Israeli president Rivlin spreads anti-Polish fake news during the March of the Living

Israeli president Rivlin spreads anti-Polish fake news during the March of the Living

The media war against Poland goes on: Israeli president Rivlin spreads historically inaccurate, offensive and anti-Polish news during the March of the Living

The war against Poland in the Israeli media got a new momentum last Thursday when the Israeli president Reuven Rivlin had attacked Poland during the 30th March of the Living in Auschwitz. Rivlin had twisted the German Holocaust perpetrators with Polish WWII victims and stated in his speech among others:

  • “The Nazi ideology which flourished on Polish soil”
  • “This was a terrain that allowed the Nazis to do whatever they liked not only in Poland but throughout Europe”
  • “Polish soil enabled the execution of Hitler’s horrific ideology of genocide”
  • “The bilateral relations between us can lead to cooperation in any field, but this law can make people think that you are not prepared to deal with your past in the Holocaust. It is not for nothing that we call the extermination camps the extermination camps of the Nazis and their collaborators”
  • “There is no doubt that there were many Poles who fought the Nazi regime, but we cannot deny that Poland and Poles had a hand in the extermination”.

According to the IHRA’s Working Definition of Holocaust Denial and Distortion (Article 5): Distortion of the Holocaust refers, inter alia, to attempts to blur the responsibility for the establishment of concentration and death camps devised and operated by Nazi Germany by putting blame on other nations or ethnic groups. 

Did president Rivlin forget the IHRA definition?

Fake News Fabrics

The Israeli media picked up the lies and produced numerous hateful headlines:

“Israeli President to Polish Counterpart: We Cannot Deny That Poland and Poles Participated in Holocaust” (Haaretz)

“Poles helped in Nazi extermination, Rivlin tells Polish counterpart” (Times of Israel)

“Rivlin: Many Poles helped carry out Holocaust – Israeli President tells Polish counterpart at March of the Living anti-Semitism in Poland helped Nazis carry out Holocaust.” (Israel National News)

“Rivlin tells Polish counterpart ‘Poles also murdered’ Jews” (Yedioth Ahronoth)

“President Rivlin to Poles: ‘We cannot deny Poland had hand in extermination’ of Jews” (World Israel News)

“They were murdered by Ukrainians, Lithuanians and yes ̶ also by Poles.” “I do not want to interfere in Polish history. Poland knows how to do its own soul searching.” (Jewish Press)

The Twist of History

The Germans officials did not react to this falsification of history. They remained silent despite the recent assurance of the Federal Foreign Office (February 4, 2018): “For this reason, Poland can rest assured that our response to falsification of history in any form, such as the use of the term ‘Polish concentration camp’, will be clear rejection and strong condemnation”. There was no official denial from the German Ministry of Foreign Affairs, no apology, no appeal to Israeli politicians and the media to refrain from twisting the victims with the perpetrators.

Poland lost 6 million citizens during the German occupation. Poles first informed the Allies about the genocide being perpetrated against Jews. The Allies did nothing*. Hundreds of thousands of Poles risked their lives during the war to rescue Jews. Many of them, like the Ulma family, paid the highest price for it.

The history that is rewritten/forgotten is the role of the Jewish Councils and Jewish (Ghetto) Police in the transportation of Jews to German death camps. Notwithstanding the much despised Jewish collaborators and the hated Jewish Kapos within the German camps.

*https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:The_Mass_Extermination_of_Jews_in_German_Occupied.pdf