In your editorial:{ " Iraq's rebirth at biblical Ur", Apr. 19}, you state :" Persecution escalated with the founding of Israel in 1948; more than 100,000 Jews left the country, often losing every thing in the process." The facts are that it was Israeli leaders who were applying the pressure on Iraqi Jews to migrate to Israel. When that did not work, secret agents were sent to Iraq, in 1950/1951, to manufacture acts of persecution, to achieve that end. As revealed later, Mordechai Ben Porat was one of those agents who were responsible for tossing hand grenades at Shem-Tov Synagogue, in Iraq, killing and injuring a number of innocent worshippers. This was to blame this criminal action on Iraq, and encourage reluctant Jewish immigrants to leave for Israel. In fact, the Iraqi government offered, in 1972,to those Jewish Iraqi citizens the right to return to their homes.