Posted on 10/30/2013 2:04:01 AM PDT by Brad from Tennessee
On July 10, 1941, half the residents of Jedwabne, a Polish village 85 miles northeast of Warsaw, murdered the other half. The mob, led by the mayor, were Catholics; their 1,600 victims were Jewish, slaughtered over several nightmarish hours with bats, knives, rifles and other improvised weapons. Those who survived the massacre were then rounded up in a barn donated by a local farmer, which was then set ablaze. A plaque erected at the site blamed Nazis for the massacre, but, in fact, Nazis had only authorized it. Locals walked by the plaque for half a century, knowing the truth, but saying nothing.
Jedwabne's terrible secrets were at last laid bare in Neighbors, an explosive account of the massacre by Princeton University historian Jan T. Gross. That 2001 book shattered carefully held myths, promulgated by Communist leaders, that Poles were only victims of World War II, not perpetrators. (Poles -- who unlike many European countries never officially collaborated with the Nazis -- lost close to 6 million citizens to the Nazis, or about 17 percent of the population. Just over half of those were Jewish.) Now, 12 years later, comes Aftermath -- premiering stateside Nov. 1.
It's a film inspired by Jedwabne that has forced the country to once again face certain unthinkable aspects of its past. Since its October 2012 premiere at the Warsaw Film Festival, the movie has been a lightning rod. Major news outlets have dismissed it as anti-Polish propaganda, its non-Jewish star Maciej Stuhr has been the target of vicious anti-Semitic attacks, and its producer says he has been blacklisted by the country's national film council. . .
(Excerpt) Read more at hollywoodreporter.com ...
It is truly unfortunate that this movie was made based on Jan Gross’s book. His book does not tell the truth of what happen. He did did a very poor job in researching the facts of the massacre. His book is a sensational depiction of the most egregious cover stories created by the propaganda machines of the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany during and after the war. Gross is not a historian, but a sociologist (and a socialist). He did not visit the German Archives, nor did he do any forensic analysis of the site. All he did was rehash the stories as told in the Soviet show trial of the mayor. Prof Marek Jan Chodakiewicz, a historian, did a detailed analysis and totally discredited Gross’s work in The Massacre in Jedwabne, July 10, 1941: Before, During, After. The bottom line: the massacre was a Nazi operation, specifically designed to build the appearance Polish collusion in their holocaust operations. It was German troops who shot all the men and then herded the women and children into the barn and setting it on fire, killing a total of @ 400 people. They used Polish villagers as film props for the event. After the Soviets took control of the area the second time, they charged the mayor and the other leaders of the town for the massacre, which gave them the cover story to “purge” any remaining Polish leadership and members of the Home Army in the village. The modern rehash of this book gives the former members of the communist party who are still very politically active in Poland (with strong support from their Russian/Soviet sponsors) an opportunity to attack the Catholic Church as the perpetrator in the Holocaust and undermine its position as the major moral and intellectual force opposing communism.... (They are still very angry at John Paul II). This film is nothing but anti-Catholic fodder. If one really wants to understand what happened at Jedwabne, Chodakiewicz is a must read.
Like the Reichstag fire Hitler blamed on Communists, which in fact the Nazis started.
It’s not necessarily either/or. It could be a mixed situation. With nominal Catholics who were not Christian (or at best were confused) participating in the massacre.
Ping
Thanks for your considerable insight into this painful event. I've seen some of the still photographs taken that day. The joint Soviet/Nazi invasion of Poland, which followed the Hitler/Stalin non-aggression pact, shook the U.S. Communist Party to its core. Many members lost their faith and left the party. I will follow your advice on Chodakiewicz.
You are correct in that there were some nominal Catholics who aided the Nazis as well as the Communists. The problem is both the Nazis and the Communists used that participation to impugn all Poles as well as the Catholic Church at large as willing participants in the Holocaust. For the Nazis, it gave them the images which used to portray themselves as if they had an approved moral cause. For the Communists, it gave them the cover to label all Polish enemies of the Soviets as Nazi collaborators after the war....Which is the message which is still repeated in popular media with regard to Poland today.
These attacks on the Catholic Church seem to increase in direct proportion with the number of intermarriages between Jews and Gentiles and the number of non-Israeli Jews questioning the right of Israel to exist.
It is an undisputed fact that Roman Catholic Italy never persecuted its Jewish population (though Germans in Italy did after Mussolini was initially overthrown), and that many Jews found refuge in Roman Catholic Spain. The Pope at the time was hailed by Jews for his efforts, and this was by people who witnessed the events of the time.
Thank you so much for introducing me to Chodakiewicz. I knew nothing of all of this until I saw the notice on Drudge today of the movie.
The Poles and the Germans are sick and tired of being reminded how evil they were because it always costs them money.
So while the Poles “enjoy” thousands of Israeli high school youth making the pilgrimage to the camps and Jewish killing fields and the revenues earned from them, they'd prefer to plow it all down and build a mall on these sites.
They want to move on while the State of Israel is a constant reminder of their guilt. What better way to get back at the Jews than pump billions of Euros into the PLO-FATAH and HAMAS?
It is unfortunately correct that some Poles collaborated with the Nazis. Some Jews collaborated as well, in the hopes of saving themselves. Some in every country collaborated.
It is also quite true that Poland was the very first nation to stand up to Hitler. Despite being crushed between Hitler and Stalin’s military machines, Poles played key roles in the eventual Allied victory. Millions of Poles, Jewish and non-Jewish were murdered as a result. No nation suffered more heavily than Poland.
No country should feel superior to others in this regard. Many British people were more than willing to collaborate as well as many Americans, for example, Charles Lindbergh and Joseph Kennedy.
Well put. I work with a number of Poles who are infuriated by these accusations; the reason so many Jews lived in Poland was because they were treated so well. Unlike some other European countries, Poland actually fought for its independence against both Nazism and Communism. Unfortunately they were damned by geography and the lack of will of the West to counter either of those forces.
“So while the Poles “enjoy” thousands of Israeli high school youth making the pilgrimage to the camps and Jewish killing fields and the revenues earned from them, they’d prefer to plow it all down and build a mall on these sites.”
Poles wanting to build a mall on the site of a death camp is no different than Hungarians wanting to remove a statue of Stalin from the town square. They were built by foreign invaders, and no reflection on Poles themselves (many of whom died in said camps).
Like the Turks deny they murdered the Armenians..
same deal..
Thank you for your reasoned response. After reading about "Aftermath" there was something unbelievable about the accusation.
The movie is nothing more than another hit piece against the Catholic Church, by a propaganda artist, selectively using questionable information to press his biased cause.
There are always a few corrupt people. But to use them to project against all Poles and the Catholic church is a bigger sin. There are too many low information people out there ready to buy in to anything that supports their own prejudices and bias!
People who take advantage of that are really corrupt because they know better!
Don’t know the facts but in the article the director is said to have ignored contrary historical records because he says he knows “these kind of people” and “these kind of towns”. Sounds like a total leftist bs job to me.
Very different. 3m non-Jewish Poles were exterminated by the Germans. Any Pole who helped a Jew would, if discovered, have his entire family killed. There are a number of Jews who want to scream at the world for not helping them. They are no more or less justified than the Tutsis who were hacked to pieces by Hutus in Rwanda or Armenians who were slaughtered by the Turks. Nobody has a duty to rescue someone else at the risk of his own life. Any civilian who did so in Poland was a genuine hero. Much more of a hero than any number of soldiers with rows of medals on their chests. Because in helping a proscribed group, they were staking the lives of their families with nobody to back them up, whereas soldiers at least are supported by their respective military establishments with training, supplies, reinforcements and R&R downtime. These civilians had only raw courage to lean on.
Thanks
This wouldn't be the first time in European History that Jewish communities were slaughtered by their Christian neighbors. In the past, religion had little to do with Christian's motive for perpetrating these crimes; they simply used religion as an excuse to murder Jews and take their property.
If you can determine what happened to Jewish property after they were murdered, you will probably come a little closer to truth. More than likely, this wasn't a case of religious fervor; it was simply greed at its ugliest.
As always, "Follow the Money" and you'll usually discover the motive and then the perpetrator.
Lidice happened in 1942, after Jedwabne, so by then the Nazi's probably didn't feel the need for any "props."
This is crazy, but I also have an aunt who married into our family, (but is no blood relation to me) whose parents were Polish communists. Yeah, she voted for Obama, twice.
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