Visceral Jewish Anger at Poland’s Antidefamation Law is Baseless

In February 2018, the Polish Parliament passed legislation commonly referred to as Poland’s antidefamation law. The law was an amendment to the “1998 Act on the Institute of National Remembrance – Commission for the Prosecution of Crimes against the Polish Nationâ€.

The purpose of the antidefamation law was to protect the reputation of the Republic of Poland and the Polish Nation. It was enacted in response to publicly-stated phrases such as “Polish death camps†that were often used as labels for the death camps set up by the Germans in occupied Poland. A correctlyworded phrase instead would be “German death camps in occupied Polandâ€. Another common phrase the law targeted was “Poland’s complicity in the Holocaustâ€. This is a nebulous term that implies the Polish government-in-exile in London and the Polish Underground State knowingly assisted Hitler by murdering Polish Jews during World War 2. In both cases, these are historically false and egregiously offensive phrases that the Polish government insisted must not remain unchallenged.

The two key elements of the antidefamation law are clauses 1 and 3 of Article 55a. Clause 1 prohibits assigning responsibility or co-responsibility to the Polish State for the crimes against humanity committed by the Third Reich, i.e., Germany and its annexed partner in crime, Austria. It is historical fact the Polish State did not commit these crimes. Clause 3 exempts academic research that identifies the actions of individuals who committed these crimes and it also exempts artistic activities portraying such actions.

The text of Article 55a is as follows:

1. Whoever claims, publicly and contrary to the facts, that the Polish Nation or the Republic of Poland is responsible or co-responsible for Nazi crimes committed by the Third Reich, as specified in Article 6 of the Charter of the International Military Tribunal enclosed to the International agreement for the prosecution and punishment of the major war criminals of the European Axis, signed in London on 8 August 1945 (Polish Journal of Laws of 1947, item 367), or for other felonies that constitute crimes against peace, crimes against humanity or war crimes, or whoever otherwise grossly diminishes the responsibility of the true perpetrators of said crimes – shall be liable to a fine or imprisonment for up to 3 years. The sentence shall be made public.
2. If the act specified in clause 1 is committed unintentionally, the perpetrator shall be liable to a fine or a restriction of liberty.
3. No offence is committed if the criminal act specified in clauses 1 and 2 is committed in the course of the one’s artistic or academic activity.

Despite the fact that Polish government officials coordinated the text of law with their Israeli counterparts a year beforehand, it later sparked outrage from various Israeli officials. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called it an “attempt to rewrite historyâ€. Israel’s Foreign Minister “adamantly opposed†the bill’s approval. According to ministry spokesman Emmanuel Nahshon, “Israel views with utmost gravity any attempt to challenge historical truth. No law will change the facts.†Israeli Housing Minister Yoav Galant, one of several cabinet ministers to denounce the bill, told Israel’s Army Radio that he considered it “de facto Holocaust denialâ€.

Echoing Israel’s baseless, visceral criticism, the U.S. State Department said the legislation “could undermine free speech and academic discourse†and Washington was concerned about the repercussions it could have “on Poland’s strategic interests and relationshipsâ€. The Foreign Affairs and Defense Committee of Israel’s Knesset declared that “the Polish law is a crime and we will not allow it to happen.†Jack Rosen, President of the American Jewish Congress and chairman of the American Council for World Jewry, claimed that Poland has put itself “in the same team as Iran and other Islamic terror states and the alt-right in the US and Holocaust deniers.†Israeli politician Yair Lapid, who became Minister of Finance and later Minister of Foreign Affairs, proclaimed: “I utterly condemn the new Polish law which tries to deny Polish complicity in the Holocaust. It was conceived in Germany but hundreds of thousands of Jews were murdered without ever meeting a German soldier. There were Polish death camps and no law can ever change that.â€

As can be seen, such extravagant claims, outrageous charges, and unbridled hysteria continue to poison Polish-Jewish relations. The simple fact is that the antidefamation law criminalized public falsification of historical fact. The same principle upholds holocaust denial laws, which in Israel is a criminal offense. It should be noted that the Polish government later revised the law and made such statements a civil, rather than criminal offense.