| This is with regard to the article “The Looking Glass” by Helen Stringer published in the June edition of your paper which presents the journalist’s perception of Euro 2012 in Poland and her comment on the treatment of Jews by Poles during the 2nd World War.Ms Stringer’s comments imply that Poland decimated its own Jews. Does Ms Stringer know that the majority of the pre-war European Jewry lived in Poland? One may ask why, if Poles were allegedly so anti-semitic as the article implies? Has Ms Stringer heard about Hitler’s “Final Solution”? Does she know that the concentration camps were built and operated by Germans on the territory of Poland invaded and occupied by Germany for many years? Does she know how many Poles died in these camps as well, and how many Poles were involved in saving Jews? Does she know that Poland was the only country in Europe where hiding a Jew was punishable by death for the entire family?
Does Ms Stringer know that when the Polish underground emissary, Jan Karski, risking his life, sneaked into the Jewish ghettos or concentration camps to find evidence of how Germans were treating Jews and, then, he escaped to Great Britain to report the plight of the Polish Jews to Winston Churchill, Churchill refused to meet him? President Franklin Roosevelt, in turn, showed more interest in how the Germans treated their horses than in how they treated Polish Jews.
Poland is not where the Jews just died. It is where they lived. Poland was the centre of Jewish life since the 13th century. If Poles had been so anti-semitic, would it have been possible for Talmudic scholarship to grow and flourish in Poland? Would it have been possible for Chasidism to begin in Poland? Would Yiddish, the language spoken by the Polish Jews, have flourished? Would numerous Jewish artists such as Isaac Bashevis Singer or Artur Rubinstein have been able to perfect their art there?
Accusations like the ones presented in the article deprive both the Polish nation and the Jews of many centuries of peaceful coexistence, and, what is even more deplorable, they deprive the Jews of the rich culture they have developed when living in Poland during many centuries.
While it may be construed that your journalist’s astounding mistruth is more likely to be the result of poor education rather than malicious intent towards the Polish nation, it is inexcusable that you as editors would allow such an insult to be published in your paper. The 2nd World War is well documented, and it is incredible to believe that people such as yourselves would have such distorted historical knowledge. What political purpose does it serve you or your readers to publish such nonsense?
Bozena Szymanska
Od Redakcji.Poniżej tekst przeprosin, jakie niedawno opublikowała Helen Stringer, a które przesłał nam Ambasador RP Andrzej Jaroszyński.
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