Poland moves to embrace its Jewish past

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Financial Times
By Jan Cienski
Published: January 24 2005 02:00 | Last updated: January 24 2005 02:00

SNIP:
In an attempt to break down the stereotype of Poland and its anti-Semitism, the government, alongside the tiny remnant community of Polish Jews, is planning to build a $63m (€48m, £34m) museum of the history of Polish Jews in Warsaw. The museum, which has been raising funds from around the world, is scheduled to open by 2008. The government and the city of Warsaw will announce the size of their grants tomorrow.

"Our goal is to return to the light of memory the thousand-year history of Jews in Poland which has almost been forgotten," says Ewa Junczyk-Ziomecka, the museum's director for development. "The museum will show that not only were people physically killed but their culture was killed and even their memory was destroyed."

The museum is part of a wider trend in Poland of nostalgia towards the Jewish presence, coupled with a decline in anti-Semitism and anti-Semitic incidents.

Nearby Krakow is now home to one of the most vibrant festivals of Jewish culture in the world, and museums are springing up across the country, most of them founded and run by non-Jews, to remember that Jews were once an integral part of Poland.

http://news.ft.com/cms/s/46e25b08-6dad-11d9-ae0d-00000e2511c8.html

[TahitiNut]

1. "tiny remnant community of Polish Jews"

No other country had a greater decline in its Jewish population than Poland. Not even close.

"Poland was home to the largest Jewish population in Europe and served as the center for Jewish culture. A diverse population of Jews from all over Europe sought refuge in Poland, contributing to a wide variety of religious and cultural groups. Before the outbreak of World War II, more than 3.3 million Jews lived in Poland, the second largest Jewish community in the world; barely 11 percent (369,000) survived the war population."
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/vjw/Poland.html

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2. unfortunately, there are only 10,000 Jews left in Poland

because of the anti-Semitism they all left after the Holocaust which killed millions of Polish Jews. Most of these Jews are elderly. So when they go, that's it.

Unfortunately for Christian Poles (I am one of them) the departure of the Jews left a major hole in Polish life. Polish Jews were as integral to the cultural/economic life as Jews are to New York City or Afro-Americans to America. Imagine America without these people.

However, one point in defense of some Polish reluctance to hide Jews was that the penalties for defying the Nazis in any respect were much more severe. Whole families and villages were killed in repraisal. Yet, the country with the most representatives in the cemetary for the Righteous (Yad Vashem) in Jerusalem that commemorates the people who stood up for Jews is Poland.

On the other hand, there was a huge amount of home-grown anti-Semitism that led to pogroms over the centuries. It has been a most troubled history of 2 people.