Paweł Machcewicz’s text for Tuesday’s “Rzeczpospolita” caused considerable indignation, and public opinion was shocked by even one sentence from this text. The historian claims that in the case of the Ulma family or other families, Jews were saved
They cannot be used to “obscure” the picture that emerges from research over the past twenty years, which documents the enormous scale of hostility and violence against Jews in Polish society.
It is a pity that Machcewicz does not mention by first or last name whose research he is referring to. Since in 2003 the unit “Center for Holocaust Research” was founded at the Polish Academy of Sciences under the leadership of sociologist Barbara Engelking, the professor probably refers to this environment. Machcewicz always refers to mythical “research”, but never to details. This is understandable because researchers from the Polish Academy of Sciences often embarrass themselves when real historians read their work (Engelking is not a historian).
In the text (1/3 of the newspaper page) Machcewicz distances himself from the bizarre statement of Prof. Jan Grabowski about 200,000 Jews allegedly murdered by Poles, but he does not mention what exactly he means, what title, research, source – where is this “mass scale of violence against Jews”? If such a situation existed in Machcewicz’s family, we want to assure you that hostility towards Jews in one family is not mass hostility in Polish society.
Playing with Kosiniak
Funny enough, Machcewicz is used for political games by Donald Tusk, who was the favorite during his first government (half a billion zlotys for a museum with luxury apartments for the management). Well, at the end of June, in an interview for “Gazeta Wyborcza”, Machcewicz criticized the Minister of National Defense Władysław Kosiniak-Kamysz, comparing him to the “pisist” Piotr Gliński, that he “fits the pattern of the previous government” and that the head of PSL did not defend him, Machcewicz, against the decisions of PIS in 2017. The mockery of Kosiniak takes place on June 26. Two days later, the head of the Ministry of National Defense repeats his criticism of the decision of the management of the Museum of the Second World War to remove the Ulmas and Kolbe (Pilecki is no longer important to the PSL), although the reasons behind this removal include Machcewicz. And so, on July 2, a few days after the objection of the head of national defense, Machcewicz became a member of the Scientific Council of the Museum of the Second World War, and a week later – on July 9 – in the mentioned text in “Rzeczpospolita” he mocked Kosiniak-Kamysz that I have a war on the borders “I write tweets about the museum exhibition. Machcewicz was appointed to the museum council by the Minister of Culture, Bartłomiej Sienkiewicz’s successor, Hanna Wróblewska, who was completely politically independent and, moreover, did not know much about Polish historians and had previously dealt with modern art of dubious value. In a word: Machcewicz’s promotion is being supervised by Donald Tusk himself, who is once again pulling Kosiniak’s ear.
Minister of National Defense
Cutbacks in the army under the PSL leader? Tusk supports! Publish news on Onet about the dramatic morale of the army at the border just before the European Parliament elections? Tusk consumes the election results! Machcewicz undermines Kosiniak-Kamysz’s position in identity stories? He is promoted to the museum board. Maybe it will be a new secular tradition that when someone is in a bad mood, he will take it out on the Minister of Defense? He can always hide somewhere, he always has his evacuation backpack packed.
Source: wPolityce
Emma Matthew is a political analyst for “Social Bites”. With a keen understanding of the inner workings of government and a passion for politics, she provides insightful and informative coverage of the latest political developments.