The publication of Jan Gross’s Neighbors fundamentally challenged common sense understandings of Poles and Jews in Poland, as the world watched on. Gross described what happened in a remote town in Eastern. “[O]ne day, in July 1941, half the population of a small East European town murdered the other half – some 1,600 men, women and children.” He reported in the introduction of his book that it took him four years between the time he first read the testimony of Szmul Wasersztajn describing the atrocities of Jedwabne, and when he really understood what happened. He read the description but was not able to process its implications. And as I observe the debate over Jedwabne, it seems to me that many people still have not been able to process the implications. Here I reflect on the meanings of the debate for better and for worse.

I have no doubt that the works of Jan Gross, and the writing of many Polish journalists, historians and sociologists, contribute to the foundation of democracy in Poland. They advance the project of freedom for Poles and for other nations, to echo the famous slogan of Polish patriots of the 19th Century. They address the Jewish question; for me, they address my mother’s question, with their dignity. There has been an extended debate, an official apology by the President of Poland and an official inquiry and correction of the public record. All of this has been noted and admired abroad, even as it sparks controversy.

On the other hand, there was much that was said and written in response to the revelations about Jedwabne, that brought me back to my Polish American compatriot’s “Jew down” remark, as reported in my first “Why Poland?” post, and much worse. It has been very hard for me to read the primitive, but also the more refined, anti-Semitism, which is now very much a part of Polish public discourse. I realize now that my travels in Poland back in the seventies, and my intensive work with the democratic opposition and underground Solidarność, though extensive and long enduring, were in important ways limited. I knew how Jews and anti-Semitism were symbolically central to modern Polish identity, but I thought . . .

Read more: Why Poland? Part 3: Thinking about Jedwabne, Addressing Premature Holocaust Fatigue