The Holocaust in Poland was conducted by the Germans. They alone bear the responsibility for this enormous crime
17.08.2022
Jan Grabowski is no researcher, but an individual who hates Poland and wishes to portray it in the worst light. He talks nonsense about the hundreds of thousands of Jews allegedly murdered by Poles during the second world war. He presents no documents to support his argument, but he does find a considerable positive response, according to Bronisław Wildstein author and commentator, who has recently been appointed to the board of the Museum of the History of Polish Jews POLIN .
TYGODNIK TVP: the Minister of Culture and National Heritage recently appointed you to the fifteen-strong board of the Museum of the History of Polish Jews POLIN. There was an immediate reaction from Professor Jan Hartman (a Polish philosopher specializing in bioethics, writer and politician, he is also known as a left-winged publicist) who wrote that you “are a Jewish renegade and antisemite who peddles anti-Jewish rhetoric from the so-called ‘right’”. How do you react?
BRONISŁAW WILDSTEIN: I won’t comment on the words of this man. I think it says more about him than me. If someone wants to react, then by all means, but I will not.
What will be your role on the board?
The board itself is not subdivided into sections. It is collegiate and works as a whole. There are no divisions of competences. My role will be limited to being a board member. I will undertake the work that the museum does. I take this very seriously. It has a vital historical and group identity issues role. So within the scope my talents I shall try and not to involve the museum in political infighting. I am also a member of the IPN (Institute of National Remembrance) board the most important Polish historical/national identity centre. Co-operation between the two is obvious.
What are the aims that can be realised by mutual cooperation between the POLIN Museum and IPN?
We should realise concrete research initiatives. The IPN is currently researching into the second world war. Paradoxically the Institute has investigated this period the least. This is due to the fact that the IPN was established after the fall of communism and had as its task the exposing of lies, also analysis and documentation of communist Poland.<
So does this mean that there was little research into the post-war, anti-communist underground as some critics of the IPN maintain?
Of course not. It was about research into communist Poland as a whole, this specific time, the history of a non-independent country, subordinated to Moscow but also into the communist and totalitarian state. The history in communist Poland was propaganda. We needed to jettison the communist ballast and present a realistic picture. So work on the second world war suffered as a result, including the Holocaust. It was only recently that the IPN was able to tackle this subject more deeply.
One of the primary tasks of the board of the museum is the acceptance of a final evaluation of the main exhibition. What role do you see for yourself in this?
The answer lies in the question. It’s necessary to see how the exhibition looks. Then we can decide just how objective it is. I want to make the exhibition the best possible.
The Holocaust is an important part of the world historical narrative. How should we present this to modern youth reared chiefly on television series?
You have to tell the truth. You cannot erase it. Truth can be painful, but we have to face it because only this will liberate us.
That’s a bit of a generalisation with which nearly everyone can agree. But how do we show the details.
It is necessary to show the truth in context, in all its shades. I repeat that this does not mean to erase it. You can present history in shortcuts and outcomes, stressing selected fragments. But this will deform the whole picture. I’ll give you a concrete example.
Please do.
To show what the crime actually was; was it marginal and did it represent the Polish nation as a whole. We need to portray the whole context, including exploring the workings of the Polish underground state to help the Jews. The inhuman times led to an increase in crime levels. Poles were not angels. There were the negative aspects that I mentioned. But I repeat again, you have to keep these issues in their correct proportion.
It’s possible to say that to talk about Poles rescuing Jews during the German occupation is only a part, not the whole of the history about which we speak.
The debate about Poles helping their fellow Jewish citizens during that time is deteriorating. I do not understand that remembering them merely serves to mask the more shameful aspects of Polish history. This is nonsense. We remember those who behaved not just correctly but heroically. You cannot exploit a wartime tragedy to hit out at Polish identity. The ones who do this are pseudo researchers.
Who do you have in mind?
Jan Grabowski for example, who is no researcher but an individual who hates Poland and wants only to portray it in the worst light. He spouts nonsense about hundreds of thousands of Jews allegedly murdered by Poles during the second world war. To back up his arguments he presents no documents but gets a positive response nonetheless.
What are the reasons for the popularity of this narrative?
Various, but mostly for ideology that wants to besmirch the Polish reputation. On the other hand, it’s due to the promotion of untruth, one that lies in the interests of the true perpetrators. The Holocaust in Poland was conducted by the Germans. They alone are responsible for this huge crime and no none else. If they did succeed in enrolling some Poles whom they exploited for various reasons, we need to say this. They are guilty as individuals, but as a nation and country the Germans bear responsibility for the Holocaust. No one should relativise this truth. Relativise this and you relativise the Holocaust. I say this because there is a huge amount of work ahead of us in clearing the second world war of lies about the Holocaust in Poland.
Germany is willing to shoulder the guilt about the Holocaust. The Russians also accuse the Poles of crimes.
The Russians are investing heavily to shoulder the Poles and Poland of co-responsibility for the Holocaust. In this they try to absolve themselves of the blame for the second world war, which they started together with Germany. They wish to absolve themselves of the crimes that they committed during the period of their alliance with the Germans and later when that fought the Third Reich. In communist Poland, unfortunately it was said, as today, that the Soviets liberated the country. In a sense they saved us from death at the hands of the Germans but this did not mean that they gave us freedom. We have to be truthful in saying that they subjugated us. It is in the interests of imperial Russia, because that is what it is today, to portray Poles and Poland in the worst possible light.
Also the narrative of Polish co-responsibility for the Holocaust is not only visible in Russian media.
Its spread around the world by ideologues who hate national identity as such and they cooperate with dishonest people such a Jan Tomasz Gross, who built his career on such foundations. His book are deformations of history. He relies on the grotesque assumption that all memory is sacrosanct.
Why do you think that memory is not necessarily sacrosanct?
The poor Poles are looking at a valley full of bones.
see more
Victims remain victims whatever and they command our sympathy and respect. They are particular witnesses, traumatised in large part by their experiences that can distort their memory. We need to treat their testimonies with particular care. We can say much on the issue. But I point out a few intellectual currents that seek to reverse the proportions in presenting the Holocaust on Polish territory, by the Polish state. The previous governments had unfortunately done much to make the Poles co-responsible for the Holocaust in their so called “pedagogy of shame”.
In whose interests is teaching the Poles a pedagogy of shame?
To shame our historical identity, to throw out this like ballast, blocking our modernisation and Europeanisation. Our past was to be a continuation advanced by misunderstanding at best, but possibly through criminality. The Poles like every nation did commit crimes but we need to set out the proportions and establish collective characters where possible. This work lies before us still. The IPN is working hard on this matter. As for other institutions, unfortunately they often act against this aim.
The Holocaust has been shaped for millions by the comic strip work of Art Spiegelman and “Maus” together with other popular works such as films or television series. What is an equally effective way of presenting the truth about the Holocaust?
We start with sensible research in a strategic project. Then we put these into concrete cultural initiatives. Popular culture draws on highbrow culture; equally history. If history is honestly presented, popular culture will follow. People start to learn history in schools. They use popular cultural instruments that draw on what is fashionable We need to undertake various forms of initiative to attract young people into history. The IPN realises many interesting projects in this regard for example in creating computer games.
It also publishes historical comic strips.
Not only, games have a wider impact. There are other ways. But the IPN alone is not in a state to rectify this huge challenge. We need to understand, to paraphrase Cicero , that history is the teacher of life. We can be stupid when we say that we have left it behind. But this has nothing in common with reality because we refer to history constantly. The Holocaust shows us this very well.
And there’s the constant reference to the second world war.
SIGN UP TO OUR PAGE 
