Poland’s conservative-nationalist media is in an uproar over what former Israeli President Reuven Rivlin just told the Times Of Israel about a confrontation that he once had with his Polish counterpart Andrzej Duda during a state visit. In his words, “In Polish I said to Duda, ‘please, don’t ignore the past, you have to learn what happened in the past. Saying that nothing happened that we were both the victims is not correct’”. The context within which he said this will now be shared since most might be unaware of it.
Poland passed a law in early 2018 making it illegal to blame the Polish Nation as a whole for Nazi crimes committed during the 1939-1945 occupation that genocided six million Poles, or around 1/5 of the population, half of whom were Jews. It was later amended that same year to remove criminal penalties but still remains in force, with Rivlin arguably violating it through his recent comments, though German–backed Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s return to power could impede efforts to penalize him for this.
Andrzej Zybertowicz, a Nicolaus Copernicus University sociology professor who also served as one of President Duda’s advisors at the time, said that the furious reaction from some Israelis stemmed from a “feeling of shame at the passivity of the Jews during the Holocaust.” He called those critics “anti-Polish” and claimed that Israel is “clearly fighting to keep the monopoly on the Holocaust”, adding that “Many Jews engaged in denunciation, collaboration during the war. I think Israel has still not worked it through.”
The Russian Foreign Ministry confirmed the aforesaid claim in a statement about anti-Semitism four years later that can be read here after a similar scandal between Russia and Israel. They reminded everyone that “In Poland and other countries of Eastern Europe, the Germans appointed Jewish industrialists as heads of ghettos and Jewish Councils (“Judenrat”), and some of them are remembered for absolutely monstruous acts.” They also linked to this 2018 Haaretz article on that same subject.
It should be said as well that while Russia wouldn’t agree with the following assessment, many Poles believe that some Jews acted as Soviet fifth columnists during its mid-September 1939 intervention and post-war establishment of the Polish People’s Republic, which they consider an invasion and occupation. The Institute of National Remembrance has dedicated itself to documenting alleged crimes against the Polish Nation from 1917-1990, some of which were committed or facilitated by Polish Jews.
Nevertheless, it would be factually and morally wrong to blame Jews as a whole for what some of their co-religionists did to Poles during that time, the same as it’s factually and morally wrong to blame Poles as a whole for what some of their co-ethnics did to Jews from 1939-1945. Those who’d like to learn more about Polish-Jewish relations should read British historian and honorary Polish citizen Norman Davies’ two-volume magnum opus “God’s Playground: A History Of Poland”, particularly Volume 2 Chapter 9.
It’s crucial to clarify these historical truths after what Israeli Foreign Minister Israel Katz claimed in early 2019 one year after the law was passed about how “Poles suckle anti-Semitism with their mothers’ milk.” If anyone claimed that “Jews suckle Islamophobia with their mothers’ milk”, then they’d be “cancelled” and could even be charged in some countries with a hate crime, yet Katz got off scot-free without even a false apology and is once again the Foreign Minister after an unrelated hiatus.
It was against this backdrop and immediately after his participation in a delegation that participated in Polish-based events during this year’s Holocaust Remembrance Day that Rivlin shared his scandalous anecdote with the Times of Israel and added that “We were also butchered by the Polish people.” The way in which he misportrayed the events of a few rogue Poles as representative of the Polish Nation and then denied the latter’s victimization under the Nazis is historically revisionist hate speech.
Both Jews and Poles were genocided by that fascist regime, with half of the Holocaust’s six million victims being Polish and half of the just as numerous “Polocaust’s” being Jews. Their victimization was therefore equal in terms of quantity killed, the way in which they were murdered, and the culprits. It’s always morally wrong to construct hierarchies of victimhood, and in this case it’s also factually wrong too, with it amounting to hate speech to deny the Nazis’ equal victimization of Poles during World War II.
Rivlin not only violated Polish law, even though this particular one is unlikely to be enforced under Tusk, but also spit in the face of all Poles. He likely did so for the exact reasons that Zybertowicz assessed four years ago relating to Israel’s desire to maintain its monopoly on the Holocaust and the shame that it feels about some fellow Jews collaborating with the Nazis like Russia also reminded everyone of. Rivlin’s historically revisionist hate speech should therefore be condemned by all real anti-fascists in the world.
