CHIDUSZ ENGLISH 2018

Father Israel

Excerpt from the article: Father Tadeusz Rydzyk is the founder of the largest Catholic radio station in Poland. An able political manipulator who relentlessly perpetuates anti-Semitic conspiracy theories through his personal media network, Rydzyk has become the face of the most discriminatory and anti-progressive faction of Polish Catholicism. Poland’s right-wing parties both love and need…

When Angels Came for Tea

Excerpt from the article: Two families hiding a Jewish man and his young son. Siblings informing on their own brother and his Jewish wife. A decent German army police commander, killed just after the war. Jewish women who died because someone was tempted by their alleged “treasures”. The memory of the Holocaust in Koźminek (near…

It’s All Happening at the Zoo

Excerpt from the article: The Żabiński Award honors Poles who saved Jews during the Holocaust. It has been awarded since 2015 by the controversial From the Depths foundation, which mimics the agendas of several better established organizations that deal with Holocaust commemoration. The award is the foundation’s flagship project and aims to redress failings on…

Stranger than Fiction [Interview with Writer Mikołaj Grynberg]

Excerpt from the article: He used to think his grandparents had phone numbers tattooed on their forearms. His father used to count the steps to the basement of the building in the Marymont district where he hid during the war. He used to get beaten up at school for murdering Jesus. Years later, he organized…

Poland’s Mikvahs

Excerpt from the article: “I won’t tell you more than I can, and I cannot tell you much,” she says, opening a brochure entitled Balanit’s Mission. We’re sitting at her desk by the entrance to the mikvah in Łódź. Teresa, called ‘Aunt’ by local Jewish community members, chooses her words carefully. She won’t disclose the…

Good Walls Make Good Neighbors

Excerpt from the article: German soldiers were murdering children in the market square and leading the last Jews from Korczyna to death. She was eleven years old. Her mother told her to go over to a stranger. She didn’t say anything else and didn’t give her anything to take with her. The man put her…

The Cemetery of Jewish Liberties

Excerpt from the article: In 2000, the Union of Jewish Religious Communities in Poland submitted a request to the Property Commission for the old Jewish cemetery in Kalisz to be returned to its rightful owner. It took years for the local authorities and the Union to negotiate and draft a complex agreement stipulating its return.…

Our Jews and the Fifth Column

Excerpt from the article:  A bill drafted to defend the good name of Poland has caused the biggest crisis in Polish-Jewish relations since the anti-Semitic campaign of March ’68, which resulted in the majority of Polish Jews being forced to leave the country. This barely a few weeks before the fiftieth anniversary of the events…