How do you go forward from a past of staggering horror?

[rubato]

It is a question which demands that we answer it. Nelson Mandela gave us one model in the "truth and reconciliation commissions" and something similar is being done in Rwanda. But it is shocking that the problem is not all that rare, its common almost to the point of banality. Germany has taken the admirable approach of admitting all of it and paying the victims damages. But most countries or regions have been less honest and I suspect will bear the cost of repeating their evils. This is just one such example:


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http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/b3582054 ... z2Eaci11ri

Massacre haunts Polish history

By Jan Cienski in Jedwabne

Standing on the edge of the village of Jedwabne, a stone pillar dusted with early winter snow commemorates an event that many Poles would prefer to forget. In 1941, local people, at the instigation of their German occupiers, drove more than 300 of their Jewish neighbours into a barn and set it on fire, killing them all.

That dreadful crime is the inspiration for “Aftermath”, a new film by director Wladyslaw Pasikowski, which looks at a similar tale set in a fictional Polish village. The movie has set off a furious national debate over how to deal with the darker episodes in Poland's history. ...

“The whole thing is really unfair. A lot of other towns also killed their Jews – I don't know why they picked on us. Now the whole world thinks that the people of Jedwabne are devils.” "
________________________________

Poles have portrayed themselves as victims of the Nazis and denied that this massacre was instigated and driven by the deeply anti-semitic Roman Catholic Polish villagers. The truth is harder to accept. But what route can we take to the future which will help to keep this from just happening again and again?




yrs,
rubato

[MajGenl.Meade]

“The whole thing is really unfair. A lot of other towns also killed their Jews"

Oh, well . . . that's all right then.

The "how" of such events is illustrated in that quote. When aberrant behaviour is not condemned but is in fact encouraged within any social peer-group to the point of being non-aberrant, humans will join that behaviour, encourage it and defend it. This "mob" psychology effect is often seen in violence by and between football supporters; amongst celebrating basketball fans; and in college towns (Kent, Oh) on an annual basis.

As to the causes, there are many - rooted in one. Greed, fear, hatred, jealousy combined with ignorance all stem from mankind's sin nature. I'm afraid that such people differ from each of us only in degree - and there is no guarantee that most of us would, when push comes to shove, succeed in behaving any better. The world has few Bonhofers and very many Karadžićs.

Meade

[Lord Jim]

Poles have portrayed themselves as victims of the Nazis

Gee whiz, I don't know how they could possibly have gotten that impression:

The German occupation of Poland was exceptionally brutal. The Nazis considered Poles to be racially inferior. Following the military defeat of Poland by Germany in September 1939, the Germans launched a campaign of terror. German police units shot thousands of Polish civilians and required all Polish males to perform forced labor. The Nazis sought to destroy Polish culture by eliminating the Polish political, religious, and intellectual leadership. This was done in part because of German contempt for Polish culture and in part to prevent resistance against the occupation.

In May 1940, the German occupation authorities launched AB-Aktion, a plan to eliminate the Polish intelligentsia and leadership class. The aim was to kill Polish leaders with great speed, thus instilling fear in the general population and discouraging resistance. The Germans shot thousands of teachers, priests, and other intellectuals in mass killings in and around Warsaw, especially in the city's Pawiak prison. The Nazis sent thousands more to the newly built Auschwitz concentration camp, to Stutthof, and to other concentration camps in Germany where non-Jewish Poles constituted the majority of inmates until March 1942.

The Nazis conducted indiscriminate retaliatory measures against populations in areas where resistance was encountered. These policies included mass expulsions. In November 1942, the Germans expelled over 100,000 people from the Zamosc region; many were deported to the Auschwitz and Majdanek camps. Approximately 50,000 Polish children were taken from their families, transferred to the Reich, and subjected to "Germanization" policies.

Following the annexation of western Poland to Germany, Hitler ordered the "Germanization" of Polish territory. Nazi governors (such as Arthur Greiser in the Warthegau and Albert Forster in Danzig-West Prussia) expelled hundreds of thousands of Poles from their homes in the Generalgouvernement. More than 500,000 ethnic Germans were then settled in these areas.

A Polish government-in-exile, led by Wladyslaw Sikorski, was established in London. It was represented on Polish soil by the underground "Delegatura," whose primary function was to coordinate the activities of the Polish Home Army (Armia Krajowa). The Polish resistance staged a violent mass uprising against the Germans in Warsaw in August 1944. The rebellion lasted two months but was eventually crushed by the Germans. More than 200,000 Poles were killed in the uprising.

Between 1939 and 1945, at least 1.5 million Polish citizens were deported to German territory for forced labor. Hundreds of thousands were also imprisoned in Nazi concentration camps.

It is estimated that the Germans killed at least 1.9 million non-Jewish Polish civilians during World War II. In addition, the Germans murdered at least 3 million Jewish citizens of Poland.

http://www.ushmm.org/wlc/en/article.php ... d=10005473

[Lord Jim]

Oh brother, once again he doesn't even bother to read what he copies and pastes....

From the article he posted:

In 1941, local people, at the instigation of their German occupiers,

His commentary at the end:

denied that this massacre was instigated and driven by the deeply anti-semitic Roman Catholic Polish villagers.

In his rush to express his anti-Catholic bigotry, he didn't even notice that the source he chose to back him up directly contradicts him....

[Lord Jim]

As part of wider efforts to destroy Polish culture, the Germans closed or destroyed universities, schools, museums, libraries, and scientific laboratories. They demolished hundreds of monuments to national heroes.

To prevent the birth of a new generation of educated Poles, German officials decreed that Polish children's schooling end after a few years of elementary education. "The sole goal of this schooling is to teach them simple arithmetic, nothing above the number 500; writing one's name; and the doctrine that it is divine law to obey the Germans. . . . I do not think that reading is desirable," Himmler wrote in his May 1940 memorandum.

In the annexed lands, the Nazis' goal was complete "Germanization" to assimilate the territories politically, culturally, socially, and economically into the German Reich. They applied this policy most rigorously in western incorporated territories—the so-called Wartheland. There, the Germans closed even elementary schools where Polish was the language of instruction. They renamed streets and cities so that Lodz became Litzmannstadt, for example. They also seized tens of thousands of Polish enterprises, from large industrial firms to small shops, without payment to the owners. Signs posted in public places warned: "Entrance is forbidden to Poles, Jews, and dogs."

The Roman Catholic Church was suppressed throughout Poland because historically it had led Polish nationalist forces fighting for Poland's independence from outside domination. The Germans treated the Church most harshly in the annexed regions, as they systematically closed churches there; most priests were either killed, imprisoned, or deported to the General Government. The Germans also closed seminaries and convents, persecuting monks and nuns. Between 1939 and 1945 an estimated 3,000 members of the Polish clergy were killed; of these, 1,992 died in concentration camps, 787 of them at Dachau.

http://www.ushmm.org/education/resource/poles/poles.php

[dgs49]

One of the aspects of the so-called "holocaust" that I have never seen explored is an examination of why the Jews in Europe were so despised that the German-instigated measures were carried out by not only Germans but by many other European countries. The impression one might get is that Hitler and his leaders had an animal-hatred for Jews, but others were indifferent or positive about them. This is clearly not the case.

Was it primarily the result of the very-influential Catholic Church teaching for generations that "the Jews" were responsible for killing Christ? Or is that to simplistic?

I can't believe that the Poles in this reported incident were impelled to commit mass murder solely because they wanted to please the German occupiers. There had to be some significant animus beforehand. What precipitated that animus?

[Crackpot]

THat were despised and people were suspicious of them. for the same reason people today are suspicious of large groups of foreigners that keep to themselves and keep their own customs.

[Sue U]

the so-called "holocaust"

If my opinion of you could possibly sink any lower, this would be the vile remark that did it.

I have never seen explored is an examination of why the Jews in Europe were so despised that the German-instigated measures were carried out by not only Germans but by many other European countries. The impression one might get is that Hitler and his leaders had an animal-hatred for Jews, but others were indifferent or positive about them. This is clearly not the case.

I had prepared a lengthy post outlining the roots of antisemtism from the ancient Greek Empire to today, but the board ate it before I could hit post. Suffice it to say that half of all the 6 million Jews murdered in the Holocaust were living in Poland (3 million), and another 1.3 million were in the Ukraine and western Soviet states all under direct Nazi occupation and military control. Many collaborationist governments were far less committed to the Nazi policy of Jewish genocide. Even Italy largely refused to cooperate with deportation and extermination, and 80% of its Jewish population survived. Occupied Denmark smuggled out virtually its entire Jewish population to Sweden. Nazi-allied Bulgaria, although enacting discriminatory laws against Jews, protected its entire Jewish population and refused to deport a single person despite Nazi demands.

So no, Dave, it is not the case that most European countries were happy to cooperate in the murder of Jews during the Holocaust; it is that the very large majority of Jews were killed in those areas designated by the Nazis to be made Judenrein by the direct application of German military force.

The massacre at Jedwabne was, by any serious evaluation, an awful anomaly. For centuries, the tolerant and liberal culture of Poland had been a haven for European Jews. That's why so many were living there at the outbreak of the war. As far as we can trace, my own family had been living in Eastern Poland since the middle of the 18th Century, which is as far back as records go. But all those who decided to continue to stick it out in their historical homes rather than emigrate before 1939 were murdered in the Nazi plan to eradicate Jews in Poland.

[Lord Jim]

Well said Sue.

I've been meaning to put together a proper response on this but haven't had the time.

By the time that massacre occurred, the entire social, political, and cultural structure of Poland had been largely systematically destroyed by the Nazis, who were determined to "wipe Poland off the map" and use it's residual population as nothing but a slave labor pool. There is nowhere that the Nazis occupied, (with the possible exception of the portions of Russia and Ukraine that they controlled..which they did not control as long) where their rule was more brutal and murderous than in Poland.