Jerusalem summons Polish ambassador for dressing down after Prime Minister Donald Tusk accuses Israel of starving Gazans, comparing situation to World War II.

By David Rosenberg, World Israel News

The Prime Minister of Poland sparked a diplomatic row with Israel this week with accusations that the Jewish state has caused a famine in the Gaza Strip.

On Sunday, Prime Minister Donald Tusk published a tweet in Polish expressing support for Israel’s war with Hamas, while at the same time accusing Israel of causing a famine in Gaza which, he claimed, has killed “mothers and their children.”

“Poland was, is, and will be on Israel’s side in its confrontation with Islamic terrorism, but never on the side of politicians whose actions lead to hunger and the death of mothers and their children,” Tusk wrote, invoking the legacy of World War II.

“This must be obvious to nations that together went through the hell of World War II.”

On Monday, Israel’s Foreign Ministry pushed back on Tusk’s comments, slamming his attempt to compare the war in Gaza to the Second World War.

“Unfortunately, Poland Prime Minister Donald Tusk is linking his timely condemnation of Hamas with an unacceptable reference to politicians, accompanied by a reminder of the horrible days of World War II,” the Foreign Ministry said.

“The Prime Minister of Poland should remember the lesson of ‘Never Again.’
Never Again, Prime Minister Tusk, applies to our era’s new Nazis and their collaborators, Hamas. Israel acts within international law. When Poland is threatened, you don’t take risks either.”

A day later, the Foreign Ministry summoned the Polish Ambassador to Israel, Maciej Hunia, for a formal dressing down over Tusk’s “unacceptable statements.”

“Israel firmly rejects these accusations and expects Poland to refrain from using language that distorts history and dishonors the memory of Holocaust victims,” the ministry announced.

“Israel is fighting a terrorist organization that openly seeks the murder of Jews and Israelis, and the destruction of Israel,” the statement reads.

“Israel acts under international humanitarian law and has significantly expanded its humanitarian aid efforts — including the entry of additional aid convoys into the Gaza Strip, humanitarian pauses, the opening of safe passage routes for aid delivery, infrastructure repairs, and airdrops of humanitarian supplies — including coordination with the European Union.”

The post Polish PM sparks row accusing Israel of starving Gaza civilians appeared first on World Israel News.

The Polish Confederation Party politician reacted with hostility to the Israeli ambassador’s criticism of antisemitic remarks

By World Israel News Staff

Grzegorz Braun, a far-right member of The Polish Confederation Party, told the Israeli Ambassador to Poland, Yacov Livne, to “go home or go to hell,” after Livne criticized Braun’s antisemitic remarks at the Polish Independence Day parade on Saturday.

Braun, whose party’s policies include curtailing immigration  and withdrawing from the European Union, said at the parade, “We do not want the Polish people to be collateral for the acts of genocide taking place right now in Palestine.”

Braun carried a sign with the term “USrealization of Poland” to express his belief that Israel and the United States join forces to undermine the sovereignty of the European country.

In response to Braun’s blatantly antisemitic sign and remarks, the Israeli ambassador tweeted on X: “Stop Usraelization (sic!) of the Polish raison d’Etat” – call these “patriots”, on Polish Independence Day in Warsaw. They fight against 3 “evils”: the US, the EU, and Israel… No words!”

https://twitter.com/YacovLivne/status/1723634494819713307

Braun’s response to Livne’s post was hostile; “Go home, your Excellency, go home ASAP – or go to hell, whatever you please.”

Antisemitism has never been absent in Poland. Before the Israel-Hamas war, Israel and Poland were engaged in ongoing disagreements regarding the latter’s law criminalizing any mention of Polish involvement or complicity in Nazi crimes against Jews during the Holocaust.

In response to this anti-historical law, Israel for a time postponed student trips to Polish sites connected with the Holocaust, including the Auschwitz death camp.

On the reinstatement of these trips, Yad Vashem released a statement urging “appropriate preparation, guidance, and processing while maintaining complete historical accuracy, including the role of Poles in the persecution, handing in, and murder of Jews during the Holocaust, as well as in acts of rescue.”

The post Polish lawmaker tells Israeli ambassador to ‘go home or go to hell’ appeared first on World Israel News.

The content of the educational trips has been a point of contention for Poland.

By World Israel News Staff

Noa Kirel, who came third in the Eurovision song contest last week, came under fire in Poland for comments she made connecting her win to the Holocaust.

“Receiving 12 points from Poland after nearly the entire Kirel family was murdered in the Holocaust – that is a victory,” told Israeli media in comments that were later slammed in Poland.

The Do Rzeczy Polish newspaper wrote: “The Israeli artist recalled the Holocaust, and blamed the Poles for the murder of Jews.”

The country’s nationalist government last year passed a law that criminalizes accusations of Polish collusion with the Nazis during the Holocaust.

In response to Kirel’s comments, Polish MP Anna Maria Żukowska tweeted, “Does this statement reflect the level of education about the Holocaust in Israel? Do young people in Israel think that the Holocaust was caused by Poland, over which a young Israeli citizen can achieve a moral victory after many years, or what?”

Poland’s Deputy Foreign Minister Paweł Jabłoński tweeted, ““The fact that many people in Israel consider Poland to be an accomplice to German crimes – and not their victim – is often the result not so much of bad will as lack of knowledge and incomplete education.”

On Saturday, Jabłoński issued another statement inviting Kirel to Poland “to understand why she thinks about our homeland in this way and to explain why [her comments] are painful to us.”

Poland was the first country to be invaded by Nazi Germany. While 3 million non-Jewish Poles were murdered by the Nazis, and thousands risked their lives to help Jews, there is a wealth of evidence showing how Poles either helped find Jews or else murdered them themselves, as well as Poles who looted Jewish homes.

The post Noa Kirel’s Holocaust comments spark outrage in Poland appeared first on World Israel News.

“Who is a hero? That is one of the core questions of Jewish existence. Here, the answer is clear. They were the heroes,” President Isaac Herzog said.

By Associated Press and World Israel News Staff

Presidents and Holocaust survivors and their descendants commemorated the 80th anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising on Wednesday with a poignant sense that the responsibility for carrying on the memory of the Holocaust is passing from the witnesses to younger generations.

Germany’s president, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, said the lessons of his own country’s aggression hold a lesson as Russia’s attack on Ukraine has “destroyed the foundations of our European security order.”

“You in Poland, you in Israel, you know from your history that freedom and independence must be fought for and defended. You know how important it is for a democracy to defend itself,” Steinmeier said at a ceremony alongside presidents Isaac Herzog of Israel and Andrzej Duda of Poland.

“But we Germans have also learned the lessons of our history. ‘Never again’ means that there must be no criminal war of aggression like Russia’s against Ukraine in Europe.”

The anniversary honors the hundreds of young Jews who took up arms in Warsaw in 1943 against the overwhelming might of the Nazi German army.

There are no surviving fighters still alive. Marek Edelman, the last surviving commander, died in 2009. He remained in Poland and helped keep alive the memory of the revolt in his homeland. Simcha Rotem, a fighter who smuggled others out of the burning ghetto through sewage tunnels, died in 2018 in Israel, where he had settled.

The small number of elderly surviving witnesses today were mostly children at the time of the revolt.

The commemorations took place in front of the Memorial to the Ghetto Heroes where the fighting erupted, led by three presidents whose nations were forever shaped by World War II.

‘I bow to the dead in deep sorrow’

Germany, which inflicted death and destruction across the vast areas that it occupied, has acknowledged its crimes and expressed remorse.

Steinmeier once again begged forgiveness.

“As German Federal President, I stand before you today and bow to the courageous fighters in the Warsaw ghetto,” Steinmeier said. “I bow to the dead in deep sorrow.”

“Dear President Duda, dear President Herzog, many people in your two countries, in Poland and in Israel, have granted us Germans reconciliation despite these crimes,” Steinmeier said, calling that a “miracle of reconciliation” to be preserved into the future.

“Who is a hero? That is one of the core questions of Jewish existence. Here, the answer is clear. They were the heroes,” President Herzog said in his address.

“Not only here,” he continued, “but all across Europe. In the trails of tears, in the depths of carnage, in the confines of the ghettoes, and in the camps of extermination—in all nine circles of hell. In a world falling apart, in the shadow of death, under conditions of humiliation, famine, and forced labor, in the ghettoes, in the killing pits, on the death trains, in the gas chambers and crematoria, facing concentration camps and extermination camps—they succeeded, mothers, fathers, children, grandfathers, and grandmothers, in upholding human morality, mutual responsibility, faith, and basic humanity. And a love of humankind. They upheld the most fundamental and basic Jewish imperative: ‘Love thy neighbor as thyself.’

“They were not alone. With them, in a heroic battle against the Nazis and their accomplices, in every country, were the Righteous Among the Nations and members of the local resistance movements, including, of course, here in Poland, the Polish Righteous Among the Nations and members of the Polish underground, who risked their lives and chose to not stand idly by…

“I stand here at these sacred moments, in a place where whole branches of our people were cut down, destroyed, tortured, and exterminated. In a place where Jewish hope and faith faced challenges the likes of which humanity had never known. And I cannot help but imagine the daughters and sons of my people, beloved and pleasant in their lives, and in their deaths never divided (Samuel II 1:23).

“I imagine what they would have said, what they would have thought, if in those dark hours, in the stench of the sewers and suffocating cellars, staring down the barrels of guns and tanks, someone had whispered in their ears that eighty years later, we—the Presidents of Poland, Israel, and Germany—would be standing here and saluting their heroism and swearing an eternal oath together to their sacred memory, an oath with a singular core: Never Again.”

‘More than an emotional moment’

Some of those participating in Wednesday’s observances traveled from as far as Australia and the United States to honor those who perished, but also the rich Jewish civilization that is their heritage. Many hold their own private ceremonies, paying tribute to those departed at the Jewish cemetery or at various memorials on the former grounds of the ghetto.

Avi Valevski, a professor of psychiatry from Israel whose father, Ryszard Walewski, a doctor who led a group of some 150 warriors in the revolt, visited Warsaw with his wife, describing it as “more than an emotional moment.”

Valevski, 72, is working to carry on a history that his father rarely spoke to him about but also carries an emotional burden. He was young when his father became ill and died 1971, but today pores through the documentation his father left behind, and is trying to get one of his stories translated into English and published.

“He was quite proud of his fight against the ‘Nazi beast’ — his words — but I suppose that the feeling of apprehension entered my soul until now,” Valevski said.

The Germans invaded Poland in 1939 and the next year set up the ghetto, the largest of many in occupied Poland.

It initially held some 380,000 Jews who were cramped into tight living spaces, and at its peak housed about a half-million souls. Disease and starvation were rampant, and bodies often appeared on the streets.

The Jewish resistance movement in the Warsaw ghetto grew after 265,000 men, women and children were rounded up in the summer of 1942 and killed at the Treblinka death camp. As word of the Nazi genocide spread, those who remained behind no longer believed German promises that they would be sent to labor camps.

A small group of rebels began to spread calls for resistance, carrying out isolated acts of sabotage and attacks. Some Jews began defying German orders to report for deportation.

The uprising began when the Nazis entered the ghetto on April 19, 1943, the eve of the Passover holiday. Three days later, the Nazis set the ghetto ablaze, turning it into a fiery death trap, but the Jewish fighters kept up their struggle for nearly a month before they were brutally vanquished. That was longer than some countries held out.

“I’m a New Yorker but there is something that keeps drawing me back here,” said Barbara Jolson Blumenthal, whose parents survived the Warsaw Ghetto after a Pole helped them to escape and hide on the “Aryan” side of the city, while many other members of their families were murdered.

The post ‘Who is a hero?’ Warsaw Ghetto Uprising commemorated on 80th anniversary appeared first on World Israel News.

Prof. Jan Grabowski described the new agreement reached between Israel and Poland as “another victory” for those who cannot accept that their own country took part in the atrocities.

By Ben Cohen, The Algemeiner

One of the world’s leading historians of the Nazi Holocaust in Poland has issued a scathing condemnation of the recent agreement between the Israeli and Polish governments to restore trips for Israeli youth to concentration camp and World War II sites in Poland, following a bilateral dispute that lasted for three years.

Writing for the Polish Jewish news outlet Jewish.pl on Monday, Prof. Jan Grabowski, a specialist on Polish-Jewish relations during the Nazi occupation who teaches at the University of Ottawa in Canada, described the agreement reached on March 30 as “another victory for the deniers — those who are unable to understand that, to some extent, their own nation took part in the genocide designed and carried out by the Germans.”

Grabowski’s concerns were echoed in a statement from Yad Vashem, Israel’s national memorial to the Holocaust in Jerusalem. Noting its worry that historical accuracy on the tours could be compromised by Poland’s insistence, enshrined in its laws, that collaboration between the Nazi occupiers and non-Jewish Poles in the extermination of the country’s three million Jews did not occur, Yad Vashem asserted that “the recent agreement to renew educational visits to Poland does not appear to dictate or limit their operation in this respect.”

The statement observed that “the annex of the agreement contains a list of sites, compiled without Yad Vashem, which includes problematic sites that should not be visited in an educational context.” It ended with the warning that “Yad Vashem will not be involved in group visits to any site suspected of distorting the events of the Holocaust or presenting a historically inaccurate narrative.”

Several of the “problematic sites” mentioned by Yad Vashem were cited by Grabowski in his article. They include the “Museum of Cursed Soldiers” in Warsaw, which pays tribute to anti-communist military leaders who fought the Russian occupation after World War II, among them Józef Kuraś, known by the nom de guerre “Ogien,” who was accused of murdering Jews in Poland’s Podhale region. Last month, Kuraś was posthumously honored with a special commemorative coin issued by Poland’s National Bank.

“The question is whether Israeli youth will have to pay homage to Józef Kuraś, a cruel murderer of Jews and other ‘cursed’ who fought with equal willingness against the communists and defenseless Jewish children?” Grabowski wrote.

The historian also pointed to the inclusion of the “Museum of Remembrance of the Inhabitants of the Land of Oświęcim,” which is located near the Auschwitz concentration camp and which, Grabowski underlined, had once been depicted by former Prime Minister Beata Szydło as a “counterbalance” to the Auschwitz museum.

Grabowski sharply condemned the Israeli government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for signing up to the agreement.

“The question remains why the Israeli authorities agreed to this shameful diktat,” he declared. “Why did Netanyahu and his people decide to betray the memory of the six million murdered Jews? Is it about Poland’s vote at the UN? Is it about Polish support for Israel in the bosom of European organizations?”

Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid — who served as both foreign minister and prime minister during the period when Israeli-Polish relations were at rock bottom — denounced the agreement as a “national disgrace.”

“The Poles have for years attempted through every means to hide and deny the part of many Poles in the extermination [of Jews in the Holocaust] — alongside those Righteous among the Nations who acted to save Jews,” Lapid wrote on Twitter. “It is unacceptable that youth trips coming to learn of the Holocaust will learn the Polish narrative.”

Lapid added that, as the son of a Holocaust survivor, “I am ashamed of the Israeli government for giving up on its morals and principles.”

Responding to Lapid, Israeli Education Minister Yoav Kisch — whose department is jointly responsible with the Polish Education Ministry for the trips — accused the opposition leader of having been “responsible for destroying relations with Poland.”

Kisch said that there had been “no change in the trips. Anything else is fake news.”

Over the last five years, Poland’s right-wing nationalist government has frequently been at loggerheads with Israel and international Jewish organizations, as well as recognized Holocaust scholars, over its bid to present the Holocaust as a joint Polish-Jewish tragedy and its support for legislation passed in 2018 that enables civil prosecution of historians who research the collaboration of Polish citizens with the Nazi authorities during the German occupation.

In 2021, further legislation effectively closed off restitution claims for Holocaust victims and their families. Relations between Warsaw and Jerusalem nosedived as a result.

The post Leading Holocaust expert accuses Netanyahu of ‘betraying Six Million’ appeared first on World Israel News.

The deal includes “problematic locations that aren’t okay to visit on an educational trip,” Yad Vashem said in a statement.

By TPS

Israel’s National Holocaust Museum and Memorial in Jerusalem is not pleased with the new deal with the government of Poland that will once again allow youth groups from Israel to travel to that country over Israel’s Holocaust Memorial Day – Yom Hashoa.

In a statement Yad Vashem said while it values the importance of group visits from Israel to Poland to study the Holocaust and preserve its memory, it also feels it is essential that these groups be accompanied by “appropriate preparation, guidance, and processing while maintaining complete historical accuracy, including the role of Poles in the persecution, handing in, and murder of Jews during the Holocaust, as well as in acts of rescue.”

Yad Vashem acknowledged that the recent agreement to renew educational visits to Poland does not appear to dictate or limit their operation in this respect; nevertheless, the annex of the agreement contains a list of sites, compiled without Yad Vashem’s input, which includes what it calls “problematic sites that should not be visited in an educational context”.

Yad Vashem, therefore, said it will not be involved in group visits to any site suspected of “distorting the events of the Holocaust or presenting a historically inaccurate narrative.”

The post Yad Vashem criticizes new Poland deal on educational tours appeared first on World Israel News.

“So how does it feel to be indoctrinated by a terrorist? Care to share with us?” asked Yaki Lopez, head of Public Diplomacy at Israel’s embassy in Berlin.

By Andrew Bernard, The Algemeiner

The UN’s Special Coordinator for Lebanon Joanna Wronecka on Monday thanked a representative of Hezbollah for giving her a “tour d’horizon” of Lebanese issues, eliciting a strongly worded rebuke from Israeli officials.

“I thank Mr. Ammar Moussawi of Hizbullah for a tour d’horizon on issues of priority for Lebanon, including the election of a new President, the functioning of state institutions and the impact of regional and international developments on the country,” Wronecka wrote in both English and Arabic.

Moussawi is the head of international relations for Hezbollah, which is recognized as a terrorist organization by the U.S., UK, Germany, Japan and others.

In December, Hezbollah handed over one of its supporters who shot and killed an Irish UN peacekeeper in an incident that Hezbollah’s security chief called “unintentional.” A Hezbollah spokesperson told Reuters at the time that the murder suspect was a supporter, but not a member, of the Iran-backed militia.

Israeli diplomats on Tuesday criticized Wronecka’s decision to meet with Moussawi and for her choice of words in thanking him.

“Is this real..??,” tweeted Joshua Zarka, head of Strategic Affairs in Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs. “An official Senior UN Representative thanks the terrorist organization responsible for the murder of a UN peace keeper for ‘a tour d’horizon’!!!”

Is this real..??
An official Senior UN Representative thanks the terrorist organization responsible for the murder of a UN peace keeper for “a tour d’horizon”!!!
Have the world gone completely mad?! https://t.co/T6QQFleGbJ

— Joshua L. Zarka (@yzarka) January 17, 2023

“So how does it feel to be indoctrinated by a terrorist? Care to share with us?” asked Yaki Lopez, head of Public Diplomacy at Israel’s embassy in Berlin.

Wronecka, a Polish diplomat who served previously as Poland’s ambassador to the United Nations, is not the first special coordinator to court controversy for meeting with Hezbollah. Her predecessor, Jan Kubis, in 2019 met with Hezbollah Deputy Secretary General Naim Qassem and was gifted a copy of his book, which Kubis called “a necessary reading.”

She was also involved with the dispute between Lebanon and Israel regarding the two countries’ maritime borders.

The post ‘Is this real?’ UN envoy thanks Hezbollah for ‘tour,’ eliciting rebuke from Israelis appeared first on World Israel News.

Israeli student trips to Poland have been suspended over disputes on the content of the visits as well as lack of guarantees for student safety.

The post WATCH: Israel cancels student trips to Auschwitz over dispute with Poland appeared first on World Israel News.

The journalist advised Morawiecki to “promote Polish martyrdom using Jewish martyrdom, because it is possible.”

By Lauren Marcus, World Israel News

On the heels of an ongoing diplomatic spat between Poland and Israel, a Polish newspaper leaked emails between the prime minister, a prominent journalist, and several government advisors strategizing on how to improve Poland’s global image via international media.

The left-wing Socialist news outlet Wyborcza published email exchanges between Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki and “right-wing” journalist Bronisław Wildstein, which took place in 2018, as the diplomatic crisis between Poland and Israel first began.

In January 2018, the Polish parliament passed a law stating that researchers, teachers, or journalists who publicly discussed Poland’s role in the Holocaust could face up to three years in prison.

The bill sparked international outrage, along with harsh condemnation from Israel. As deteriorations in relations continued, Israel withdrew its ambassador from the eastern European nation.

According to emails obtained by Wyborcza, Morawiecki and Wildstein began discussing ways to shield Poland from the international outcry and restore relations with the Jewish State.

However, Wildstein charged that many Holocausts scholars and institutions are inherently biased against Poland.

He suggested that Poland float the idea of a joint Holocaust research project with Israeli scholars, who would parter with the Institute of National Remembrance, a Polish pro-government Holocaust research group known by its Polish acronym IPN.

“Ideally, it would be done by Yad Vashem together with the IPN,” Wildstein wrote.

“This should be forced on the Israeli authorities, since now all contacts with Israeli historians are monopolized by the Holocaust Research Center, whose main figures [Dr. Jan Grabowski and Dr. Barbara Engelking] are simply enemies of Poland.”

In a separate email, he said that “the Center for Holocaust Research presents an almost obsessive hatred of Poles.”

Wildstein also stressed the importance of seeking out journalists who were “sympathetic” to Poland, suggesting that they work to promote a narrative around World War II and the German occupation of Poland that would present Polish victims of the era as equivalent to Jewish victims.

He advised Morawiecki to “”promote Polish martyrdom using Jewish martyrdom, because it is possible.”

An advisor to Morawiecki, Andrzej Pawluszek, traveled to Tel Aviv in March 2018 with the goal of connecting with local journalists and government officials who could help them rebuild relations with Israel.

“I made great contact with a journalist from the Jerusalem Post, we drank a sea of beer, but it was well worth it,” wrote Pawluszek in an email recounting the efforts on his visit.

He suggested that the Polish government mobilize funds to help “correct Hebrew Wikipedia entries and position Israeli pages on Google” regarding Polish crimes in the Holocaust.

Earlier this year, Israel suspended its annual trip to Poland for high-schoolers in the face of an ongoing diplomatic crisis regarding a 2021 Polish law banning the descendants of Holocaust victims from attempting to gain compensation for their seized or stolen property.

The post Holocaust center has ‘obsessive hatred of Poles’ – leaked emails between Polish PM, journalist appeared first on World Israel News.

Jerusalem and Warsaw to restore ambassadors. 

By World Israel News Staff

Israel and Poland have agreed to restore relations, including their respective ambassadorial posts, a year after ties were downgraded.

Ties between the two countries took a hit following Poland’s passage of a controversial law preventing Jews from regaining property seized by the Nazis in the Holocaust.

Then-Foreign Minister Yair Lapid slammed the Polish bill as “anti-Semitic and immoral,” and prompted him to recall Israel’s charge d’affaires home for “an indefinite period of time.” He also told Poland’s ambassador to Israel not to bother returning to his post after vacationing in his home country.

However, Monday’s turn of events saw Polish President Andrzej Duda telling Israeli President Isaac Herzog in a phone call that his country’s ambassador-designate would present his letters of credentials in the coming days.

“It was agreed that relations would be restored to their proper course,” a statement issued by Herzog’s office said.

“Both presidents expressed their hope that any future issues between Poland and Israel will be solved through sincere and open dialogue and in a spirit of mutual respect,” it added.

However, it’s not all smooth sailing between the two nations. Israel last month said it was cancelling upcoming Holocaust trips for schoolchildren over Warsaw’s insistence that it regulate the visits, in a bid to control what it perceives as the “negative image” given of Poland.

The content of the educational trips has been a point of contention for the eastern European country, after its nationalist government passed a law criminalizing charges of Polish collusion with the Nazis during the Holocaust.

According to Hebrew media reports, the Polish government has also barred Shin Bet security guards accompanying the students from carrying weapons.

The post Israel, Poland restore relations a year after Holocaust property spat appeared first on World Israel News.

Warsaw concerned that visits give young Israelis a “negative image” of Poland.

By Associated Press

The Polish government wants formal rules to regulate the terms under which Israeli schoolchildren pay Holocaust study visits to the country, including on the presence of armed Israeli guards, an official in Warsaw said Monday.

Deputy Foreign Minister Marcin Przydacz said the armed guards accompanying the youth groups, the visits’ focus on the Holocaust only and a lack of contact with Polish youth were giving young Israelis a “negative image” of Poland.

“There are also threads appearing (to suggest) that Poland is an antisemitic country and for that reason it’s dangerous here,” Przydacz told Radio RMF24.

He said a new intergovernmental agreement should state in what cases guards with loaded weapons can be present. Warsaw has been seeking such a deal for months, Przydacz said.

Poland would also like young Israelis to meet with their Polish peers and understand their approach to Polish-Jewish history that spans many centuries.

The annual educational trips by thousands of young Israelis were suspended during the pandemic and last week Israel said it was not resuming them because Poland’s right-wing government was trying to control the curriculum.

Przydacz said the reason they have not been resumed was “because we believe that (they) should be regulated by an agreement between Poland and Israel.”

Poland was the first country invaded and occupied by Nazi Germany in World War II. Members of Poland’s resistance and government-in-exile warned the world about the Nazis’ mass killing of Jews, and thousands of Poles risked their lives to help Jews — even though some Poles murdered or victimized their Jewish compatriots.

Nearly all of Poland’s roughly 3 million Jews were killed by the Germans and their collaborators during the Holocaust, and the Nazis built their major death camps in occupied Poland.

Young Israelis traditionally travel to Poland in the summer between 11th and 12th grade to tour former Nazi camps, learn about the Holocaust and remember the victims. The trip has long been considered a milestone in Israeli education and, prior to the pandemic, some 40,000 Israeli students participated each year.

The post Poland seeks to regulate Israeli Holocaust study trips appeared first on World Israel News.

The content of the educational trips has been a point of contention for Poland.

By David Hellerman, World Israel News

Israel cancelled this summer’s youth trips to Poland amid a disagreement over security arrangements for the trips on Wednesday.

An initial Israeli announcement also cited Polish interference in the educational content, but Israel’s Walla News subsequently reported that an unspecified compromise was reached.

“It has been decided at this time that the activities of the youth delegations to Poland will be frozen,” said the Education Ministry in a message to some 7,000 students who already booked travel arrangements.

According to Hebrew media reports, the Polish government is not allowing Shin Bet security guards accompanying the students to carry weapons. In previous years, the guards were permitted to carry guns on Polish soil.

Polish officials have not commented on the matter.

Channel 12 reported that parents who already paid for trips will be reimbursed, but complications are expected because schools made arrangements with different travel agents and airlines

The content of the educational trips has been a point of contention for Poland, where a nationalist government passed a law that criminalizes accusations of Polish collusion with the Nazis during the Holocaust.

The law has already forced some Jewish educational programs to move to neighboring Lithuania.

Last year, Deputy Foreign Minister Pawel Jablonski claimed the Israeli youth trips promoted anti-Polish sentiment and added that Warsaw would reconsider future programs.

The post Israel cancels youth trips to Poland for Holocaust programs appeared first on World Israel News.

Some see this new development as a positive sign regarding Israel’s relationship with Poland, which had deteriorated recently.

By World Israel News Staff

Amid the fighting in Ukraine since the Russian attack several days ago, Foreign Minister Yair Lapid announced Saturday morning that it was moving its embassy in Ukraine to Poland.

“We want to express our thanks to Polish authorities for their assistance,” the Foreign Ministry said.

Dr. Yaakov Livne, the Israeli ambassador, will depart Sunday morning for Warsaw.

“Since the beginning of the crisis in Ukraine, the Israeli Embassy in Warsaw, headed by charge d’affaires Tal Yaalon, has worked in fruitful cooperation with the Polish authorities in the effort to assist Israelis leaving Ukraine, and we would like to express our gratitude to the Polish authorities for this assistance,” the Foreign Ministry statement said.

Some see this new development as a positive sign regarding Israel’s relationship with Poland, which had deteriorated recently.

In June, the head of the Foreign Ministry’s Political-Strategic Department summoned then-Polish Ambassador to Israel Marek Magierowski to express Jerusalem’s “deep disappointment” with a new law passed that restricts the rights of Holocaust survivors to reclaim property seized by the country’s former communist regime.

Foreign Minister Yair Lapid called the law “immoral” and “a disgrace,” saying that its passage “would severely damage relations between the two countries.”

In response, Warsaw announced that it would summon Tal Ben-Ari Yaalon, charge d’affaires in the Israeli embassy on Monday, over what they viewed as “intervening in the internal affairs of a foreign state.”

Meanwhile, on Saturday night, the Jewish Agency for Israel on Saturday announced the opening of six aliyah (immigration to Israel) processing stations at Ukrainian border crossings with four countries: Poland, Moldova, Romania and Hungary.

These stations, operated in conjunction with Nativ — an Israeli governmental liaison organization that maintained contact with Jews living in the Eastern Bloc during the Cold War — and Israel’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, will assist the large number of immigrants fleeing the Ukraine.

The decision to move the embassy to Poland will help Israeli citizens crossing the border from Ukraine, the Foreign Ministry said.

The post Israel moves embassy from Ukraine to Poland, helps Israelis flee war zone appeared first on World Israel News.

Israeli over-reaction to Poland may cost the Jewish state a bigger ally than it realizes.

By Dmitriy Shapiro, JNS.org

Despite international pressure to veto the bill, Polish President Andrzej Duda signed a bill passed by the Polish legislature on Aug. 14 that would prevent individuals with property seized by either the Nazis during World War II or the post-War Communist government from having it returned.

The bill effectively ends the chances that Poland’s Holocaust survivors and their descendants from receiving restitution by filing claims to reinstate their confiscated property, including those who are currently in court seeking restitution.

The action, the president wrote in a statement after signing the bill, would end decades of uncertainty for Polish people over whether the property individuals occupied have to be returned to its pre-Communist or even pre-war owners.

“In my opinion, this is the end of the state of uncertainty, when the bona fide flats and real estate could be taken away by an ordinary administrative decision, when their owner from over 70 years ago was found,” wrote Duda.

“Practice has shown that these owners were often fictitious, and that criminal groups became rich at the cost of tens of thousands of people thrown onto the pavement. Anyone born at the wrong time and place could be the victim, and re-privatization to restore justice became almost synonymous with injustice and human harm,” Duda added.

While the law does not mention Jews, the Holocaust or World War II, it ensures that an administrative decision rendered more than 30 years ago could no longer be challenged.

For months, the bill was condemned by the international community, which saw it as another attempt by Poland to wipe out its responsibility to restore the property confiscated from its Jewish community during the years of World War II and the Holocaust. Before the war, that community was the largest in the world with some 3 million Jews living in the country, mainly in the centers of Warsaw and Krakow.

Duda’s signing of the law, especially coming on the Jewish Sabbath, was seen as an affront by Jewish organizations and leaders worldwide.

“We deeply regret the adoption of these amendments. Further, we urge the Polish government to consult with representatives of affected parties and to develop a clear, efficient and effective legal procedure to resolve confiscated property claims and provide some measure of justice for victims,” U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a statement on Monday.

“In the absence of such a procedure, this legislation will harm all Polish citizens whose property was unjustly taken, including that of Polish Jews who were victims of the Holocaust.”

‘Justice for what happened in the past’

The American Jewish Committee called the approval of the bill deplorable, writing on Twitter that it would make it virtually impossible for Holocaust survivors and claimants to seek restitution and urged the governments to return to a constructive dialogue.

“Shameful that Poland has passed a law that punishes families of Polish Jewry mass murdered by the Nazis in ghettos and death camps established by Nazi Germany on Polish soil during Shoah. No respect even in death,” said Rabbi Abraham Cooper, associate dean and director of Global Social Action Agenda at the Simon Wiesenthal Center.

The World Jewish Restitution Organization (WJRO)—the world’s leading advocate for property restitution in central and eastern Europe, which has been fighting the law since it was first introduced—said it was a sad day for justice and rule of law.

“With this law, Poland is attempting to say to the world if you delay justice long enough, you can shut the door to history without taking responsibility and benefit in the present from the Communist actions of the past. They are wrong,” WJRO chair of operations Gideon Taylor said in a statement.

“This issue will not go away. Holocaust survivors, their descendants and other Polish citizens have been struggling for decades to reclaim their rightful property nationalized by the Polish Communists will not give up. Without justice for what happened in the past, there will not be legal certainty for those who trade in this stolen property in the future,” Taylor said.

In his statement, Duda took offense that the law had anything to do with the Holocaust and that Communist nationalization of property applied to all citizens regardless of religion.

‘Israel and the Jewish people will not remain silent’

The new Israeli government took an even stronger line in condemning the new law.

“Israel views with utmost gravity approval of the law that prevents Jews from receiving compensation for property that was stolen from them during the Holocaust and regrets the fact that Poland has chosen to continue harming those who have lost everything,” Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett said in an Aug. 14 statement.

“This is a shameful decision and disgraceful contempt for the memory of the Holocaust. This is a grave step that Israel cannot remain indifferent to,” the Prime Minister added.

Israeli Foreign Minister Yair Lapid called the law unethical and anti-Semitic, and recalled the charge d’affaires of the Israeli Embassy in Warsaw to return to Israel immediately for indefinite consultations. He also said that the new Israeli ambassador to Poland has been instructed to stay in Israel and recommended that the Polish ambassador to Israeli remain in Poland where he was on a vacation.

“This time should be used to explain to the people of Poland the meaning of the Holocaust to the citizens of Israel, and the extent to which we will refuse to tolerate any contempt for the memory of Holocaust and its victims,” Lapid said in the statement the day the law was signed.

“It will not end here,” Lapid continued. We are holding discussions with the Americans to coordinate our future response. Tonight, Poland has become an anti-democratic and illiberal country that does not honor the greatest tragedy in human history,” he continued. “We must never remain silent. Israel and the Jewish people will certainly not remain silent.”

The law was drafted and supported by Poland’s ruling right-wing Law and Justice Party which previously was on friendly terms with the government of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

‘Strong supporters of the Jewish state’

Eugene Kontorovich, professor of law and director of the Center for Middle East and International Law at the Antonin Scalia Law School at George Mason University, said that whatever problems Poland has had with anti-Semitism in the past, he did not see this law as inherently anti-Semitic and that the Israeli leaders are picking a needless fight.

“Poland has had over the past century, very many transitions of liens. There were Nazis, Soviets, post-Soviet. And there’s nothing inherently wrong with them wanting to have a settlement of property rights so that property rights are not constantly in question,” he explained. “And you know, the cut-off period of 30 years makes it seem that it’s really primarily about Communist nationalization and transition from communism.”

“Given that the Holocaust in Poland now was close to 80 years ago, it’s weird to think that this is primarily or significantly about Jews or about the Holocaust, when pretty much anything or all the claims that could have been made about Holocaust-era issues would have been made by now,” Kontorovich said.

Poland, he added, on numerous occasions has stood up and threatened to veto anti-Semitic actions in the European Union, becoming a vital Israeli ally—at great cost to itself—and that the outrage over the bill may be sacrificing this support.

“On numerous occasions, they have vetoed European initiatives against Israel in a way that has … generated anger from Brussels [the seat of the European Commission], and they’ve been willing to take the heat,” said Kontorovich. “I think the Polish government have proven themselves to be strong supporters of the Jewish state.”

Kontorovich believes that the pushback to the law is a vast overreaction that will likely hurt Israel’s relationship with Poland.

“Next time the Europeans are considering some kind of sanctions measure or a restriction on trade or settlements … or some condemnation of Israel, is Poland going to not veto it because of this?” posed Kontorovich.

Meanwhile, WJRO vows that it will continue fighting for the restitution of Polish property.

“Many Holocaust survivors and their families have been waiting for justice for too long,” said Taylor in a statement. “Those who deal in what is in reality stolen Jewish property should understand that we will not stop seeking justice for Holocaust survivors and others.”

The post Analysis: Will Polish anti-restitution law permanently harm ties with Israel, Jewish community? appeared first on World Israel News.

Foreign Minister Lapid calls out Polish prime minister’s reaction to Israel downgrading diplomatic relations as “anti-Semitic threats.”

By Batya Jerenberg, World Israel News

Foreign Minister Yair Lapid called the Polish prime minister’s reaction to Israel pulling its top diplomat from the country “anti-Semitic threats.”

Lapid’s comments on Sunday marked an escalating war of words over Warsaw’s new law that will prevent Jews from regaining property lost in the Holocaust and then seized by Poland’s post-war Communist regime.

Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki had sharply criticized the move as well as Lapid’s statement that went along with it.

“Israel’s decision to downgrade its diplomatic representation in Warsaw is groundless and irresponsible,” he said in a Facebook statement, “and the words of Yair Lapid … enrage every upstanding person.”

“The use of this tragedy for political ends is irresponsible and shameful,” he added. “If the Israeli government continues to attack Poland in such a manner, it will most definitely have a very negative impact on our relations – both bilateral and in international forums.”

The reference to the international arena could be a hint to United Nations and European Union meetings, where Warsaw has voted against anti-Israel resolutions over recent years.

In an immediate response, Lapid tweeted, “the negative impact on our ties began the moment that Poland chose to begin passing laws aimed at harming the memory of the Holocaust and the Jewish people in 2018. Gone are the days when Poles harmed Jews without consequence…. We do not fear anti-Semitic threats, and have no intention of turning a blind eye to the shameful conduct of the anti-democratic Polish government.”

Lapid had ordered Israel’s charge d’affaires home for “consultations for an indefinite period of time” Saturday night, and told Israel’s incoming ambassador to stay home for now as well because Poland approved “not for the first time – an immoral, anti-Semitic law.” The foreign ministry also advised Poland’s ambassador to Israel, Marek Magierowski, to extend his summer vacation in his home country for the time being.

For its part, the Polish foreign ministry said in a statement that its government would respond in kind to Israel’s “unfounded decision to lower the rank of its diplomatic representation,” citing “the principle of symmetry applicable in bilateral relations.”

Blue and White MK Michael Biton suggested a step that could hurt Poland in its pocket just as the new law hurts people who will now never receive proper restitution for their wartime losses.

“The political crisis with Poland is an opportunity to change our education policy regarding the Holocaust and World War II,” he wrote in a Facebook post.

Instead of bringing thousands of students a year to Poland to tour concentration camps and former ghettoes, “which supports Poland financially,” he suggested that their learning “can be much more significant here in Israel, while bolstering museums, heritage centers and memory projects,” among other endeavors. He also cited a need to expand their knowledge of the Holocaust beyond Europe, to what happened to Jews in North Africa as well.

The post Poland-Israel war of words escalates as relations deteriorate appeared first on World Israel News.

“This is a shameful decision and disgraceful contempt for the memory of the Holocaust,” Prime Minister Naftali Bennett said in a statement.

By Associated Press and World Israel News Staff

Poland’s president signed legislation Saturday that restricts the rights of former Polish property owners, including Holocaust survivors and their descendants, to regain property seized by the country’s communist regime.

“Israel views with utmost gravity approval of the law that prevents Jews from receiving compensation for property that was stolen from them during the Holocaust,and regrets the fact that Poland has chosen to continue harming those who have lost everything,” Prime Minister Naftali Bennett stated Saturday evening.

“This is a shameful decision and disgraceful contempt for the memory of the Holocaust,” he said. “This is a grave step that Israel cannot remain indifferent to.”

“Poland approved today, not for the first time, an anti-Semitic and immoral law, Foreign Minister Yair Lapid stated Saturday night. “Tonight I ordered the supervisor of the embassy in Warsaw to return immediately to Israel for consultations indefinitely.

“The new ambassador to Poland, who was supposed to leave soon to Warsaw, will not leave for Poland at this point,” Lapid said.

“The Ministry of Foreign Affairs will today recommend the Polish ambassador to Israel to continue his vacation in his country. He should use the time at his disposal to explain to the Poles what the Holocaust means to the citizens of Israel and how much we will not tolerate disrespect for the memories of the victims.”

Israel is holding talks with the Americans about how to respond further, he added.

“Poland became an anti-democratic, non-liberal, country that does not respect the greatest tragedy in human history. You should never be silent. Israel and the Jewish people will surely not be silent,” Lapid declared.

The law, which was passed by parliament on Wednesday, is an amendment to Poland’s administrative law, which will prevent property ownership and other administrative decisions from being declared void after 30 years.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken had called on President Andrzej Duda this week to veto the law, arguing that it would severely restrict the “process for Holocaust survivors and their families, as well as other Jewish and non-Jewish property owners, to obtain restitution for property wrongfully confiscated during Poland’s communist era.”

Duda said in a statement that he analyzed the matter carefully and decided to sign the law to end legal uncertainty and fraud linked to properties whose ownership remains in doubt decades after World War II.

He said he strongly objected to anyone suggesting that the law was directed specifically against Jews who survived the Holocaust, which was carried out by Nazi Germany in occupied Poland and elsewhere.

“I unequivocally reject this rhetoric and say it with all my strength,” Duda said. “Linking this act with the Holocaust raises my firm objection.”

Before World War II, Poland was home to Europe’s largest Jewish community of nearly 3.5 million people. Most were killed in the Holocaust under Germany’s occupation and their properties confiscated. Poland’s post-war communist authorities seized those properties, along with the property of many non-Jewish owners in Warsaw and other cities.

When communism fell in 1989, it opened up the possibility for former owners to try to regain their lost properties. Some cases have made their way through the courts, but Poland has never passed a comprehensive law that would regulate restituting or compensating seized properties.

“I am convinced that with my signature the era of legal chaos ends — the era of re-privatization mafias, the uncertainty of millions of Poles and the lack of respect for the basic rights of citizens of our country. I believe in a state that protects its citizens against injustice,” Duda said.

The legislation was widely supported across the political spectrum in Poland.

The post ‘Disgraceful contempt’: Israel recalls envoy after Polish president signs Holocaust restitution law appeared first on World Israel News.