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Saturday, December 18, 2010
The November 16, 2010 post, "March
of the Living: A Rabbinical Student's Sermon," was critical of March of the Living, a yearly pilgrimage of Jewish
students to concentration camps in Poland.
Too, "Bieganski"
includes transcripts of interviews with MOL participants who expressed a
conviction that Poles are inveterate anti-Semites. These MOL participants
evidenced a complete lack of awareness that Poles were interned in
concentration camps like Auschwitz and Majdanek, or that Poles had resisted the
Nazis and helped Jews. One MOL participant, a self-identified educator, boasted
a "comprehensive" knowledge of the Holocaust, but had never heard of
Jan Karski.
"Bieganski" is not alone. For
example, in the 2007 scholarly book, "Rethinking
Poles and Jews: Troubled Past, Brighter Future," Carolyn Slutsky
offers tough criticism of MOL.
MOL has changed, though, Jeremy
Simons, author of the above-linked sermon, insisted to me. MOL has, he says, in
recent years, improved relations with Poles.
After
posting Jeremy's sermon, I wrote to March of the Living and asked for comment,
and for permission to post that comment.
I've now
received both. Please find March of the Living's full and unedited response to
me, below.
***
The following
items demonstrate our strong, positive involvement with the Polish community:
• We work very closely with numerous Ministries in Poland as
we implement our annual program.
• Last year we happened
to be in Poland during the very tragic plane crash which killed the President
and other key members of the Polish government. We observed a moment of silence
during the March of the Living a few days later, and tied black ribbons to our
flags. Some of the students also went to visit the memorial sights that were
set up at the Presidential palace in Warsaw and in Krakow.
• Every year a senior member of the Polish Government participates in our
program.
• Many of our groups meet annually with their
high school counterparts in Poland.
• We have large
groups of Polish students and Polish religious organizations on the March. In
2010, we had close to 1,500 Polish participants. We have developed a working
relationship with the Polish Ministry of Education, the Shalom Ministry
Association in Oswiecim (headed by Roman Gawel) and with the Olive Tree
Foundation, an entity that provides educational instruction throughout Poland
on the Holocaust and the State of Israel.
• Our groups
have developed a warm relationship with the new generation of Polish guides and
these guides, with their enhanced education, have played a meaningful/valuable
role in the implementation of our mission in Poland.
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