Double Memory: Poles and Jews After the Holocaust
Double Memory: Poles and Jews After the Holocaust

Summary/Abstract: Contemporary Polish-Jewish relations resemble a vicious circle. On the one hand, most Poles firmly believe that Poland has always been one of the most tolerant countries in the world and that anti-Semitism has existed only on the margins of Polish society. As far as they are concerned, there has been no such phenomenon as Polish anti-Semitism, for Poland has always been a true paradisus Judeorum. On the other hand, most Jews, especially those on the American continent and in Western Europe, claim that Poland is one of the most anti-Semitic countries in the world. Jews have often shared the former Israeli prime minister Yitzhak Shamir's belief that virtually all Poles received their anti-Semitism "with their mothers' milk." Often, this unfortunate polarization makes any reasonable communication, let alone consensus, quite impossible. [...]

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