In recent years, the historiography of Jewish-Polish relations after the Holocaust has often shown a marked tendency to trace the conflict between these peoples to the central role of Jews in the new communist ruling system. Poles murdered hundreds of Jews, mainly in 1944 to 1946, for various reasons—some ideological, others economic. The collective guilt that the Polish political right and some of Polish society assigned to the Jews, however, proves to be inaccurate when one examines the community of Jewish survivors who gathered in the Lublin district, the first area to be liberated from Nazi occupation (summer of 1944). Most survivors were roundly disinterested, let alone involved, in politics, and the issue of communism in Poland was totally alien to them. Their main concerns had to do with family property that had been abandoned during the deportations, an attempt to locate lost family members, and, above all, an effort to reengage with the life that the Nazi bloodbath had broken off. They were stunned to confront the intensity of Polish society’s resentment and hostility toward them and the governing authorities’ bureaucratic indifference. The conflation of these two factors prompted many to abandon their prior places of residence, to move to new areas of settlement, or to leave Poland forever.
See, for example, Jerzy Tomaszewski, ed., Studia z dziejów i kultury Żydów w Polsce po 1945 roku (Warsaw, Poland: Wydawnictwo TRIO, 1997); Grzegorz Berendt, August Grabski, and Albert Stankowski, Studia z historii Żydów w Polsce po 1945r. (Warsaw, Poland: Żydowski Instytut Historyczny, 2000); Alina Cala and Helena Datner-Śpiewak, eds., Dzieje Zydów w Polsce 1944-1968 (Warsaw, Poland: Żydowski Instytut Historyczny, 1997); Natalia Aleksiun-Madrzak, “Nielegalna emigracja Żdów z Polski w latach 1945-1947,” Biuletyn Żydowskiego Instytutu Historycznego (BŻIH) 3(95)-2(96) (175-178) (1996): 67-90; BŻIH 3(96) (179) (1996): 33-49; BŻIH 4(96) (180) (1996): 35-48; Bożena Szaynok, Ludność Żydowska na Dolnym Şlasku 1945-1950 (Wroclaw, Poland: Wydawnictwo Uniwersytetu Wroclawskiego, 2000); and Natalia Aleksiun, Dokad dalej? Ruch syjonistyczny w Polsce (1944-1950) (Warsaw, Poland: Wydawnictwo TRIO, 2002).
2.
and Krystyna Kersten, Miedzy Wyzwoleniem a Niewoleniem, Polska 1944-1956 (London: Anneks, 1993), 5-27.
3.
Estimates of the number of Jews murdered in Poland after the war range from more than one thousand to several hundred. For solid data and painstaking examination of the phenomenon, see David Engel, “Patterns of Anti-Jewish Violence in Poland, 1944-1946,” Yad Vashem Studies 26 (1998): 43-85.
4.
“Report on the Situation of the Jews in Poland,” 20 October, 1945, quoted in “The Situation of the Jews in Poland as Seen by the Soviet Security Forces in 1945,” introduction and annotation by Natalia Aleksiun, Jews in Eastern Europe 3:37(1998): 58.
5.
Jan T. Gross, “After Auschwitz: The Reality and Meaning of Postwar Antisemitism in Poland,”Dark Times, Dire Decisions, Jews and Communism, Studies in Contemporary Jewry20 (2004): 214-215.
6.
See, for example, Dariusz Libionka, “Alien, Hostile, Dangerous: The Image of the Jews and the ‘Jewish Question’ in the Polish-Catholic Press in the 1930s,”Yad Vashem Studies32 (2004): 248-252.
7.
and Jaff Schatz, The Generation. The Rise and Fall of the Jewish Communist of Poland (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1991), 95-127.
See Klaus-Peter Friedrich, “Der nationalsozialistischen Judenmord in polnischen Augen: Einstellung in der polonischen Presse 1942-1946/7” (Ph.D. diss., University of Cologne, Germany, 2003), 659-72.
10.
In regard to the debate in Poland, Antony Polonsky and Joanna B. Michlic, eds., The Neighbors Respond. The Controversy over the Jedwabne Massacre in Poland (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2004).
11.
Tomasz Strzembosz, “Collaboration Passed Over in Silence” (Rzeczpospolita, 27 January 2001), The Neighbors Respond, 224-225.
12.
Bogdan Misial, “Konterrevolutionäre Elemente sind zu erschißen,“ In Die Brutalisierung des deutsche-sowjetischen Krieg im Sommer 1941 (Berlin: Propylän, 2000), 270-83.
13.
Marek Jan Chodakiewicz, After the Holocaust: Polish-Jewish Conflict in the Wake of World War II (New York: East European Monographs, 2003), 67-93.
14.
and John Coutouvidis and Jaime Reynolds, Poland 1939-1947 (Leicester, UK: Leicester University Press, 1986), 137-169.
Józef Adelson, “W Polsce zwanej ludowa,” In Jerzy Tomaszewski, ed., Najnowsze dzieje Żydów w Polsce (Warsaw, Poland: Wydawnictwo Naukowe PAN, 1993), 387; and Yisrael Gutman, Ha-yehudim be-Folin aharei milhemet ha-’olam ha-sheniyya (Jerusalem: Zalman Shazar Centre, 1985), 19.
17.
David Engel, “The Reconstruction of Jewish Communal Institutions in Postwar Poland: The Origins of the Central Committee of Polish Jews, 1944-1945,”East European Politics and Societies10:1 (1996): 93-93.
18.
Report of the Immigration Department of the Jewish Agency on the Situation of the Jews in Poland, 23 March, 1945, Hakibbutz Hameuhad Archives, Ramat Efal, Israel (KMA), section 36, container 15, file 01.
19.
Ibid.
20.
Gutman, Ha-yehudim be-Folin, 12; and David Engel, Bein shihrur li-veriha (Tel Aviv, Israel: Am Oved, 1966), 40.
21.
See, for example, Berta Verderber-Salz, Ve-ha-shemesh zarha (Tel Aviv, Israel: Naye Lebn, 1968), 158.
22.
Abram Kisel to Max Zelpner, July 3, 1944, YIVO Archives, New York (hereafter, YA), RG-116 (Poland 3), box 292.
23.
Bernard D. Weinryb, “Poland,” in Peter Meyeret al., eds., The Jews in the Soviet Satellites (Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 1953), 243-244.
24.
Nahum Bogner, Be-hasdei zarim (Jerusalem: Yad Vashem, 2000), 295-305.
25.
Weinryb, “Poland,” 240.
26.
Henryk Shoshkes, Poyln—1946 (Buenos Aires, Argentina: Zentral-farband fun poylishe yidden in Argentina, 1946), 72-81.
Krystyna Splecka to Lotte Davis (World Jewish Congress), 20 September 1946, YA, RG-116 (Poland 3), box 287.
30.
Andrzej Friszke, Opozycja polityczna w PRL 1945-1980 (London: Aneks, 1994), 8-9.
31.
Joanna Michlic-Coren, “Anti-Jewish Violence in Poland, 1918-1939 and 1945-1947,”Polin, Studies in Polish Jewry13 (2000): 34-61.
32.
Minutes of the Politburo of the PPR Central Committee, 17 December 1944, In Antony Polonsky and Boleslaw Drukier, eds., The Beginnings of the Communist Rule in Poland (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1980), 295-295, 398-398.
33.
Coutouvidis and Reynolds, Poland 1939-1947, 149-50.
34.
Polonsky and Drukier, The Beginnings of the Communist Rule in Poland, 63-64.
35.
Engel, Reconstruction of Jewish Communal Institutions in Postwar Poland, 94-95.
36.
Michal Szulkin, “Sprawozdanie z dzialalności referatu dla spraw pomocy ludności żydowskiej przy Prezydium PKWN,” Biuletyn Żydowskiego Instytutu Historycznego 3:79(1971): 76-77.
37.
“Minute of the PKWN (Extracts),” 17 August 1944, in Polonsky and Drukier, Beginnings of the Communist Rule in Poland, 268.
38.
“Sprawozdanie sytuacyjne za grudzień 1944,” Starosta Powiatowy Tomaszowski, Archiwum Państwowe w Lublinie, Lublin, Poland (hereafter, APL), Urzad Wojewódzki Lubelski—Wydzial Spoleczno-Polityczny (hereafter, UWL), sig. 251; “Sprawozdanie sytuacyjne,” do Obywatela Wojewody w Lublinie, Kraśnik, 27 January 1945, APL-UWL, sig. 224.
39.
See Igor Halagida, Ukraińcy na zachodnich i pólnocnych ziemiach Polski 1947-1957 (Warsaw, Poland: Institut Pamieci Narodowej, 2003), 26-30.
“Sprawozdanie za czas od 1 do 30 czerwce 1945r,” Radzyń, 5 July 1945, p. 2, APL-UWL, sig. 243; and Starosta Powiatowy Wlodawski do Urzedu Wojewódzkiego Lubelskiego w Lublinie, Wlodawa, 19 February 1945, APL-UWL, sig. 255.
42.
“Sprawozdanie sytuacyjne,” do Obywatela Wojewody w Lublinie, Kraśnik, 27 January 1945, APL-UWL, sig. 224.
43.
Starosta Powiatowy Lukowski, “Sprawozdanie sytuacyjne,” Luków, 25 January 1945, APLUWL, sig. 236.
44.
Starosta Powiatowy Bialski do Ob. Wojewody Lubelskiego, Biala Podlaska, 5 August 1945, APL-UWL, sig. 46.
45.
Starosta Powiatowy Tomaszowski, “Sprawozdanie Starosty za czas do 31 October 1945r.,” APL-UWL, sig. 251; and Starosta Powiatowy Powiatu Janowskiego w Kraśniku, do Ob. Wojwody Lubelskiego, Kraśnik, 5 July 1945, APL-UWL, sig. 224.
46.
Liczby mniejszości narodowych na teranie powiatu bialskiego, 2 December 1946; stanu zaludnienia na terenie powiatu wlodawskiego no. 17/36/46; mniejszności narodowe zam. na terenie powiatu Tomaszów Lubelski, APL-UWL, sig. 56.
47.
Starosta Powiatowy Tomaszowski, “Sprawozdanie Starosty za czas do 31.10.1945r.,” APLUWL, sig. 251.
48.
“Sprawozdanie za czas od 1 czerwca 1945 do 30.6.1945r,” Radzyń, 5 July 1945, p.2, APLUWL, sig. 243.
49.
Sprawozdanie sytuacyjne,” do Obywatela Wojewody w Lublinie, Kraśnik, 27 January 1945, APL-UWL, sig. 224.
50.
Starosta Powiatowy Powiatu Janowskiego w Kraśniku, do Ob. Wojwody Lubelskiego, Kraśnik, 5 July 1945, and 5 September 1945, APL-UWL, sig. 224.
51.
“Sprawozdanie sytuacyjne,” Starosta Powiatowy Lukowski, za m-c lipiec 1945, APL-UWL, sig. 236.
Komitet Ż ydowski w Kraśniku do Wojewódzkiego Komitetu Żydowskiego w Lublinie, Kraśnik, 19 March 1945, APL-UWL, sig. 50.
54.
“Protokól,” sporzadzony w dniu 7.7.1945r., APL-UWL, sig. 50.
55.
“Protokól,” 27 June 1945, APL-UWL, sig. 50.
56.
“Protokól-zeznanie,” spisany w biurze Wojewódzkiego Komitetu Ż ydów Polskich w Lubline, 23.10.1945r, APL-UWL, sig. 46.
57.
Engel, Patterns of Anti-Jewish Violence, 50.
58.
Z. Sznek, Department Polityczny MAP, do Ob. Wojewody Lubelskiego, Warszawa, 21 March 1945, ALP-UWL sig. 50.
59.
Starosta Powiatowy Bialski do Urzedu Wojwódzkiego, Wydzial Spoleczno-Polityczny w Lublinie, Biala Podlaska, 17 May 1945; Starosta Powiatowy Chelmski do Urzedu Wojwódzkiego w Lublinie, Chelm, 10 July 1945; and Zarzad miejski w Siedlcach do Ob. Wojewody Lubelskiego, Siedlce, 22 May 1945, APL-UWL, sig, 50.
60.
See, for example, Adelson, W Polsce zwanej ludowa, 401.
61.
Gross argues that anti-Semitism seeped into both national and local communist ruling apparatuses and that local players, like the national political leadership, actually tapped into the anti-Semitic pressure that emanated from the field and preferred to treat the Jews as a group that was emigrating and disappearing from Poland. In my estimation, local officials preferred to see the Jews leave their districts more because they viewed them as an incurable nuisance than for political or ideological reasons. See Gross, After Auschwitz, 204-14.
62.
Komitet Ż ydowski w Bialej Podlaskiej do Wojewódzkiego Komitetu Ż ydowskiego w Lublinie, Biala Podlaska, 25 October 1945, APL-UWL, sig. 50.
