History / Jewish love towards Poles [389]


There is a much more relevant common denominator: Both groups lost sovereignty at the hands of larger world powers. Jews in Roman times and Poland in the partitions and then again in the molotov-ribbentrop pact.

One result is that both groups have a festering feeling of being victims. (The feeling is justified -- even paranoids can have real enemies). And both groups spent a good part of their history dreaming of righting the wrong. Look at their national anthems, "Poland is not yet Lost", "Our hope is not yet Lost"(part of Hatikva anthem).

With so much in common, why is there so little understanding? Put two people with a victim complex in one room (ie one country) and they'll soon start arguing over who got more screwed.

The argument is pointless, but hard to let go of.

History / Jewish love towards Poles [389]

You've all been discussing the attitides of Jews vs Poles on a national and historic level. But on a personal level, one on one, it doesn't always work the same way. My one trip to Poland (so far) gave me an interesting perspective on this. Instead of going on an organized group, I traveled with one friend who speaks polish fluently. We rented a car and just drove around from town to town, stopping in places with Jewish historical importance and places that we heard of from our grandparents or from stories. In each place we would walk around the rynek and look for people to talk to. We would look for people who were old enough to have been around during the war, and also had a friendly face. (I think that Jews have a sixth sense of who is hostile and who is friendly). We met some very warm people, who when they heard we were from israel really wanted to talk about the Jewish aspect of poland and about the war. Some witnessed terrible things, some were themsleves in camps, and some were very uptight about the whole subject and a few were suspicious and unfriendly. But aside from grafitti, i didn't witness outright hostility.

There was a strange thing that we noticed though: In a casual conversation with random Polish people, after the first pleasantries, when they would realize we were Jews, there was usually a few seconds of awkward silence and caution, and then the conversation would continue. It seemed as if they would pause to think for a minute what to make of us, and then they would decide to be be civil and sometimes friendly.

Another weird experience was this: When we went to the local museum in Kalisz hoping to see something about the long Jewish history in the city, and we saw practically nothing. So we asked the curator about that , and she said, "Oh, if you want to see about the Jews, look in the cemetery." It gave me a chill. What she meant was that in the Jewish cemetery there is a small museum of the history if Jews in Kalisz. But that symbolizes the weirdness that a Jew feels in Poland today. Everything is about death and cemeteries, and nobody thinks that's not normal. It's taken for granted by both Poles and visiting jews. Here in israel, Jewishness is totally alive and considered a happy thing. So the contrast is startling.

History / Jewish love towards Poles [389]


I am an Israeli Jew, but my grandfather (father's side) was born in Poland as was his grandfather before that for generations. I'll try to answer why Jews generally didn't assimilate with ethnic Poles.


That was part of it for sure. But for traditional Jews it was more than that. Traditional society for both Christians and Jews was structured around religious affiliation. In the liberal modern world that seems irrelevant, but for our grandparents there was nothing more relevant than that. People's everyday lives revolved around praying together, studying together, eating the foods that the religion allowed, celebrating holidays and weddings together, etc. Catholics and Jews had almost nothing in common in these areas. (I think that Orthodox Christians and Catholics were also separated to an extent for the same reasons.) To become a "Pole" meant to become a Catholic. Jews wanted to be Jews -- both in the religious sense and in the ethnic sense. The two were inseparable.

Traditional Jews have a very strong consciousness of being a separate ethnic group. They think of themselves as part of the overall Jewish nation that was temporarily in exile from the homeland. Poles were a different nation and Jews saw no point in pretending to be Poles.

Toward the end of the 19th century, as religion became less of a force, more Jews did assimilate (as they did in Germany and Russia too). They adopted the Polish language and some of its culture. But to really assimilate you had to be a Catholic. And there was no point in giving up your own religion just to take on another one you didn't believe in.

In countries where religion is considered a private thing and not part of national identification, like the US, UK and France, a Jew can assimilate culturally more smoothly. But is that a good thing?

History / Jewish love towards Poles [389]

I was incommunicado on Shabat, so I'm answering some older posts:


Jews saw Poland not as a means to an end, but as a means of survival, because it seemed to offer a more comfortable existence than Germany, Bohemia or Spain. That's the historian's answer, but the average Jew didn't think in those terms. For him Poland was simply the place he was born in because some unknown ancestor moved there from Germany (for example) to join a cousin who moved there before. That's the way migration works.


No nation is required to accept newcomers unconditionally. I understand why Poles would have been irritated by a large community of foreigners who maintain their own separateness. But a nation, and individuals are required to deal with that issue in a non-violent manner as long as the newcomers are non-violent. The Jews, it should be emphasized, never were a physical threat to any Polish town or city where they lived. There were no bands of Jewish rioters killing and burning Polish towns. So I can't fault a Pole back in those days for resenting Jews and trying to exclude them. I would definitely fault a Pole or anyone else for participating in a pogrom.

I think that over the centuries, even though Jews remained separate, they became an integral part of the make up of Poland, some of them being there for as long as the "ethnic Poles" were. So the resentment of the newcomer became less legitimate as time went on. Once the Jews had been a part of the country for hundreds of years, they could not be called "newcomers" or "foreigners" any more. At a certain point the ethnic Poles would have to accept that Polish Jews had the same right as the Christians to live their lives as they saw fit -- even if it meant that they spoke a different language and dressed differently.

Did the Jews have an obligation to try to fit in? To some extent, yes. They had to adapt to the local ways of doing things in social matters, business affairs and politics. And in these respects they did adapt. But an ethnic minority is not obligated to disappear.


The organized tours are now very aware of that problem and are trying to shift the emphasis to the centuries of Jewish life in Poland and not only on the destruction. Most of them now visit the Nozik synagogue in Warsaw, and some go to the museum at Oświęcim. I was there. There is also a Jewish culture festival in Krakow that is drawing more visitors each year. But it's hard to get around the fact that the few physical remnants of that vanished world are mostly in the cemeteries.


That of course is a good thing -- to be able to be accepted without having to convert. What I meant is: Is it a good thing for Jews to assimilate to the extent that they disappear as Jews?

History / Jews...and their Polish experience [520]


That was part of the logic behind our withdrawal from southern lebanon a few years back. But Hizbullah started fighting again after they used the quiet to build bunkers and rocket launchers all over the south. When they attacked in summer 2006 there was no Israeli soldier in Lebanon.

It was also the logic behind the withdrawal from the Gaza strip, which included uprooting several Jewish towns and farming villages. There is not a single Jew in all the of the Gaza strip since then, and yet Hamas is firing rockets from there into civilian targets in Israel every day.

The arabs don't need an excuse to attack Israel. Israel's existence, inside any border at all, is the excuse. It's not a win-win situation. Wherever we withdrew, the situation got worse. Controlling other people is not a good situation but it's better than being hit with rockets.

History / Jews...and their Polish experience [520]


You're right that the story changes as people's perspective changes. In the end you can't even recognize the original events.
Today it's become fashionable for "enlightened" people to take the blame for all the world's problems. When I visited Auschwitz, an American girl on our tour said "We're all to blame for Auschwitz", meaning the whole world. I argued with her on the spot and told her that if we're "all to blame" then really no one is to blame. You can't let the Germans off that easy. They were to blame, and so was anyone who helped them.

History / Jews...and their Polish experience [520]

I didn't say anything about Poles. I said that whoever helped the Germans to do what they did was also to blame. I think you can agree with that.

History / Jews...and their Polish experience [520]

In Gaza we pulled out completely to the old border.
In Lebanon we also pulled out to the old border and the UN confirmed that. Then the Hizbullah claimed that the Shaba farms area ( a tiny area of a few square kilometers overlooking the northern galilee) was part of Lebanon too. But the UN and Israel say it's part of the Golan which was taken from Syria in 1967. That piece of territory is subject to negotiations with Syria, if and when that happens. So you see, the Hizbullah will use any excuse to attack. If we gave them Shaba, they would claim that some villages in Israel are also theirs (they already started talking about something like that).

History / Jews...and their Polish experience [520]


There were no borders at that point. At the end of WWII the palestine mandate included all of what is now Israel, Gaza and the West bank. The UN voted to divide the area between a Jewish state and an Arab state. The Jews accepted this compromise and declared independence on the day the British left. All the Arab countries and the local Arabs as well refused to accept the UN decision and invaded the jewish state in order to destroy it. Jordan took over what they conquered west of the jordan. Egypt took over gaza. Neither country allowed the creation of a palestinian arab state.When the fighting stopped, there were ceasefire lines that became known as the green line, which was the defacto border between Israel, Egypt and Jordan till 1967 when they attacked again. This time we conquered all of what was in the original mandate.

So going back to original borders would mean going to the ceasefire lines of 1949. Some Israelis advocate that too. I don't. Those weren't international borders but an arbitrary ceasefire line. I personally favor autonomy for arab areas west of the jordan, but not a separate state, which would only be a base for endless terrorism. I don't agree with your assumption that a return to the ceasefire lines would end the terorism since experience has shown that withdrawal has the opposite effect. But this is a legitimate argument and you're entitled to your opinion.

History / THE POLES ON THE FRONT LINES OF WWII [92]

I read recently about the Lemko and their forced removal from the carpathians to western poland after the war. This is all new to me, so I'd appreciate some background on this subject -- who they are ethnically, what their role (or fate) was in WWII, and what their current situation is. Do they have anything to do with the gorale? (I realize I'm showing my ignorance here, but bear with me.)