Poles and Jews.

Wladyslaw Bartoszewski , a Polish Catholic from Warsaw, speaks his mind:

My life experiences, along with the fact that I was named a Righteous Gentile 40 years ago, and have been an honorary citizen of the State of Israel for the last 16 years, gives me the right, perhaps even the duty, to express my thoughts on an issue that has great importance for future ties between Poland and Israel, and between Poles and Israelis.

The relationship is good - even very good. Poland and Israel are probably on better terms today than when Israel was established, and Poland certainly has closer ties with Israel than it does with many other countries.
...
Poland is one of the countries still trying to lift themselves out of the deep rut created by years of dictatorships, from Stalin to Hitler, followed by years of repressive policies and trampling of citizen's rights. In March 1968, organized harassment of the Jewish community, for example, set off a large wave of emigration that left very few Jews in Poland.
...
Trust and friendship are essential for a better future. But trust and friendship (in that order - trust comes first, and later, perhaps, friendship) can only be built on the basis of tolerance for our sensitivities and our mistakes. The only form of tolerance that is unacceptable is tolerance for hatred and criminal behavior. Hatred feeds the stereotypes that have perpetuated discrimination against the weak in Europe for generations. Often, the weak were Diaspora Jews. Thus one would expect that people whose families came from the Diaspora would be hypersensitive toward stereotyping. The response to one negative stereotype will always be another negative stereotype.

In slightly under 60 years, Israeli society has painstakingly built an impressive country. We stand in awe of your accomplishments, and this is the spirit in which we educate our young people. By the same token, we would like to see your country free of rhetoric that is insulting to the Polish people, and certainly any slurs disseminated on an organized basis.

I am not targeting anyone individually. What I am talking about is a general grudge against the Polish people. Any Jew who has suffered at the hands of the Poles has the right to speak out, and the same is true for any Pole who feels hurt by the Jews. But it is better that we stop and think: What purpose does this serve? Is it not preferable to dwell on the good memories? That is my opinion, as a human being and one of the founders of Zegota, the Council for Aid to Jews, in occupied Poland in 1942.

Read it all: The tolerance must be mutual .

[Poles]
[Jews]
[Israel]
[Wladyslaw Bartoszewski]
[Righteous]
[Poland]

Wladyslaw Bartoszewski: member of the "decent" race.

There are few of us who can truly be categorized as heroically unique, an inspiration to others, a person to emulate, an example that righteous actions, in the long run, triumph over evil ones.

Last night, the US Embassy in Warsaw honored Wladyslaw Bartoszewski, a disarmingly charming Polish octogenarian, whose story once would have been brought to the silver screen and written in boys' and girls' magazines.

By the time he was 17 years old, Mr. Bartoszewski had survived being imprisoned in Auschwitz-Birkenau for 8 months. He was a co-founder of the Zegota movement, that saved thousands of Jews, was a member of the Underground Army (resistance movement), acted as a courier, and fought in the Warsaw Uprising of 1944.

If this were not enough, after the war was over, he was twice imprisoned by the Communist regimes in Poland, one time such imprisonment lasting more than 6 years. He worked for Radio Free Europe for 18 years, became Foreign Minister of Poland twice, was made an honorary citizen of Israel and is a member of the Righteous Among the Nations of the World. He writes books and tells stories.

His life stories can't help some of us wonder, what would we have done under similar circumstances? What made a teen-ager rise up to the cause and fight so hard to preserve sanity in a world gone insane? What made the young man keep on fighting despite the demoralizing post-World War II events that catapulted Poland into 50 years of Communism?

He was once asked whether he regards his life as a success. Wladyslaw Bartoszewski answered, “I have been very fully rewarded, and that is no illusion. Beyond anything I deserve. Heroism? I did indeed take part in aiding the Jews, but I was also damned frightened. Terribly frightened. No one knows that, because I would have been ashamed to admit it. Other people did equally splendid things. They ran with grenades and shot at Gestapo colonels. They too, surely, were afraid. I was afraid in a different way. However, the fact that I was able to help someone to some degree, minimal in regard to my willingness, turned out in the end to make sense.”

If only more of us would learn about the heroic deeds of people like Mr. Bartoszewski, our world would be a better place.

Update: Power Line was kind enough to share this great story!

Bartoszewski Poland Israel United States Warsaw Uprising Yad Vashem Communism Jews World War II Auschwitz