In his Passover Message in London today Labour Party leader, Jeremy Corbyn, has sought to distance himself from anti-Semitic incidents within the Labour Party but has upset many members of the Polish community in the UK by referring to recent Polish legislation which has sought to criminalize the statement that Poland was responsible for the Holocaust in the same breath as the racist murder of a Jewish woman in Paris.
In this way he wrongly implied that the Polish government is a Holocaust denier and that the Polish nation was responsible for the Holocaust. Both propositions are manifestly not true and overlook the fact that it was the wartime Polish government which did its utmost to publicize in the West the mass killings and persecution of Jews by Nazi Germany, while its courageous underground leaders set up agencies to protect and save Jews in Poland at the same time as they sought to protect Poland's Christian population against persecution. Any attempt by a Pole to save a Jew would lead to the execution of the entire Polish family. Nobody denies that in the severity and privation of the German occupation individual Poles betrayed Jews and even hunted them in the forests, but that was not the response of the Polish nation as a whole, while betraying a Jew to the German authorities was punishable by a death sentence from the Polish underground. .
Yours faithfully,
Wiktor Moszczynski
Chairman,
Friends of Polish Veterans Association.
Stowarzyszenie Przyjaciol Polskich Weteranow (SPPW)
Author of "Hello, I'm Your Polish Neighbour"
First of all, the statement Corbyn made was this 'In Poland, the government has passed laws making it illegal to acknowledge Polish complicity in the Holocaust. ' This is actually true, that the PiS government has passed a law that wants to close down historical debate about the murder of Polish Jews by other Jews, as documented by historians such as Jan T Gross. Nowhere did Corbyn state or imply 'Poland was responsible for the Holocaust'. Yet there is this maudlin and morbid obsession within certain sections of Polish nationalist opinion that Poles are eternal victims and, therefore, could never ever do anything wrong. In practice, this has meant the PiS government has venerated what Halik Kochanski terms, in her great book on Polish wartime resistance to Nazi tyranny, the Eagle Unbowed, the 'rabidly antisemitic' NSZ. The NSZ were anti-communist partisans but they also engaged in the turning over of Polish Jews who escaped from the camps over to the Gestapo. They also, according to Timothy Snyder in Black Earth, shot dead Polish Jews in who managed to get out of the Warsaw camp. The massacre of Jews in 1941 in Jedwabne is a fact as is the pervasive antisemitism in Polish society in the 1930s. The PiS government extols the NSZ as 'cursed soldiers' worthy of emulation for the young generation and wants to shut down objective historical enquiry into the darker side of Poland's wartime record under the Nazis. The entire 'German death camps' campaign is a neurotic overreaction designed to deflect away from the fact that Germany has overcome its own ethnocentric racist demons whereas within Poland the fact such repellent militias as the NSZ are lauded as heroes signifies Poland has not. It's precisely this that leads to the mendacious appropriation of victimhood tropes as a way of closing down debate or pulling to sort of dishonest conflation attempted in your dishonest piece of community groupthink. The complicity of a minority of Poles in the Holocaust is a historical fact, as is the antisemitic nature and murders of the NSZ. The law Corbyn mentions is there to potentially deny these sorts of crimes ever happened or ever could.
ReplyDeleteCorrection 'the murder of Polish Jews by other Poles'
DeleteK Naylor, thank you for your contribution to the discussion; your post is a long one so I ask you for a bit of patience while reading my quotation and reply in three parts:
DeletePART 1
>>First of all, the statement Corbyn made was this 'In Poland, the government has passed laws making it illegal to acknowledge Polish complicity in the Holocaust. ' This is actually true, that the PiS government has passed a law that wants to close down historical debate about the murder of Polish Jews by other Poles, as documented by historians such as Jan T Gross.<<
It is not true. This law (in my opinion badly prepared) excludes research and art activity, where you CAN blame the nation or state (which could be an absurd... but you can) and also excludes individual or group cases. I am not a PiS supporter, so I think it was too much into Israel type of approach in their law about holocaust... but only bad will can make anybody interpret this Polish law in the way you suggest. In such respect any and all laws can be abused and Mr Gross could have been already in prison because of any other things orchestrated against him, but he is not. Poland is a Part of our judicial civilisation. There was no evidence of abuse of this particular law as well. Actually Mr Gross has been criticised by historians and quality of his research methodology and the way he concluded from facts, creating statistics. It would be better to leave it to the historians, rather than produce any prophets on any side.
PART 2
Delete>>Yet there is this maudlin and morbid obsession within certain sections of Polish nationalist opinion that Poles are eternal victims and, therefore, could never ever do anything wrong. In practice, this has meant the PiS government has venerated what Halik Kochanski terms, in her great book on Polish wartime resistance to Nazi tyranny, the Eagle Unbowed, the ‘rabidly antisemitic’ NSZ. The NSZ were anti-communist partisans but they also engaged in the turning over of Polish Jews who escaped from the camps over to the Gestapo. They also, according to Timothy Snyder in Black Earth, shot dead Polish Jews in who managed to get out of the Warsaw camp. The massacre of Jews in 1941 in Jedwabne is a fact as is the pervasive antisemitism in Polish society in the 1930s. The PiS government extols the NSZ as 'cursed soldiers' worthy of emulation for the young generation and wants to shut down objective historical enquiry into the darker side of Poland's wartime record under the Nazis.<<
You put together before the war anti-Semitism (which was obviously alive, in economically distressed societies, parts of Catholic Church and media, radical nationalist organisations even if it would be hard to avoid Jews as they simply were a part of the Polish society, economy and social life before the war), NSZ (as a one of Polish resistance groups) and Jedwabne (Einsatzgruppen actions and lynches on the territories formerly occupied by Stalin and gained by Hitler) together. In fact anti-Semitism did not exist only within NSZ and not all NSZ soldiers should be blamed for anti-Semitism. You generalize about NSZ. Moreover there were Jewish soldiers and commandants in NSZ and cases of crimes against Jews were not more documented than helping them. It is actually a question for historians whether they had an anti-Semitic agenda but research can suggest something different. NSZ paper ‘Szaniec’ informed about German crimes on Jews and early said that any cooperation in it would be treated as treason. For the Government in Exile (London) and Armia Krajowa (Home Army) NSZ was a problem, as the Government wanted to unify all underground. It was not in their interest fight any kind of stereotypes, even if Stalinists blame them for all bad things in the world. I need to mention that ideology of NSZ is very far from my way of thinking, but you need honesty to admit that NSZ was responsible for fewer crimes against Left and Jews than Soviets. Stalin’s concentration camps and mass graves were full of Jews together with other nations and it is Stalin and not NSZ who exterminated European left before the war and demoralized and terrorised half of Europe during and after the war allowing it to start as Hitler’s ally. NSZ was ready to stand against him and Hitler as one of many Polish organizations. In every one of them you can find treason. Situation in occupied Poland was not black and white. You could find many before war atavists of anti-Semitic organisations who turned to help Jews. Also we can find unaware soldiers of managed by Soviet PPR, AL, GL, who did not know that their actions was collaboration or their organisations were emanations of regime responsible for terrible crimes against the European Left, not mentioning concentration camps.
PART 3
Delete>>Nowhere did Corbyn state or imply 'Poland was responsible for the Holocaust'.<<
Actually Corbyn mentioned ‘Polish complicity in the Holocaust’ in the context of the law that excludes individual crimes, so if he did it in an informed way, he actually supports the blame of the nation and the state and distort the Holocaust history. This way perhaps he proves his ignorance or bad will and the Jewish society were right to attack him.
>>The entire 'German death camps' campaign is a neurotic overreaction designed to deflect away from the fact that Germany has overcome its own ethnocentric racist demons whereas within Poland the fact such repellent militias as the NSZ are lauded as heroes signifies Poland has not.<<
You use NSZ argument to prove that 'German death camps' type campaigns are mostly or only to ‘deflect away’ something similar what ‘Germans has overcome’... Let me omit the fact there is a vivid nationalist party and huge Nazi underground in the current Germany with legal demonstrations on the streets. The conclusion that there is something Poles want to avoid by it but they should face is a conclusion without any evidence as most of this kind of actions fight disinformation about the states, not about individuals or criminal groups. Such actions existed long time before PiS, were supported by PO and many Jews around the world and they do not inform there were no Polish crimes on Jews but that holocaust was not a Polish construct. I admit that many of such actions come from trauma and dignity issues and it is often trauma of victims not any perpetrators of war crimes. Even if they start to influence Polish nationalist... in fact it is better for them. So... you twist the message, alas.
>>It's precisely this that leads to the mendacious appropriation of victimhood tropes as a way of closing down debate or pulling to sort of dishonest conflation attempted in your dishonest piece of community groupthink. The complicity of a minority of Poles in the Holocaust is a historical fact, as is the antisemitic nature and murders of the NSZ. The law Corbyn mentions is there to potentially deny these sorts of crimes ever happened or ever could.<<
You concluded by linking things which you did not proved in your text. As far as Corbyn is concerned... we know he admitted calling Hamas and Hezbollah friends. It looks like now, by saying what far right colonists would be probably happy to hear about that terrible Poland, using the misinformation, he wants to share the blame for anti-Semitism with others. So... what is he able to tell next? Is it a serious politician’s speech?
Moreover, significant statements have been made recently by the father of the current PM Morawiecki that blames Jews for their own demise and ghettoisation in the war. Nowhere did Corbyn wrongly imply 'the Polish government is a Holocaust denier’ or ‘the nation’: he made clear the law is there to deny the complicity of Poles in the Holocaust, which implies the minority who were complicit or any Poles. Though it might be difficult for those with a primitive mentality to comprehend, pointing out the fact that there is a law aimed at discouraging and preventing investigation into antisemitic violence committed by some Poles during World War Two is not the same as asserting the PiS government is into 'Holocaust Denial', as if the mass extermination of Jewry in concentration camps ‘never happened’. The PiS government accepts the Holocaust happened and the obvious responsibility for the mass extermination of European Jewry on Polish territory remains that of Nazi Germany. But this is a fact accepted by the current German government. However, the issue is the present PiS administration wants to pretend that mentioning Polish antisemitic crimes is about 'slandering the nation' or demonising ‘all Poles’. This conceit is repeated in your mendacious attempt to pretend Corbyn is accusing the ‘Polish nation’ of being responsible for the Holocaust. That was not what he said. Corbyn should have provided more nuance in his comments to make clear the PiS government was trying to deny the complicity of a minority of Poles through a law attempting to control the writing of history in order to impose a rigid nationalist interpretation that bolsters the partisan political ideology of the current government. 'Individual Poles' were not just wandering round in forests in the war. They were members of partisan movements such as the NSZ with roots in the Endecja and splinter groups from it even more radical than that led by Roman Dmowski. It speaks volumes that rather than actually deal with this real history and the real attempt to silence debate on this, the immediate and entirely neurotic response is to claim Corbyn is collectively victimising Poland for having responsibility for the Holocaust. As a Labour politician, it is astounding that your first reaction to Corbyn’s Passover speech was a reflex defence of the repellent far-right government in Poland at present that is systematically dismantling the basis for constitutional representative democracy there. Much of what you write about Poland’s wartime record such as the rescue of Jews, the heroic role of the AK and resistance in the rest of this post is both true but increasingly and widely understood anyway by most informed people in Britain who have knowledge of the tragedy and nobility of that struggle, as well as the undoubted betrayal of Poland after 1944. But the profile and significance of Poland and Poles in Britain and of Polish contribution to it then and now could only be diminished by what is, quite frankly, a stupid and banal attempt at self-interested identity politics.
ReplyDeleteHmm... actually I need to give you a little but reading here as well. Sorry, about reply in parts again :(
DeletePART 1
>>Moreover, significant statements have been made recently by the father of the current PM Morawiecki that blames Jews for their own demise and ghettoisation in the war.<<
Do you repeat some script or what? Morawiecki family never avoided fact that it is partly Jewish. This people know more about how to be a victim of the holocaust than you can ever imagine. You can blame them for their political convictions but never for being anti-Semitic. Actually it was very much undiplomatic (as most of PiS government is rubbish in diplomacy) but Morawiecki father could feel resentment against Jewish collaborators and Gestapo workers. Alas the whole holocaust system within Ghettos was based on Jewish helpers. There were brave Jews who challenged it but many of elite people not only were passive but collaborated if you read Jewish writers like Hannah Arendt. Morawiecki’s family members could be reported by Poles but bitten or killed by Jewish Police before Auschwitz. There should be no positive discrimination towards ethnicities. Do we aim at it? Morawiecki shouted against the hate and the wave of rubbish comments by racists and ignorants, who finally got his comment out of the context.
Read this:
https://www.jta.org/2017/12/08/news-opinion/world/poland-appoints-ex-banker-with-jewish-roots-as-prime-minister
>> Nowhere did Corbyn wrongly imply 'the Polish government is a Holocaust denier’ or ‘the nation’: he made clear the law is there to deny the complicity of Poles in the Holocaust, which implies the minority who were complicit or any Poles. Though it might be difficult for those with a primitive mentality to comprehend, pointing out the fact that there is a law aimed at discouraging and preventing investigation into antisemitic violence committed by some Poles during World War Two is not the same as asserting the PiS government is into 'Holocaust Denial', as if the mass extermination of Jewry in concentration camps ‘never happened’.<<
‘Primitive mentality’ in those who resist jumping on the bandwagon? That is peculiar. The law actually do not discourage nor prevent ‘investigation into antisemitic violence committed by some Poles’. It excludes research and art activity and it excludes concrete cases as it is to stop hate speech and false racist accusations mostly against Polish ethnic group. It is your and perhaps Mr Corbyn speech writer manipulation or ignorance to suggest such intentions and if you know about any case of using this law this way, I would be happy if you inform press or European courts. If not it is a libel. If you say that the law made for fight with slender is made to fight with holocaust investigation, you actually slender people who voted for this law as holocaust supporters.
PART 2
Delete>>The PiS government accepts the Holocaust happened and the obvious responsibility for the mass extermination of European Jewry on Polish territory remains that of Nazi Germany. But this is a fact accepted by the current German government. However, the issue is the present PiS administration wants to pretend that mentioning Polish antisemitic crimes is about 'slandering the nation' or demonising ‘all Poles’. This conceit is repeated in your mendacious attempt to pretend Corbyn is accusing the ‘Polish nation’ of being responsible for the Holocaust. That was not what he said. Corbyn should have provided more nuance in his comments to make clear the PiS government was trying to deny the complicity of a minority of Poles through a law attempting to control the writing of history in order to impose a rigid nationalist interpretation that bolsters the partisan political ideology of the current government.<<
What a fantastic argumentation... to a fellow Labour. I assume you are a devoted and unbiased Labour and especially Mr Corbyn supporter or you try to convince us. There are many people in this country who think that Labour actually abandoned the Left and the British residents/citizens following Conservarists, also many left oriented people point that part of the Labour can be influenced with the Stalinist propaganda, so please be a bit critical. But... Corbyn and a person responsible for writing his speech did what they did. Are there Polish anti-Semitic crimes or just anti-Semitic crimes? I already explained to you that nobody stopped research or artistic activity with any law against those who such blaming stereotype and generalisations. This law excludes and allows research and artistic activity whatever kind. This law is against racist hate speech and libel. You can find much more severe examples of fighting with defamation in Europe or outside than this law. If it is used in any other way... report it, but do not use libel yourself. Instead of feeding PiS voters... demonstrate PiS flaws. This is my advice.
>>'Individual Poles' were not just wandering round in forests in the war. They were members of partisan movements such as the NSZ with roots in the Endecja and splinter groups from it even more radical than that led by Roman Dmowski. It speaks volumes that rather than actually deal with this real history and the real attempt to silence debate on this, the immediate and entirely neurotic response is to claim Corbyn is collectively victimising Poland for having responsibility for the Holocaust.<<
Again, not all NSZ partisans had roots in Endecja (and please look at my other comment about NSZ; they are in the posts above). Also not all before the war anti-Semites were enemies of Jews during the war. Zofia Kossak-Szczucka who before the war was extreme anti-Semitic Catholic publications contributor, during the war was a leader for Irena Sendler within ‘Zegota’ the Polish Council to Aid Jews. Whose message does look more neurotic when someone sees your twisted ‘facts’: yours or the clear statement of Wiktor Moszczynski?
PART 3
Delete>>As a Labour politician, it is astounding that your first reaction to Corbyn’s Passover speech was a reflex defence of the repellent far-right government in Poland at present that is systematically dismantling the basis for constitutional representative democracy there. Much of what you write about Poland’s wartime record such as the rescue of Jews, the heroic role of the AK and resistance in the rest of this post is both true but increasingly and widely understood anyway by most informed people in Britain who have knowledge of the tragedy and nobility of that struggle, as well as the undoubted betrayal of Poland after 1944. But the profile and significance of Poland and Poles in Britain and of Polish contribution to it then and now could only be diminished by what is, quite frankly, a stupid and banal attempt at self-interested identity politics.<<
I cannot see that Wiktor Moszczynski defends PiS government in any way. He simply does not show that current Poland needs to be fought in all respects... like the governments which slender other nations, use trolls to subvert foreign elections, occupy territories of others (also in Europe) and use chemical weapons. Could you comment them (it can be together with Mr Corbyn, who seems to be more into solving the real and virtual party issues rather than the world problems...)? What you have written about ‘the profile and significance of Poland and Poles in Britain’ and of ‘Polish contribution to it then and now’ that could only be diminished by what Mr Moszczynski says is simply astonishing and rude. I understand that other Poles have no right to express their opinions... other than yours and PiS supporters according to your agenda? PiS is to be fought against and any other issue is just a banal and stupid show of self interest. I wish you than to feed your enemy but... with yourself. Please keep others away from PiS and your fixation to feed PiS voters with any ignorant or whatever writing. Good luck!
K Naylor and Mr. Moszczynski fail to include in this topic the role of the Jewish councils, the Jewish police and the Jewish gestapo in helping the German Nazis in the execution of their plan of anti-Jewish genocide. Such an omission is a serious detriment to the discussion on the Holocaust. What is also absent is the role of the Jewish militias who were responsible for the deaths of Polish civilians in the Eastern part of Poland during the 1939 to 1941 Soviet occupation, and the Jewish partisans who did the same in later years. What also needs to be pointed out is the role of the Jews who helped the Soviets install the Soviet backed communist regime and persecuted and killed thousands of Poles after the war. These actions were part of the history of those times.
ReplyDeleteK Naylor and Mr. Moszczynski fail to include in this topic the role of the Jewish councils, the Jewish police and the Jewish gestapo in helping the German Nazis in the execution of their plan of anti-Jewish genocide. Such an omission is a serious detriment to the discussion on the Holocaust. What is also absent is the role of the Jewish militias who were responsible for the deaths of Polish civilians in the Eastern part of Poland during the 1939 to 1941 Soviet occupation, and the Jewish partisans who did the same in later years. What also needs to be pointed out is the role of the Jews who helped the Soviets install the Soviet backed communist regime and persecuted and killed thousands of Poles after the war. These actions were part of the history of those times.
ReplyDelete