The Jews in Germany
From Suzanne Lee Sir: The title of Andrew Gimson's piece ('Within the German pale', 21 June) was an unhappy one for those of us with long memories.
I have just returned from a two-week visit to Frankfurt am Main, where I and 40 other German-Jewish refugees from the Third Reich were guests of the city with their partners. Similar schemes operate throughout Germany.
Despite official claims that the new Jewish community is integrating well. I could find no Germans who have Jewish friends or acquaintances. Centres of Jewish life are protected from terrorist attack by concrete walls and a police presence.
The sparse attendance at art galleries and museums suggests that the void in German culture caused by the expulsion and deaths of the former German-Jewish community at the hands of the Nazis has yet to be filled. However, I learnt from second-generation members of the Greek community in Frankfurt that their Jewish peers whose parents have come from Russia and Poland are happy to mix and party, and there is hope that true integration will take place with the next generation. The Wladimir Kaminer phenomenon also gives a promise of a necessary flowering of Jewish culture to come.
Suzanne Lee London SW15
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