The uncle of the two Limerick children seriously ill after their car was set ablaze said yesterday that it was the "quick thinking and bravery of the decent people of Moyross", that had saved them from certain death.
Leo McNamara said: "I have a nephew and a niece who are still alive because good Moyross people risked their lives to pull them out of the car. There are decent people in Moyross."
Yesterday, following lengthy operations on six-year-old Millie Murray and her four-year-old brother Gavin at Our Lady's Hospital for Sick Children in Crumlin, Mr McNamara said that Millie is swathed in bandages but she had begun to breathe on her own and was "just able" to talk now.
"She's still critically ill and on a long road. But Gavin all we can do is pray. He's still fighting. He's not out of the woods. He lost an ear, and the side of his face and back are badly burned as well. Keeping the fluid in his body is the big problem."
Their brother Dillon, aged one, who would also have been in the car if his 15-year-old sister Noelle had not held him back to change his nappy, stood close-by as their uncle explained that due to the extensive burns to Millie's arms, legs and buttocks, there could be difficulties obtaining the skin grafts she needed.
Meanwhile, in Moyross, two young mothers, aged 20 and 21, said they were "really afraid" for their children: "In the last few years, it's got very bad here."
Young and old, people had the same response. "The fear now is that if you cross someone, they'll come and attack your children," said a woman at a shop near the scene of the tragedy.
While many people on the 1,100-house estate, were prepared to give an opinion, none wished to be identified.
But they described the scenes on Saturday night as youths ran through back gardens, hiding bottles filled with petrol. A mother of four said that if she could find a place to rent immediately, out of the area, she would take it. "We're all dead in ourselves. Living here now is like sitting on a time-bomb. We're the forgotten souls."
As gardaí conducted house-to-house investigations, one resident said that although she would like to invite them in, she knew it would "send out the wrong message to people watching".
Some people balk even at attending residents' committee meetings. One said: "Well, you wouldn't be going unless it was to complain about rubbish being left around and broken windows and that's enough to annoy the wrong kind of people".
A man said that local fears were not exaggerated.
"There are dangerous people. There wouldn't be fear without some people being willing to follow through on their threats. People are angry and fearful and the fear operates on two levels.
"There is fear among residents since this incident, fear that their windows will be put in, or worse. And there's fear among the official community, the people who work in community development, who should be the spokespeople for these areas. Their fear is of losing funding if they're seen to criticise the authorities."
One politician, who believes that the situation in Limerick has been deteriorating over the last 12 to 18 months, told The Irish Times there was "a kind of unwritten code among public representatives, that at times of trouble and intense media scrutiny", they would not "talk it up".
For local activists, there is a difficult balancing act. While many insist that this kind of incident was "not the norm" for the people of Moyross, Juan Carlos Azzopardi, project co-ordinator of the community development project, agreed that people do experience fear and intimidation in some areas.
The manager of the community enterprise centre, Paddy Flannery, admitted that their work had been "set back three to four years".
For the past few days, they have been trying to maintain a balance in media reporting, reminding journalists of "so many positive things that are going on", while helping people "to regain their confidence and not to feel abandoned".
A statement from the Moyross Partnership and the 40 groups it represents, said it "unreservedly condemned any form of violence or intimidation within our community".
They appealed for calm, asking people who may be in a position to do so to assist the Garda in its investigations and - following a withdrawal of taxi services from the estate on Sunday night - also appealed to local services to "act responsibly and not to penalise the good people of Moyross".
The problem, said one man, is that local teenagers have adopted the petrol bomb as "the must-have toy at the moment". But, he added, anti-social behaviour begins with someone kicking a ball against an old person's house and a garda ignores the call for help."