POLAND 2008/9

 

Cemetery desecrations, violent attacks and antisemitic slogans and banners at football matches were among the 196 incidents categorized as being of a violent racist or antisemitic nature committed in Poland in 2008. Radical anti-Zionist rhetoric was employed by several politicians from the right and left during Israel’s military offensive in Gaza. Although ultra-nationalist parties such as the League of Polish Families and Self-Defense were no longer represented in the Polish parliament following the October 2007 election, a number of former antisemitic League activists continued to serve as members of the Law and Justice faction. A group of League activists, led by former neo-Nazi skinhead Piotr Farfal, managed to seize control of Polish state TV in December.

 

the jewish community

There are some 5,000–10,000 Jews in Poland out of a total population of close to 40 million. The majority live in Warsaw, Wroclaw, Krakow and Lodz, but there are smaller communities in several other cities. There are virtually no Jews in the eastern part of Poland where once large, important communities, such as those of Lublin and Bialystok, existed.

The Union of Jewish Religious Communities (Zwiazek Kongregacji Wyznania Mojzeszowego), or Kehilla, and the secular Jewish Socio-Cultural Society (Towarsztwo Spoleczno-Kulturalne Zydowskie), or Ferband, are the leading communal organizations and these, together with other Jewish groups, are linked by membership in the KKOZRP, which acts as a roof organization. There is a Jewish primary school in Warsaw maintained by the Lauder Foundation, which has been active in rehabilitating Jewish life in Poland, especially through youth projects. The American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (the Joint) is also active in Poland, particularly in social welfare. The leading Jewish publications are the monthly Midrasz and Dos Jidische Wort, which appears in Yiddish and Polish.

Important institutions are the Jewish Historical Institute, with its revamped museum, the E.R. Kaminska State Yiddish Theater in Warsaw and the Jewish Cultural Center in Krakow. There are centers for Jewish studies in Warsaw University and the Jagiellonian University in Krakow.

 

Parliamentary organizations and extra-parliamentary groups

Political Parties

Radical nationalist parties such as the League of Polish Families (Liga Polskich Rodzin, LPR) and Self-Defense (Samoobrona) were no longer represented in the Polish parliament (Sejm), following the October 2007 election (see ASW 2007), but retained their seats in the European Parliament until the June 2009 election. Nevertheless, a number of former LPR activists, with a long record of antisemitism, continued to serve as members of Jaroslaw Kaczynski’s Law and Justice (Prawo i Sprawiedliwosc, PiS) faction. They included Ryszard Bender, a retired history professor at the Catholic University of Lublin, who is a member of the Senate. Bender is notorious for having claimed in a 2000 Radio Maryja broadcast that Auschwitz was not a death camp. The right-wing PiS is the main opposition party to the liberal government. Despite its apparent mainstream status, it maintains a close alliance with the antisemitic Radio Maryja. Veteran Radio Maryja broadcasters Anna Sobecka and Gabriela Masłowska also represent the PiS in parliament.

Michal Kaminski, a leading PiS member, was President Lech Kaczynski’s spokesman in 2008. At the beginning of his career he was a member of the extreme right National Rebirth of Poland (Narodowe Odrodzenie Polski, NOP). In 2000, he publicly declared his support for the slogan “Poland for the Polish,” while in 2001, he campaigned against commemoration of the 1941 pogrom at Jedwabne.

 

Extra-parliamentary Groups

Both LPR and Self-Defense carried on their activities as extra-parliamentary groups. Former LPR leader Roman Giertych continued to enjoy media interest and was invited frequently to participate in various TV programs and give press interviews. Through behind the scenes manipulations, a group of LPR activists, led by former Nazi skinhead Piotr Farfal, managed to seize control of Polish State TV in December 2008. As a result, many members of the LPR, and its notoriously antisemitic youth organization All-Polish Youth (Mlodziez Wszechpolska, MW) found employment in the institution, subsequently influencing the content of the programs, while mainstream parties could not agree on how to remove Farfal from the post of public TV chairman.

Another ex-Nazi skinhead, Mateusz Piskorski, former spokesman of Self-Defense, continued his active cooperation with the radical New Left (Nowa Lewica, NL) group and the so-called anti-globalist magazine Obywatel (The Citizen), edited by Remigiusz Okraska. Piskorski was also active on the international scene through his involvement with Aleksandr Dugin’s Eurasian Movement in Russia.

The National Rebirth of Poland (Narodowe Odrodzenie Polski, NOP) remains active as a radical antisemitic organization, inter alia, distributing posters and stickers bearing the slogan “Bombs on Israel.” In 2008, the NOP’s activities were somewhat overshadowed by its rival on the “national-revolutionary” scene, the National-Radical Camp (Oboz Narodowo Radykalny, ONR). The ONR is a Nazi skinhead organization which carries on the tradition of its violent fascist namesake banned by the Polish government in 1934. Its latter day incarnation operates legally with several branches registered as independent associations throughout Poland. The ONR specializes in organizing street marches and counter-demonstrations as well as an annual festival marking the 1936 Myslowice pogrom (see ASW 2007). A split in the ONR gave birth to a smaller, neo-fascist offshoot called Falanga.

The Polish National Party (Polska Partia Narodowa, PPN) led by Leszek Bubel continued to publish mass-circulation papers, such as the weekly Tylko Polska (Only Poland), which are sold and distributed by the government-owned company Ruch.

Other active antisemitic organizations include the Polish branch of the international skinhead Blood & Honour (B&H) network, the Bytom-based skinhead White Eagles Association (Stowarzyszenie Biale Orly, SBO) and neo-pagan groups such as Niklot and Zadruga.

The neo-Nazi hit list Redwatch operated by Blood & Honour continued to post threats against members of minorities, journalists, teachers of Holocaust education and human rights activists. According to the Never Again Association, there are about 500 racist and xenophobic Polish websites currently online.

 

Antisemitic and racist activity

The Brown Book (Brunatna Ksiega), published jointly in March 2009 by the anti-racist Never Again (Nigdy Wiecej) Association and the academic institution Collegium Civitas, details cases of racist, antisemitic and xenophobic attacks, vandalism and insults committed in Poland from 1987to 2008. In 2008 there were 196 incidents (compared to 149 in 2007), mostly of an antisemitic and neo-fascist (such as swastikas daubed on walls) character. They included cemetery desecrations, violent attacks and antisemitic slogans and banners at football matches.

For example, on the night of March 4, the local Jewish cemetery was vandalized with swastikas and a Star of David on the gallows in Lezajsk. One of the graves desecrated was that of the famous 18th century Polish rabbi Elimelech Weissblum. The walls of the ohel (a small brick tomb) were daubed with misspelled slogans such as “Entry to Jews forbidden.” The police launched an investigation. On April 21, they apprehended one of the perpetrators, aged 18. He faces up to two years in prison for offending religious feelings and profaning the tomb of a holy person.

In May an Orthodox Jewish-American tourist was beaten and intimidated by a group of youths after he asked them directions to the grave of Rabbi Yitzhak Kalish in the town of Warka. After the story was published in the press, the local authorities and police flatly denied any problem of antisemitism in the town, despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary. (For example, many antisemitic comments made by local youths were quoted in the press.)

Radical anti-Zionist rhetoric was employed by several politicians from the right and the left during Israel’s military offensive in Gaza. At a demonstration in front of the Israeli embassy in Warsaw on January 10, 2009, Piotr Ikonowicz, leader of the extra-parliamentary New Left party, declared: “Israel is an imperialist puppet in the midst of the Arab world trying to divide Palestinians. Those who won elections [Hamas] are not terrorists. Israeli criminals are terrorists”; and “We want to tell you Jews, Israelis, don’t allow yourselves to be incited against Palestinians or you will die.” At the other end of the spectrum, Jolanta Szczypinska, a well known MP representing the Law and Justice party, issued a joint statement with the leader of the Polish−Palestinian Friendship Association condemning “the extermination of the Palestinian people” conducted by Israel. In an interview with the Arab website safsaf.org, Szczypinska referred to events in Gaza as a “Holocaust.” She added: “Every criticism of the policy of the Israeli government is met with attacks and the charge of antisemitism. I experienced it myself. But I don’t care.” In reaction to events in Gaza, Szczypinska established the Polish−Palestinian Parliamentary Group, with the support of four other Law and Justice MPs and one left-wing MP.

 

Responses to racism and antisemitism

On an official visit to Israel in April 2008, Prime Minister Donald Tusk (from the liberal Civic Platform) declared that “there is no tolerance for antisemitism in Poland.” Such high-level statements rarely translate into concrete measures against antisemitism on the ground. According to Poland’s official submission to the United Nations in 2008, in the framework of the National Program for Combating Racial Discrimination, Xenophobia and Related Intolerance, the National Prosecutor’s Office “undertook activities aimed at establishing whether there were any organizations based on anti-Semitic or racist ideology operating in Poland.” The conclusion of this search “proved that there were no such organizations on the territory of Poland”; this is despite evidence to the contrary. This shows yet again the reluctance of Polish governmental institutions to acknowledge the existence of antisemitic activity.

            High-level tolerance toward the far right was demonstrated by the failure of mainstream parties to agree on the removal of the former Nazi skinhead Piotr Farfal from the post of state TV chairman. No antisemitic group was banned in 2008 and there were few convictions of individuals in the courts. The state-owned company Ruch continued to sell racist and antisemitic publications such as those published by Leszek Bubel.

The state Institute of National Memory (Instytut Pamieci Narodowej, IPN) is influenced by the far right and has been accused of promoting an ethno-nationalist interpretation of Polish history. For example, in 2008 the IPN published a book After the Holocaust, written by the US-based historian Jan Marek Chodakiewicz. The latter alleges that those Jews killed in Poland after the war were mostly Communist collaborators. Chodakiewicz reinforces the stereotype of Jewish communism while criticizing the findings of Jan Gross, who in his book Fear documented the strength of antisemitism in postwar Poland.

In a rare intervention with regard to antisemitism and racism, the ombudsman (human rights commissioner) Janusz Kochanowski sent a letter to the president of the Polish Football Association (PZPN), expressing concern about incidents of racism in Polish stadiums.

Two leading football clubs in Poland, Legia Warsaw and Widzew Lodz, participated in the events of the International Day Against Racism (March 21). On March 22, players from both teams entered the field wearing T-shirts with the slogan “Let's kick racism out of stadiums.” After the game the T-shirts signed by the players were sold to fans on an Internet auction. The money raised was turned over to the Never Again Association.

The main response to racism continues to come from NGOs. The Never Again Association publishes an anti-racist magazine and provides information to journalists and researchers interested in the problems of racism and xenophobia. It also runs a national hate crime monitoring program.