The meaning of words: Pogrom

Pogrom

It refers to an anti-Semitic popular movement encouraged or tolerated by the authorities and accompanied by looting and massacres, and by extension a violent uprising against a Jewish community (Robert Historique, 1903).

The word pogrom first appeared in everyday language around the 1880s, following a series of anti-Semitic incidents in Russia after the assassination of Tsar Alexander II in 1881.

Today, the term pogrom can sometimes be used to refer to violent attacks on other minorities within a country, unlike genocide.

Although the word is of Russian origin and generally reserved for anti-Semitic massacres and looting, it has become universal to describe violence against minorities.

However, the term pogrom does not have a precise legal definition, unlike concepts such as genocide which is clearly defined in international law.

  • An untargeted act of violence. It targets a particular group, often an ethnic or religious minority.
  • A simple political opposition that is directed against the authority or institutions in place, often for economic or political reasons.
  • The pogrom of Saint Valentine: on 14 February 1349, 2,000 Jewish inhabitants were burned alive in Strasbourg, wrongly accused of having poisoned the wells and caused the Black Death. This massacre virtually wiped out the Jewish community of Strasbourg and became one of the first documented pogroms in Western Europe.
  • Pogroms of 1881-1884: in reaction to the assassination of Tsar Alexander II in 1881, a series of pogroms broke out in the Russian Empire, notably in Ukraine and Poland.
  • Pogroms of 1903-1906: this wave of pogroms intensified in cities like Kishinev, where extreme violence caused the death of many people.
  • The Night of the Broken Glass, from 9 to 10 November 1938, was a pogrom organized by the Nazi regime during which a hundred Jews were murdered, synagogues burned, Jewish shops and homes destroyed, and about 30,000 people were deported to concentration camps.
  • The Kielce pogrom (Poland, 1946): After the end of World War II, rumors of child abduction by Jews led to a wave of violence in the town of Kielce, Poland. 42 Jews were killed, marking a moment of anti-Semitism after the Holocaust.

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