EAJC Statement Regarding the Draft Law on Concentration Camps in Poland

"The bill passed by the Polish Sejm is nothing other than an inappropriate attempt to revise one of the darkest pages of the twentieth century. Yesterday, the world marked International Holocaust Remembrance Day. This date of remembrance commemorates the liberation of the Auschwitz concentration camp by the Soviet Army. A law that imposes criminal liability for mentioning the role of the Polish nation in the mass murder of Jews insults the memory of the victims of Auschwitz and precludes public debate regarding the complicity of the local population in Nazi crimes. The sole purpose of this law is oblivion. Its authors seek to exploit the fact that fewer and fewer eyewitnesses to those events remain among us, in order to rewrite history—a history written in the blood of both the Jewish and Polish peoples. We must not forget the Righteous Among the Nations, many of whom were Polish; their memory is deeply revered in Israel. We must not forget that tens of thousands of Poles risked their lives and perished defending their country and their Jewish fellow citizens from the Nazis, and the Jewish people sacredly cherish the memory of their heroism."

"The Euro-Asian Jewish Congress calls upon the upper house of the Polish Parliament to halt the advancement of this shameful bill. The Second World War was a profound national tragedy for Poland, yet this cannot justify the political and criminal prosecution of those who remind modern Poland of the numerous local collaborators in Nazi atrocities whose hands are stained with the blood of innocent victims."