It is not the 1930s but you’d never know it from the virulent church service held this week at the Basilica of the Sacred Heart of Jesus church in Krakow, Poland. More than 1,000 people attended the special church service organized by the Committee Against Defamation of the Church and For Polishness, along with the anti-Semitic Radio Maryja. Posters around the neighborhoods of Krakow announcing the event drew local residents with the slogan on them “The kikes will not continue to spit on us.”
“The Jews are attacking us! We need to defend ourselves,” shouted Professor Bogoslav Wolniewicz at the service. Attendees were treated to a diatribe against the Jews by the bishop of Krakow, Albin Malysiak, who began inflaming the crowd there with his sermon beginning “”A man who does not love his homeland, but some sort of international entity, apparently also does not love his nearest and dearest.” Seems that they had a rollicking good time bashing the Jews, any Pole who has any business dealings or sells anything to Jews, and anyone who supports the Jews such as at Righteous Among the Nations Wladyslaw Bartoszewski, at a minister in the Prime Minister’s Office responsible for Jewish-Polish affairs; and at the newspaper that, in their eyes, represents the Polish left, Gazeta Wyborcza, and its editor, Adam Michnik.
They are upset, you see, about a scholarly book written by a Polish-born Jew that documents the pogroms against Jews that took place in Poland following the end of World War II when concentration camp survivors and those who had been in hiding attempted to return to their homes and to try to find any surviving loved ones and well, to not put too fine a point on it, were killed by their Polish neighbors among other actions taken against them by their fellow Poles. The book is called “Fear: Anti-Semitism in Poland after Auschwitz” and it is by Jan Gross.
A review of the book from Booklist (whose core mission is to provide public and school librarians with reviews that help them decide what to buy. In recent years, Booklist has also become a valuable tool that helps librarians make reading recommendations):
Professor Gross’ widely acclaimed Neighbors: The Destruction of the Jewish Community in Jedwabne, Poland (2001) described the slaughter of Polish Jews by their fellow Poles as the Nazis watched approvingly. Now Gross illustrates with eloquence and shocking detail that the bloodletting did not cease when the war ended. Contrary to most expectations, many Polish Jews who survived the Holocuast wished to remain in Poland. After all, Jewish and Gentile Poles had generally coexisted peacefully, if not harmoniously, before the war, and many Polish Jews viewed themselves as staunch patriots. But when Jews attempted to return to their hometowns and to reclaim their property, tensions reached the boiling point; the explosion came in the town of Kielce, when the disappearance of an eight-year-old boy sparked the old blood libel of ritual murder. As the slaughter of Jews began, police and military officials either joined in the outrages or refused to intervene. In succeeding years, with the complicity of Communist authorities, the position of the remaining Polish Jews continued to deteriorate. By 1949, the goal of the Nazis had been achieved: Poland was essentially free of Jews. This is a masterful work that sheds necessary light on a tragic and often-ignored aspect of postwar history.
So the Bishop of Krakow and these other folks feel like their country has been given a bad rap about its treatment of the Jews and they’d really like to do something about it. They are up in arms that anyone would accuse any Poles of being Anti-Semitic. Yeah, and they used posters proclaiming “The kikes will not continue to spit on us” to advertise their church service…Well, I’m convinced. Obviously no Anti-Semitism to be found in Poland after the war and certainly not now. Ummm hmmm.
Hey, those bitter diatribes and slogans have convinced me, too. No anti-semitism in Poland, yeah, right!
This article is a piece of lies. Is written by “Gazeta Wyborcza” - who is totally unbelievable newspaper, and case Its all about the Jan Tomas Gross Book “Fear”(Jan Gross is a friend of Adam Michnik, Jew, the director of the newspaper)
The discussion in church Was about lies in this (”Fear”) book, many of them. Of course “Gazeta” didn’t say a word about It.
It wasn’t any antisemitic incident, only words to Polish Jews were:
“Please, say to Jan Tomas Gross, and people who stands behind Him: >LEAVE POLES ALONE, LEAVE US (Polish Jews) ALONE!!! WE LIVE HERE IN PEACE, AND LEAVE US ALONE
Me again.
There wasn,t any posters against Jews (any foto???).
Belive me, I was there, and I write about it on My blog (in Polish):
1) About lies in the article:
http://muchanadziko.salon24.pl/60632,index.html
2) Truth about the meeting:
http://muchanadziko.salon24.pl/60654,index.html
3) About English version of the false (!!!) article in haaretz
http://muchanadziko.salon24.pl/60888,index.html
REGARDS
W.M
W.M. –the fact that there was a pogrom in Kielce following the Second World War is a well-known and documented fact. The fact that returning Jews were beaten, threatened and killed in other regions of Poland, individual acts of violence not as a pogrom, is well-documented. During the war the AK killed fellow partisans who they discovered to be Jewish. There was a great deal of anti-semitism in Poland. Not all Poles were anti-semitic certainly and there were many Poles who risked their lives and gave their lives trying to help their Polish neighbors who happened to be Jews. Those who were silent and those who actively turned in and turned upon their neighbors were a much higher percentage of the population than those who gave aid, however.
Poland is a really interesting case. I have some very good and very young Polish friends, living in Poland, who are more of the liberal persuasion, since they also lived in the U.S. and have seen some parts of the world. However, even with them I cannot have a discussion about either Russia, Germany or the Jews. These are traumatic topics to them and they block any attempt to talk about it. I have seen the same reaction in many Germans. To me it is a show of bad conscience.
Of course, there are others then who don’t think they need to have a bad conscience but who proudly tout the fact that yes there is and always has been anti-Semitism in Poland. I always thought it was a big irony of history that Hitler and the Germans despised Poles as much as Jews, otherwise they could have been really good allies.
Now, what should we say? I still think that this part of the Polish people are fighting yesterday’s wars. The church and the very conservative parts of the rural population are very afraid of the changing times in Poland that came with the membership in the EU and their exposure to Western European moral indifference. So they look for a handy scapegoat: the Jews. In Poland’s case this looks to me more like the whistling in the dark.
I am much more concerned about Britain or France where I feel the anti-Semitism is something new and not born out of old fears. They adopt it out of convenience to appease the increasing muslim parts of their societies. To me that is much more dangerous.
Were I not a decent sort I would ask where the “professor” received his certificates: off the bottom of a box of cookies?
Were I not a decent sort I would ask the “professor” why his countrymen fell in step with the Hitlerites during the war and then whined when the Stalinistas took them over after the war.
But I am a decent sort so I will merely ask him what septic tank he sups from.
[...] OlehGirl [...]
Some people are just stupid, even Christians! I am a Christian and I agnolgize this…..
Mac –hey no need to apologize for other people’s craziness, it is no reflection on you! But I do know what you mean because every time I hear of some incident involving a Jew who behaved in a bad way it just makes me cringe.
John — the Poles are an interesting case and very difficult for me to understand and the Ukranians even more so. I have a far easier time understanding the German responses and culture of today.
Velvel — don’t do that when I’m drinking coffee at my computer! lol.