An Israeli at a train station in central Poland looks at the train schedule: Warsaw ... Lublin ... Lodz ... Krakow ... The automatic thought of concentration camps will take years to slow down, and that is understandable.
But it is time to cleanse ourselves of the one-dimensional Israeli perspective that Poland is worth a Holocaust, to get out of the arrogant contempt and mental fixation.
I would like to point out a deep and rooted problem in the Polish-Jewish-Israeli triangle, which has painful effects on our future: the Israeli view of Poland as the source of evil and of the Poles as "Satan's aides" is distorted, ignorant, pious and sacrificial, and causes a deep and bleeding wound that must be healed.
Brief historical overview: Jews lived in Poland for a thousand years and were assimilated into business, culture, politics, alongside the non-Jewish population.
One third of the Warsaw population was Jewish, as was one third of the Lublin population or a quarter of the Krakow population.
In September 1939, Poland was occupied by Germany, and the Nazi death enterprise was established on its soil.
Throughout the war years the citizens of ruined Poland were mostly busy surviving.
The war and the Holocaust claimed the lives of six million Poles, half of whom were Jewish Poles, 85% of all Polish Jews.
At the end of the war, Poland passed from the Nazis to the communist regime for decades.
If we put things on the table, in the most superficial way: Germany led by Hitler was the devil who won the death machine.
At times it seems that the preoccupation with Polish guilt obscures this fact.
Poland, as an occupied and powerless country, remained weak and battered.
I do not seek to deal with the question "how many good Poles and how bad were" or "who were the most antisemitic."
The subject was investigated and chewed up in the media.
True, there were quite a few haters of Jews, bad neighbors and murderers in Poland.
The events of Jedwabne Kielce will be remembered forever, and 7,000 Polish Righteous Among the Nations who have sacrificed their lives will not atone for them.
And a word about public relations: "Free" West Germany has apologized.
She paid reparations, established relationships, erected memorial monuments and introduced the German-Israeli youth exchange into the education system.
The "correction" entered the Israeli consciousness.
70 years have passed, and Berlin has become a sought-after tourist destination, life in Germany beckons the Israeli immigrant, and everything seems fine.
This, while Poland under the auspices of Communism - remained somewhere in the East.
Diplomatic relations with it were renewed only in 1990, and in recent years there have been upheavals over the question of its role in the Holocaust.
I am the granddaughter of the late Auschwitz survivors, and like many Israelis, see Poland as a lost source, an old "home" important for understanding my identity. In recent years I have met non-Jewish Poles, who also see Poland's Jewish past as part of their identity: The Jewish Memorial Association in its city, the actor Witold has set up a mesmerizing center for the preservation of the memory of the Jews of Lublin, the photographer Agnieszka documents the Hassidic community, the artist Rafao Batalievsky created the famous graffiti "I Miss You Jew" which expresses just that - Poland lacks its Jews. And public figures who dedicate themselves to the preservation of the Jewish memory, the cry of the wounded past and the life that preceded it.They do not act out of guilt!
From the overly prevalent Israeli point of view - suffering from arrogant antagonism, mental shallowness and victim fixation - a change must take place, which will give us a little normalization.
Understanding the complexity of the story and neglecting prejudices is essential to our ability to learn from the past and break free from its shackles.
To be liberated from the ghetto.
The discharge will heal a painful wound that continues to bleed.
Poland of 2022, like the aforementioned graffiti, feels an old longing for its Jews. We must free Poland from our hatred - in order to liberate ourselves as a society.
The author is a spokeswoman for the Polish Institute in Tel Aviv, a cultural body that promotes Polish culture in Israel and in cooperation between Poland and Israel on cultural and historical issues.
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