Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article

To: andy_card
With all due respect, what are you smoking? I suppose you also think that Ukrainians and Germans were also historically kind to Jews, because so many Jews lived there too.

Again, your ignorance of history comes through. From the 14th through 17th centuries, various countries of Western Europe such as Spain expelled Jews, and many Jews fled because of persecution. Poland offered them sanctuary. This is a fact which you can easily verify for yourself. That is why there were more Jews in Poland than in any other country of Europe.

There were a lot of Jews in the Ukraine because the Ukraine was controlled by Poland throughout much of history.

42 posted on 08/07/2002 4:15:26 PM PDT by traditionalist
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 40 | View Replies ]


To: traditionalist
Again, your ignorance of history comes through. From the 14th through 17th centuries, various countries of Western Europe such as Spain expelled Jews, and many Jews fled because of persecution. Poland offered them sanctuary. This is a fact which you can easily verify for yourself. That is why there were more Jews in Poland than in any other country of Europe.

I don't deny that. But to claim that Poles were somehow immune from anti-Semitism just because they, unlike much of the rest of Europe, failed to expel their Jews is absolutely ludicrous. Poland was a last choice, in most cases, not a first choice.

In 1483, for example, Warsaw expelled its Jewish population. That isn't, in my opinion, much sign of tolerance. In 1648-49, 100,000 Jews were murdered in Poland. Again, that doesn't seem like the actions of a society free from anti-Semitism. Again, in 1655, Polish Jews were massacred. In 1712, Polish Jews were blood libelled, expelled, and slaughtered. In 1734-36, 1768 and 1788, massive Polish Pogroms murdered tens of thousands of Jews. In 1819, anti-Semitic riots broke out in many Polish cities. In 1881, 1906 and 1911, Polish Pogroms killed thousands. In 1912, Poles organized a universal boycott of all Jewish businesses. In 1937, two years before Hitler invaded, Jews were systematically expelled from Polish universities. During the war, Poles volunteered to exterminate Jews, often seizing the initiative from the Germans. In 1946, there was a Pogrom in Kielce. In 1968, thousands of Jews were purged from positions of power, and forced into exile.

While much of the rest of Europe gradually learned the error of their ways, Polish politics remain largely steeped in anti-Semitism. Just look at Tadeusz Wilecki, Michal Kaminski, Jan Lopuszanski, Witold Tomczak, even Lech Walesa for examples.

43 posted on 08/07/2002 4:54:38 PM PDT by andy_card
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 42 | View Replies ]

Free Republic
Browse · Search
News/Activism
Topics · Post Article


FreeRepublic, LLC, PO BOX 9771, FRESNO, CA 93794
FreeRepublic.com is powered by software copyright 2000-2008 John Robinson