Head of Major Jewish Organization Slams Polish Officials for Casting Doubt on Polish, Nazi Murder

[uawchild]

Source: The Alegmeiner

The head of a major Jewish organization slammed Polish officials on Wednesday for questioning Polish and Nazi involvement in the murder of Jews during the Second World War.

World Jewish Congress president Ronald S. Lauder said in a statement that recent comments to this effect by Polish Education Minister Anna Salewska and Jedwabne Mayor Michael Chajewski are a “slap in the face” to Holocaust victims.

Last week, Zalewska cast doubt on the involvement of Poles in two pogroms in the 1940s — the 1941 Jedwabne massacre, in which Poles burned alive more than 300 Jews in a barn, and the 1946 Kielce massacre, in which 42 people died. The anniversaries of both pogroms were commemorated earlier this month.

During an interview with public broadcaster TVN, when asked whether the massacres should be taught in schools, Zalewska answered, “Jedwabne is a historical fact that has led to many misunderstandings and very biased opinions,” adding that the perpetrators of the Kielce massacre were antisemites, “but not quite Polish.”

Read more: https://www.algemeiner.com/2016/07/21/head-of-major-jewish-organization-slams-polish-officials-for-casting-doubt-on-polish-nazi-murder-of-jews-in-wwii/

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"According to Lauder, the comments by the minister and mayor undermine the efforts of Polish scholars, “who have spent more than 25 years unearthing evidence of horrifying acts of violence against Jews committed by Poles.”


Good Lord. It certainly does.

[agingdem]

1. Rewriting history...

My Polish Jewish grandparents were victims of that "misunderstanding"...

[63splitwindow]

2. Netanyahu tried laying blame for the decision on Muslims...

http://www.reuters.com/article/israel-netanyahu-hitler-idUSL8N12L23U20151021

"...
...
Husseini famously flew to visit Hitler in Berlin in 1941, and Netanyahu said that meeting was instrumental in the Nazi leader's decision to launch a campaign to annihilate the Jews.

"Hitler didn't want to exterminate the Jews at the time, he wanted to expel the Jews," Netanyahu said in the speech. "And Haj Amin al-Husseini went to Hitler and said, 'If you expel them, they'll all come here.'

"'So what should I do with them?'" Netanyahu said Hitler asked the mufti, who responded: "Burn them."
...
..."

[uawchild]

3. Thankfully there is an ignore list on DU.

Sigh. This comes across as blame the victims in the context of the OP. Your article is simply irrelevant to this topic.

Sorry, but it's a level of tone deafness that Is staggering.

Good bye

[Little Tich]

4. New Case Study Explores Role of Polish Peasants in Holocaust Atrocities

Source: Haaretz, Feb 15, 2013

Jan Grabowski's new book paints a damning portrait of Polish citizens who betrayed and murdered their Jewish neighbors without German orders.

Polish peasants and villagers played an instrumental role in rounding up and denouncing Jews during the Holocaust, often taking initiative without any encouragement from the Germans, according to a soon-to-be-published study by Holocaust historian Jan Grabowski.

In “Hunt for the Jews: Betrayal and Murder in German-Occupied Poland,” Grabowski argues that Poles living in the countryside served as enthusiastic accomplices to the Nazis and that many Jews who had managed to survive the ghettos and escape transports to the death camps eventually lost their lives only because they were turned in by their Polish neighbors. The book is scheduled for publication in October by the Indiana University Press.

Grabowski, a professor in the department of history at the University of Ottawa, is also on staff at the Polish Center for Holocaust research. He presented his findings at a special symposium held this week at Yad Vashem on new research pertaining to Polish Jewry during the Holocaust.

In his latest study, Grabowski delved into the history of one particular rural county in southeastern Poland, where many Jews were betrayed or murdered by local residents, after they had escaped mass deportations and killings and were desperately seeking hideouts in the countryside.

Read more: http://www.haaretz.com/jewish/features/new-case-study-explores-role-of-polish-peasants-in-holocaust-atrocities.premium-1.503742

Note: Haaretz premium article: Google title for access.

[COLGATE4]

7. In the monumental documentary film SHOAH

tells the story of the charming old Polish peasant who offered water to some of the unfortunates on the train to the concentration/killing camp stopped alongside his fields, in exchange for some gold or valuables. The kindly old fellow chuckled as he pocketed the swag and then left without giving them so much as a drop.

[Behind the Aegis]

6. Good for Lauder.

It is obvious there will always be those who want to rewrite history, provide ahistorical "evidence", and those who mock the ones protesting the bigotry. Sadly, this is a history most people don't even know anyway.