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THOUSANDS OF YOUNG ISRAELIS FLOODING POLAND [93]
Hey, my daughter and her Israeli high school class just came back from a trip to Poland. Sorry, but they didn't trash any hotel rooms or attack any Polish old people. They did have a very emotional experience going to camps and seeing the few remains of Jewish communities that no longer exist.
They ran into some friendly Poles and also some drunk Poles who yelled at them. They saw occasional grafitti of a star of david hanging from a gallows (I've seen that too.) One impression of Poles I heard from my daughter is that the girls are pretty but expressionless, not as lively as Israeli girls. The boys, she said, were cute. She is afterall a teenager.
Before they go on these trips they have many seminars to prepare them for it and they usually travel with a survivor who gives them a personal point of view. They are not indoctrinated to hate Poles but they do get the impression that most Poles were not sympathetic to the Jews during the holocaust. They are certainly aware that it was the germans who committed the mass murder, along with help from Ukrainians, Lithuanians and Latvians. They are also aware that Poles were under occupation and were not allies of the germans. I even told my daughter some of the Polish attitudes on this issue that I've learned from this forum. She can form her own conclusions.
The issue of "regaining" property in poland is not discussed at all in their program. As Israelis they are fully aware that they have a homeland and they would not dream of leaving Israel to live in their granfather's villages in Poland. You don't have to worry about thousands of young israelis flooding poland, since these trips are never longer than 10 days.
The purpose of these tours is to give high school kids some historical perspective and help them identify with their ancestors who lived in a very different environment than they do. By the end of the trip they are very glad to go back home.