The Fighting and the Propaganda: The Uprising in the Warsaw Ghetto from the Perspective of ‘Polish London’

Author(s): Dariusz Libionka / Language(s): English Issue: 4/2017

The text talks about the reaction of the Polish government in London to the outbreak of the uprising in the Warsaw ghetto and Szmul Zygielbojm’s suicide. The author analyses stenographic records of the sessions of the Polish government in exile, daily logs of the president’s and PM’s activity, stenographic records of the National Council sessions, correspondence sent by the government to Warsaw, the content of official declarations of the government, and the Polish press between April and June 1943. The author reconstructs the government’s state of knowledge regarding the situation in Warsaw and presents the chronology of its popularisation. He also wonders what influence the-then political crisis (the German propaganda’s revelation of the massacre of Polish officers in Katyń and Stalin’s severance of diplomatic relations with the Polish government) had on the government’s approach to the situation in the occupied country, particularly with regard to the fighting in the Warsaw ghetto.

Labyrinths and Tangled Paths. The Story of a Righteous One

Author(s): Barbara Engelking / Language(s): English Issue: 4/2017

The article tells the story of Henryk Ryszewski, who provided hiding to about a dozen Jews in his flat in the Warsaw district of Mariensztat. Accused after the war of blackmailing Jews (as I think, wrongly), he was convicted and spent several years in prison. His prosecutor fell victim of the ‘paper industry affair’ show trial and also spent a few years in prison.

Predator. The Looting Activity of Pieter Nicolaas Menten (1899–1987)

Author(s): Nawojka Cieślińska-Lobkowicz / Language(s): English Issue: 4/2017

looting of works of art in the General Government, Jewish antique shops and artistic salons in Kraków after 1939, occupation period art trade, murder of professors in Lvov, Schöngarth’s Einsatzgruppe zur besonderen Verwendung, Dutch Nazi, corruption in the German party apparatus and in the Security Police in the General Government, pursuit of Nazi criminals, post-war trials of perpetrators.

“Why did they, who had suffered so much and endured, had to die?” The Jewish victims of armed violence in Podhale (1945–1947)

Author(s): Karolina Panz / Language(s): English Issue: 4/2017

This article discusses the armed anti-Jewish violence and the events connected with it, which occurred in the Polish Tatra Highlands (southern Poland) during1945–1947. The number of Jewish victims exceeded thirty, including children from Jewish orphanages. Among the perpetrators of those acts of terror were partisans from the group commanded by Józef Kuraś ‘Ogień’ – one of the most important symbols of anti-communist resistance. This article is a results of several years of research and is based on highly diverse sources. Its main purpose is to recreate those events, with particular attention given to the victims of those acts of violence.

The Golden Mean Principle. A Handful of Comments on the Currently Dominant Discourse on ‘Polish-Jewish Relations’

Author(s): Piotr Forecki,Anna Zawadzka / Language(s): English Issue: 4/2017

The article attempts to deconstruct the dominant Polish discourse regarding the ‘Polish-Jewish relations’. Its central figures are: the logic of the golden mean as a tool to reach historical truth, symmetrisation of Polish and Jewish wrongs and faults, and hospitality as the prevalent attitude of Poles towards Jews. The authors show its opinion forming power using three examples: a review of Paweł Pawlikowski’s film Ida, the reception of the POLIN Museum of the History of Polish Jews, and a discussion on the Righteous monuments, which were to be erected in Warsaw.

Critical History and its ‘Shadow Cabinet’. Polish Historiography and the Holocaust during 2003–2013

Author(s): Bartłomiej Krupa / Language(s): English Issue: 4/2017

The author discusses the most important phenomena in Polish historiography and the selected publications about the Holocaust released during 2003–2013. Similarly to ‘narrativists’, Krupa is interested in the shape, the language, the storytelling manner, and the metaphors used. Having indicated the most important scholarly centres and publications of sources, the author concentrates on the camp monographs, syntheses and regional studies produced during that period, and then concludes that most of them are written in a very traditional way. The year 2000, when [the Polish edition] of Jan Tomasz Gross’s book Neighbours was released, proved to be a breakthrough year for [Polish] historiography. Before analysing the far-reaching consequences of this publication, Krupa briefly discusses the polemics surrounding the other books by that author. On the one hand, they led to the birth of the historiographical ‘shadow cabinet’ – a mobilisation of the milieu concentrated mostly around the IPN and directed at disparaging the significance of Gross’s publications. On the other hand, the most important consequence of Gross’s critical thinking about the Polish stances was the birth of the ‘peasant trend’ in [Polish] historiography. The books by Andrzej Żbikowski, Barbara Engelking, Jan Grabowski, as well as the collective works such as Prowincja noc and Zarys krajobrazu described, in a committed and interdisciplinary way, the shameful stances of the rural community – the denunciations, rapes, and even murders of Jews, with Tadeusz Markiel’s shocking testimony holding a special place among these publications. The works that acclaim the Polish stances and stress the Polish engagement in the rescuing of Jews (particularly those published within the framework of the IPN project „INDEX – In memory of Poles murdered or prosecuted by the Nazis because of their assistance to Jews”) are to constitute a counteroffer to the critical “peasant trend” within the framework of the “shadow cabinet.” At the end of the article Krupa discusses the books that regard the unknown pages of the Holocaust history in Warsaw written by Agnieszka Haska, Barbara Engelking, Dariusz Libionka, or Libionka’s collaboration with Laurence Weinbaum, which are not revolutionary in the sphere of language but nonetheless broaden the knowledge on the Holocaust. The author ends his discussion with a reference to the monumental work Jewish Presence in Absence. The Aftermath of the Holocaust in Poland, 1944–2010, without which, just as without reflecting on the consequences of the Holocaust in general, it is impossible to understand Poles and the situation in Poland.

“That load of Jews is finally dead.” Extermination of Jews as presented in 1942 letters of German soldiers

Author(s): Marcin Zaremba / Language(s): English Issue: 4/2017

The Home Army intelligence intercepted letters written by German officers and clerks to their families as well as those sent from Germany to friends and relatives on the front line. On the basis of that correspondence the Polish underground drafted special intelligence reports, which were sent to London. The selection of letters devoted to the Holocaust presented in this article can make it easier to describe and understand the stances and opinions of “ordinary Germans” regarding the “final solution.”

Reports on the Jews Apprehended in Warsaw During May–July 1943 Submitted by the ‘Praga’ District of the Polish Police

Author(s): Jan Grabowski,Dariusz Libionka / Language(s): English Issue: 4/2017

The article presents a selection of documents from the files of several precincts of the Warsaw ‘blue’ police, which illustrate the involvement of Polish officers in the search for the Jews in hiding, during the 1942–1944 period.

The Jewish Biblia Pauperum

Author(s): Nawojka Cieślińska-Lobkowicz / Language(s): English Issue: 4/2017

On the Museum of the History of Polish Jews

Author(s): Małgorzata Szpakowska / Language(s): English Issue: 4/2017

The Holocaust in a “Museum of life” (the Polin Museum and its trouble with the genius loci of the Muranów district)

Author(s): Jacek Leociak / Language(s): English Issue: 4/2017

POLIN Museum’s Core Exhibition: A Response

Author(s): Barbara Kirshenblatt-Gimblett / Language(s): English Issue: 4/2017

Visitors’ Reactions to the Holocaust Gallery: From the guide’s notes

Author(s): Natalia Sineaeva-Pankowska / Language(s): English Issue: 4/2017

The Righteous are among us

Author(s): Agnieszka Haska / Language(s): English Issue: 4/2017

The Omnipresence of the Righteous

Author(s): Justyna Kowalska-Leder / Language(s): English Issue: 4/2017

Anan ben Dawid jako islamizujący heretyk żydowski: o tym, jak raw Saadia Gaon stworzył mit fundacyjny karaizmu

Author(s): Marzena Zawanowska / Language(s): Polish Issue: 01/2018

The paper explores the recently reconstructed and edited polemical work Kitab al-radd ʻala ʻAnan [The Book of Refutation against Anan] written in the early 10th c. CE by the allegedly “archfoe” of the Karaites, rav Saadia Gaon (d. 942). It focuses on the reconstruction of the story of Anan ben David (VIII c.), who with time begun to be considered the founding father of Karaism, and demonstrates that it was Saadia who created the basic myth of his lifestory. This myth was later on used not only by other rabbanite polemicists, but also appropriated by the Karaites. It includes several important elements, unknown from earlier sources, which constitute Saadia’s genuine contribution to the conceptualization of Karaism, its origins and nature. They are 1. Pinpointing Anan as the source of religious schism in medieval Judaism; 2. Historicization of Anan’s figure thanks to providing short description of his biography and psychological depiction of his character, including motives of his behavior; 3. Socio-political contextualization of his life and deeds; 4. Historical reconstruction of the development of heresy in Judaism, including the indication of common treats between the ancient sectarians (Sadducees) and Anan’s followers (Karaites); 5. Cultural rooting of Anan’s doctrine in its Islamic environment. All these elements have permanently entered the discourse on Karaism in Rabbanite and Karaite writings like. In addition, lack of other historical sources and/or symbols, the story created by Saadia was later on appropriated by the X-XI c. Karaites (i.e., Elijahu ben Abraham, Chiluq ha-Qaraim ve-ha-Rabbanim), who at the time desperately needed unifying myths, as the founding myth of their religion. It is therefore possible to conjecture that if not for the Babylonian geonim, who sought for the unification of Judaism and centralization of religious and political power in their own hands, and for polemical purposes first elevated Anan to the rank of a symbol (Rav Natronai Gaon) and then reconstructed his lifestory (Rav Saadia Gaon), it is not unlikely that he would not have been recognized by the Karaites as the founding father of their movement.

Gdzie się podział Anan? Jehuda ha-Lewi i jego nowatorska rekonstrukcja początków karaizmu. Księga Kuzari, III: 64–67 – próba przekładu i interpretacji

Author(s): Marzena Zawanowska / Language(s): Polish Issue: 02/2018

One of the most influential books of Jewish thought ever written is Yehudah ha-Levi’s Kitab al-radd wa al-dalil fi al-din al-dhalil, or Kitab al-chujja wa al-dalil fi nusrat al-din al-dhalil [The Book of Refutation and Proof on Behalf of the Despised Religion], better known under its shorten Hebrew title Sefer ha-Kuzari. On the basis of a letter preserved in the Cairo Genizah, some scholars assumed that it has originally been composed as a polemical response to a Karaite convert. And yet, the Karaites are neither perceived, nor described by ha-Levi as heretics. In fact, his depiction of this alternative to Rabbanite form of Judaism – its adherents and origins – appeared so appealing to the Karaites that made some of them believe that the author had been a Karaite himself, while his reconstructions of the movement’s history with time became appropriated as the founding myth of Karaism. The aim of this paper is to scrutinize ha-Levi’s historical reconstruction of the origins of Karaism against the backdrop of earlier and later Rabbanite reports on the subject in order to understand his complex attitude towards the Karaites vis-à-vis his concept of heresy. It demonstrates that, paradoxically, and despite ha-Levi’s overt claims to the contrary, his writings contributed to the identification of the Karaites with the Sadducees – subsequently consolidated by Abraham ibn Ezra and Moses Maimonides – thanks to his dating of the beginnings of Karaism in the Second Temple period, at the time of a fierce conflict between the Hasmoneans and the Sadducees on the one hand, and the Pharisean sages on the other.

Left, Right, and Antisemitism in European Public Opinion

Author(s): Jeffrey H. Cohen / Language(s): English Issue: 2/2018

Antisemitism has long been found on both the political far-right and farleft. The recent rise in antisemitism worldwide raises the question of whether current antisemitism is found more with the far-right or far-left, the former a function of right-wing populism and the latter with what has been termed the new antisemitism. This paper uses data from the 2014 round of the European Social Survey in 20 nations to test for the connection between ideological selfplacement and antisemitic attitudes in mass publics. Analysis finds greater levels of antisemitism with the extreme far-right compared to the far-left, but extreme leftists appear slightly more antisemitic than moderate leftist. Further, there is less antisemitism than anti-Muslim and anti-Roma (Gypsy) attitudes at all positions on the left-right continuum. The conclusion puts the findings into context and suggests directions for future research.

Zsidók Ukrajnában

Author(s): Judit Hamburg / Language(s): Hungarian Issue: 1/2018

Zisel,J. – Chruslinska,I.: Antisemitismus als Fakt und Stereotyp Juden in der Ukraine: Ein Gespräch = Osteuropa, 2017, No. 5. 87–90 p.

Válasz Cieger Andrásnak

Author(s): Zoltán Paksy / Language(s): Hungarian Issue: 75/2019

Paksy Zoltán: Istóczy Győző és a magyar antiszemita mozgalom(1875–1892). L’Harmattan, [Budapest,] 2018. 281 oldal.