffer under this phenomenon ... historically Jews have been frequent victims of such violence." TulsaRaceRiot-1921

The term is also used in reference to attacks on non-Jewish ethnic minorities, and accordingly some scholars do not include antisemitism as the defining characteristic of ''pogroms''. Reviewing its uses in scholarly literature, historian Werner Bergmann proposes that a pogrom should be "defined as a ''unilateral, nongovernmental'' form of ''collective'' violence that is ''initiated by the majority population'' against a largely defenseless minority ethnic group, and he also states that pogroms occur when the ''majority'' expects the state to provide it with no assistance in overcoming a (perceived) threat from the minority," but he adds that in Western usage, the word's "anti-Semitic overtones" have been retained. Historian David Engel (historian), David Engel supports this view, writing that "there can be no logically or empirically compelling grounds for declaring that some particular episode does or does not merit the label [pogrom]," but he states that the majority of the incidents which are "habitually" described as pogroms took place in societies that were significantly divided by Ethnic group, ethnicity and/or religion where the violence was committed by members of the higher-ranking group against members of a stereotyped lower-ranking group with which they expressed some complaint, and the members of the higher-ranking group justified their acts of violence by claiming that the law of the land would not be used to stop them. There is no universally accepted set of characteristics which define the term pogrom. Klier writes that "when applied indiscriminately to events in

, the term can be misleading, the more so when it implies that 'pogroms' were regular events in the region and that they always shared common features." Use of the term pogrom to refer to events in 1918–19 in Polish cities including Kielce pogrom (1918), Kielce pogrom, Pinsk massacre and Lwów pogrom, was specifically avoided in the 1919 Morgenthau Report and the word "excesses" was used instead because the authors argued that the use of the term "pogrom" required a situation to be antisemitism, antisemitic rather than political in nature, which meant that it was inapplicable to the conditions which exist in a war zone, and media use of the term pogrom to refer to the 1991 Crown Heights riot caused public controversy. In 2008, two separate attacks in the West Bank by Israeli Jews, Israeli Jewish Israeli settlement, settlers on Palestinian people, Palestinian Arabs were characterized as pogroms by then Prime Minister of Israel Ehud Olmert."As a Jew, I was ashamed at the scenes of Jews opening fire at innocent Arabs in Hebron. There is no other definition than the term 'pogrom' to describe what I have seen
Settlers attack Palestinian village
/ref> Werner Bergmann suggests that all such incidents have a particularly unifying characteristic: "[b]y the ''collective attribution'' of a threat, the pogrom differs from other forms of violence, such as lynchings, which are directed at individual members of a minority group, while the ''imbalance of power'' in favor of the rioters distinguishes pogroms from other forms of riots (food riots, race riots or "communal riots" between evenly matched groups); and again, the ''low level of organization'' separates them from vigilantism, terrorism,

and genocide".

Selected list

This is a partial list of events for which one of the commonly accepted names includes the word "pogrom".

Etymology

Historical background

Russian Empire

Eastern Europe after World War I

Rest of the world

Germany and Nazi-occupied Europe

After World War II

Usage

Selected list

See also

Notes

Citations

Further reading