“This trip is of great significance for the majority of participants, who are originally from the region. They have come to see where their families lived before or during the war and to pay tribute to those who died,” commented Richard Prasquier.
“Poland has undertaken a significant task of remembrance. Poles recognise the importance of Jewish history in this country,” explains Sebastian Rejak, in charge of the Africa and Middle East department at the Polish ministry of Foreign Affairs, who also talks of the significant improvement in Israeli-Polish relations. “Cultural exchanges and information trips are organised for young Poles and Israelis, to help them have a better understanding of Polish culture and counter the image of Poland as one vast cemetery.”
With this in mind, a museum of Jewish history in Poland will be set up to retrace 1000 years of Jewish presence in the country. Located in the former Warsaw ghetto, opposite the memorial monument, the museum will recall the social life of Jewish communities in Poland, which today have completely disappeared. “It is fundamental for Polish memory, because a lot of young people are living in a country from whose memory the history of the Jews has been hidden,” considers for his part Richard Prasquier. “For us, this museum is very important, for the sake of Europe’s memory, after the Holocaust. It is essential that Polish Judaism should retake its place in the collective memory,” he added. “This museum will show to all that Poland was a welcoming place for Jews,” point outs the President of CRIF, while not ignoring modern signs of anti-Semitism. “The country must look its history in the face,” he concludes.
This revival is seen as a “revenge” after those years of terror. From this point of view, the visit by the President of the State of Israel for this commemoration is highly symbolic. Warmly welcomed by the Jewish community at the Twarga Street synagogue in Warsaw, Shimon Peres said: “I have come to hear both the Kaddish and the Hatikva.” Greeting the “new Poland”, he insisted on the “excellent relations” between the two countries, even referring to them as “strategic”. Shimon Peres spoke of the influence of Polish Jewish culture in Israel and what it had contributed to the young country. For this, “Israel is grateful”. “I am very pleased to be here in this place that the Nazis sought to eradicate,” he added, wishing “that Jews might be able to fully live their Judaism in their Polish setting”. For Bronislaw Geremek, “there is a need to overcome this painful heritage and the mutual distrust it created”.
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