Two former ambassadors to Poland, Shevah Weiss and Zvi Rav-Ner, each of whom was born in that country, have been hotly pursued by international, Israeli and Polish media, whose journalists are interested in getting their take on Poland’s new restitution law, which would more appropriately be named the anti-restitution law.
Last month, just a few short weeks before Polish President Andrzej Duda signed the contentious legislation that more or less put an end to the possibility of reclaiming property or being compensated for lost property, Israel’s chargé d’affaires in Poland, Tal Ben-Ari Yaalon, in an address to the Polish joint Senate committees, said: “I stand here today on behalf of Israel, the nation-state of the Jewish people. Our country has arisen from the ashes of the Holocaust. I stand here for the survivors and thanks to the survivors, as a granddaughter of a Holocaust survivor, as a descendant of a Polish Jew who was murdered in the Holocaust.
“They were, and some of them still are, this country’s citizens. Poland was their home. This is where they flourished for centuries, the largest Jewish community in the world. They lost everything during the Holocaust, and so the issue of their property is an issue of dignity, of justice and of memory.
“We are here to give a voice to Holocaust survivors and their descendants, whose property was first seized by the Nazis, and later nationalized by the Communists. These survivors have the right, historically, morally and legally, to present their claims and to receive the compensation they deserve for their property. After all their suffering, it is the very least they are owed.
“We share a moral obligation to respect the rights of Holocaust survivors, former citizens of Poland, current citizens of Israel. It is our duty. Each and every one of us.
“We understand Poland wants to strengthen proprietary certainty for its current citizens, but denying the previous owners their rights cannot be the way. This legislation, in its current form, will severely hurt the rights of former and current Polish citizens whose property was seized during World War II and under the Soviet occupation.
“This legislation deals with thousands, if not tens of thousands of administrative decisions, taken during Soviet times by the Communist regime, in violation of the law, in order to nationalize private property.
“For many years, after the fall of Communism, it was the administrative legal system that enabled former owners to exercise their rights and reclaim their property.
“This administrative code stood as a lighthouse, shining light on the rights of Poles who were wronged by the Communist regime, to reclaim what was theirs. It wasn’t just about Polish-Jewish Holocaust survivors, that upon coming back to their hometowns, discovered their houses were taken and new families lived there, nor about the Polish Jews who were forced out of Poland after the events of March 1968; the administrative act enabled all, regardless of ethnicity and religion, to pursue their rights in court, in the hope of achieving justice.”
Similar points were made by Weiss and Rav-Ner, but Weiss, who is a political scientist, who has taught at the universities of Haifa and Warsaw, went a step further last week in an interview that he gave to the Polish publication Rzeczpospolita.
Germany owes Poland compensation for World War II, because the Germans destroyed Poland during the war, he said, emphasizing that Poland was correct in demanding war reparations from Germany.
“Poland can tell the Germans that they slaughtered millions of Poles, destroyed Warsaw.... The German side owes reparations to Poland because the Germans destroyed Poland,” said Weiss.
With regard to the restitution law, Weiss referred to it as “an open wound” in Polish-Israeli relations, adding that the whole reparations issue calls for dialogue. He repeated this in interviews in Israel.
Poland has been stating for years that there must eventually be a cutoff date for reparations. Too much has happened in the period of more than eight decades since Germany invaded Poland in September 1939. After the war, Poland was taken over by the Soviets, and there was little or no room for property claims. Then came the end of Communist rule, and Poland for some years embraced democracy and developed a strong, liberal economy. Numerous property claims were processed with a near enough to happy ending for owners or heirs.
Efforts by the State of Israel, as the Jewish state, to lay claim to Jewish community properties were rejected by a series of Polish governments on the grounds that the Second World War and the Holocaust took place between 1939 and 1945, whereas the State of Israel did not exist before 1948.
As for personal property, apart from the many legal complications, the owners in most cases were either murdered or died. Of those who were murdered, their heirs were often murdered with them, meaning that there are no heirs with documented evidence of ownership. Meanwhile two or three generations of Polish families may have been living in those properties. What does one do with them? They are not the ones who should be paying restitution in cases where there are heirs, unless they are descendants of tenants who lived there before the war, and heirs of the prewar owners can prove their claim. The back-rent should come to a small fortune. But there’s a huge gap between what is morally correct and what is legally correct.
Weiss would not categorize the new legislation as being antisemitic, in that it does not apply specifically to Jews, and he acknowledges that there are more non-Jews than Jews whose property was confiscated by the Nazis and later by the Soviets.
He also thinks that Israel’s reaction was somewhat hasty, but does not point a finger at Foreign Minister Yair Lapid.
Unfortunately, Israel, and Jews in general, tend to be ruled by emotion rather than logic in anything related to the Holocaust. Contrary to contentions by Lapid, Poland does not deny or denigrate the Holocaust, though it does take exception to any comments that might suggest that Poles were collaborators.
Someone who has more than once publicly acknowledged that there were Poles who aided the Germans in tracking down, betraying and killing Jews is Poland’s Ambassador to Israel Marek Magierowski, who has arguably done more to enhance bilateral relations than have any of his predecessors, although there were others who worked very diligently to improve relations, and who have returned to Israel at least once in other capacities. But Magierowski took the trouble to learn to speak Hebrew fluently, to pay special attention to Holocaust survivors, and on his Twitter account to memorialize righteous Poles who risked their lives to save Jews, as well as Jews who were murdered in the death camps. He has also reminded anyone who follows his Twitter account of major atrocities by the Nazis in Poland.
For Lapid to suggest that Magierowski continue his vacation in Poland and not return to Israel was – for want of a better, more politically correct word – a stupidity. Magierowski took the trouble to explain the legislation both in writing and in electronic media interviews. His presence in Israel at this time would be extremely helpful.
Moreover, Lapid’s strident attitude has left Israel wide open for criticism in relation to confiscated Palestinian properties. Here again, Israel’s critics and opponents have put emotion ahead of logic. Yes, it is wrong not to compensate Palestinians for loss of property, but comparing Israel’s policies regarding the Palestinians to those of the Third Reich with regard to Jews during the Holocaust is ridiculous. Palestinians have a hard time going through checkpoints, but thousands of Palestinians work both legally and illegally in Israel. They use public transport in Israel, and nobody relegates them to the back of the bus. They frequent Israeli coffee shops, and no one asks them to leave. Those who suffer from severe illnesses that cannot be treated properly in Palestinian hospitals are admitted to Israeli hospitals. While the Palestinians have suffered and are suffering certain injustices, there is absolutely no comparison to how Jews were treated during the Holocaust.
Whether dialogue can clear the air at this stage of mutual acrimony and mudslinging, remains to be seen. But without dialogue, relations between Israel and Poland, and possibly other former Soviet bloc countries, will get a lot worse before they get better.
■ DESPITE PRIME MINISTER Naftali Bennett’s request that Israelis refrain from traveling abroad unless absolutely necessary, Likud head Benjamin and Sara Netanyahu, accompanied by their son Yair, set out on a two-week vacation to San Francisco. Photographs of their arrival in San Francisco that were published in the Hebrew media showed all three Netanyahus wearing masks, as did the opposition leader’s bodyguards.
■ FOLLOWING THE change of Israel’s government, Pfizer CEO Albert Burla complained that Netanyahu had phoned him 30 times – sometimes in the wee small hours, in order to secure the Pfizer anti-COVID vaccine for Israel. In an interview that Burla gave last week to David Crow of the Financial Times, Burla was somewhat more complimentary, saying: “The biggest thing that became clear was Bibi was on top of everything, he knew everything. He called me 30 times, asking: ‘What about young people... what are you doing about the South African variant?’ I’m sure he was doing it for his people, but I’m also sure he was thinking: ‘It could help me politically.’”
■ SCORES OF journalists and film buffs were invited on Friday to the Jerusalem Cinematheque for a preview of the Jerusalem Film Festival, which opens at Sultan’s Pool on Tuesday, August 24.
With its usual generosity, the cinematheque hosted a buffet brunch and an even more sumptuous lunch. Invitees had been told in advance that Health Ministry regulations were being strictly adhered to. Masks were worn at the entrance to the building and green passes or other evidence produced, but once inside, most people lowered their masks until the screenings, after which they had to put them back in place before being allowed to enter the cinema halls.
Nine films were screened, and invitees could pick any three that they wanted to watch. Sabbath observers and people with short-term attention spans opted for only two. Nearly all of the films shown were foreign, with English and Hebrew subtitles. The choice included Bad Luck Banging or Loony Porn; The Divide; Ballad of a White Cow; Bergman Island; The Most Beautiful Boy in the World; Lamb; Flee; The Tale of King Crab; and Mandibles.
A foreign film in which the dialogue was in English was Bergman Island, which was a feature film and documentary rolled into one. Starring Vicky Krieps, Tim Roth, Mia Wasikowska and Anders Danielson Lie, it was shot on the island of Faro, otherwise known as Bergman Island, where the famous Swedish filmmaker Ingmar Bergman lived in his declining years, and where he died and is buried.
Aside from being both a feature film and a documentary, it is also a film within a film, in which fact and fantasy are juxtaposed – and it has a surprise ending. Although the dialogue is in English, the only native English-speaker among the lead actors is Roth. Almost everyone else speaks English with a slight foreign accent. Not only is the cast international, but so are the film’s angels, who come from France, Belgium, Germany, Sweden and Mexico.
Several films deal with same-sex relationships woven into other plots, as in The Divide, a French production starring Valeria Bruni Tedeschi, Marina Fois and Pio Marmaï, which starts out as a lovers’ spat between two middle-aged lesbians, enters into a violent political anti-Macron demonstration and dispute, and then illustrates how emotional and ideological differences can be cast aside in emergency situations inside a hospital.
■ FOUR IS hardly a milestone number, but for people in the tourist industry who succeed in holding their heads above water at a time when tourism is in the doldrums, every number that signifies another year of survival becomes a milestone number.
Ibis, the economy brand of the France-headquartered, multinational Accor hotel chain, launched its Israel operations four years ago with the opening of the Ibis hotel in midtown Jerusalem. To celebrate its Israel anniversary, Aharon Bernstein, the general manager of Ibis Israel, and marketing manager Tal Feldboy hosted families of children who have cancer, as part of the company’s policy to give back to the community. The families were guests of the hotel, and enjoyed several of the attractions that Jerusalem has to offer, such as the Snow Show at the Jerusalem Botanical Gardens, the Friends of Zion Museum and a pleasant stroll through the Music Square, where they listened to Pablo Rosenberg and Gal Toren, who also happened to be guests at the hotel. The hotel management naturally arranged for a fourth-year birthday cake, of which Rosenberg also received a slice.
■ IT’S PAR for the course that the president and the prime minister of the state should participate in several events together, but most events of this kind are outside of the president’s and prime minister’s residences. However, in the short span of time that Isaac Herzog has been president, he has hosted Bennett on at least four occasions, the most recent having been on Monday of this week when, together, they welcomed home the Israeli Olympic team, which did so well at the Tokyo Olympics. Herzog noted that this was the first time that the president and the prime minister were conducting such an event together. In the past, whoever happened to be the president and the prime minister held separate welcome ceremonies.
Herzog spoke of the pride and joy that the Olympic team had brought to the people of Israel, who were united in their excitement over those events in which Israel competed and won a medal – especially a gold medal. “When we heard ‘Hatikva’ played twice, our hearts swelled,” he said.
Bennett noted that from Israel’s perspective, the Tokyo Olympics were the best ever in terms of the results. He also had words of comfort for those members of the team who did not succeed in winning a medal, and praised them for their endeavors, noting that being selected for Israel’s biggest Olympic team ever was a reward in itself.
Rhythmic gymnast and gold medalist Linoy Ashram, in thanking Herzog and Bennett for their warm reception, spoke of the solidarity of the team, and recalled that when they came to the President’s Residence two months earlier to receive the blessing of outgoing president Reuven Rivlin, the team members were excited and apprehensive, and were perhaps dreaming of medals but did not dare say so out loud.
Because so little time had passed since Rivlin, in his former capacity, had wished the team well, he was also invited to participate in the welcome home event.
■ IN JANUARY 2020, when Rivlin hosted world leaders who had come to Israel for the series of events related to the 75th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz, it became more evident than usual that the President’s Residence was too small to serve its current and future purposes, and additional temporary structures had to be set up to accommodate the visitors and their delegations, as well as the many journalists covering events. Although some changes and additions have been made to the compound as a whole, there has been minimal structural change to the building, because it is regarded as a property to be preserved.
As the population grew and the number of events increased, so did the staff at the President’s Residence, so much so that when the Herzogs moved in, the president’s wife, Michal, thought that she would be sitting in the office that was once occupied by her mother-in-law, Aura Herzog, during the 10 years in which the current president’s father, Chaim Herzog, was president. But someone else was sitting there. It was not as if Michal Herzog’s office had been appropriated. Sonia Peres never came to live with her husband at the President’s Residence, so she never took over the office in which Gila Katsav had sat. Nechama Rivlin had no need for an office. She received all her visitors in the president’s private residence two floors up from the ground floor. So when Michal Herzog arrived, there was no office for her.
Although there is nothing in the law that requires her to take on special duties, she is well aware that she is expected to take up some form of community activity, and she’s still considering options that are somewhat different from those of her predecessors. Her mother-in-law had been the moving force for the Council for a Beautiful Israel, and had also been a keen supporter of Schneider Children’s Medical Center for Israel. Reuma Weizman concerned herself with Micha, the Association for the Deaf. Gila Katsav used to like reading stories to very young children, and Nechama Rivlin liked to encourage children to plant small gardens and to take care of pet animals. Because of her own physical disability, she also “adopted” children with disabilities, telling them that everyone has a disability of some kind, but that some disabilities are more obvious than others.
Visitors to the President’s Residence may see four or five staff members at events – more at state dinners, or when the guest of honor is the president of the United States, but visitors are unaware of the underground rabbit warren in which there are many staff people, including soldiers and civilian national service personnel. Nor do they know about the conference room just to the left of the entrance ahead of the staircase that, on different floors, leads to the president’s office and to his private living quarters.
The President’s Residence needs to be extended, and a viable solution has to be found without destroying the current building.
Meanwhile, extensive repairs will be conducted at the Prime Minister’s Residence over the next six months, even though Bennett has said that he has no intention of actually moving in with his family.
If Netanyahu continues to head the Likud, and the Likud returns to office after the next elections, all the things that the Netanyahus used to complain about when they lived in the building will have disappeared, and the interior will have been upgraded and modernized.
■ JUST BEFORE taking office, Herzog was given a huge farewell by the Jewish Agency, of which he had been an extremely popular chairman for three years. Among the participants were two young French immigrants, Sarah Chemla and Rudy Haziza, both from the same part of France, who met at the agency’s Ulpan Etzion in Jerusalem. Although the couple had mutual friends and acquaintances in France, they had never met before coming to Jerusalem. At the farewell ceremony for Herzog, they presented him with an invitation to their wedding. Herzog pledged to attend, and this week kept his promise.
■ FORMER FOREIGN minister Gabi Ashkenazi, no longer weighed down by affairs of state and the need to wear a suit and tie to work every day, is happy to get into casual attire and spend more time with his grandchildren. A few days back, he took them to Technoda, the new medical museum in Hadera, with its numerous interactive exhibits, but absolutely refused to have them photographed, though following the guided tour he agreed to pose for photos himself with Technoda CEO Gadi Mador.
■ IT WAS quite a big deal in the diplomatic career of Ilan Sztulman when he was appointed Israel’s consul-general in Dubai, but that is not the only first in his family. His wife, Jacqueline, gave birth to their daughter Mia on the first anniversary of the signing of the Abraham Accords, and the nurse who delivered the baby at the Mediclinic hospital is an American Muslim. Since America played such a major role in the establishment of diplomatic relations between the Jewish state and a Muslim state, nothing could have been more appropriate. Mia is the first Israeli citizen to be born in Dubai.
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