Poland's president vowed on Saturday to restore Polish citizenship to the survivors of thousands of Jews pushed out of the country by the communist regime 40 years ago. An estimated 15,000 Poles of Jewish background were forced to leave Poland as the communist government stoked an anti-Semitic campaign following student protests in March 1968.
The departing Jews were stripped of their Polish citizenship and told never to return. "I am ready, without any formalities or even requests ... to return citizenship to everyone from those times who will want it," President Lech Kaczynski said at a ceremony in Warsaw at one of the train stations where thousands had boarded to leave.
"I treat this as my personal contribution to reversing the consequences of those sad, shameful events. Never more." The anti-Semitic purges in 1968 eliminated most of the Jewish population in Poland that had survived the Holocaust and forced most of those who stayed to hide their Jewish background.
The episode has been a sore point in Poland's recent history, highlighting disagreements over whether the post-war anti-Semitism was mainly a creation of the communist regime. In a book published in Polish this year, controversial author Jan Gross argued anti-Semitism was widespread in Poland after World War Two, culminating in the 1968 exodus.
Those who returned for the 40th anniversary of the expulsions spoke of bitter sweet emotions. "We left because we couldn't be Poles and we couldn't live here as Jews," said Michal Sobelman, who was part of the 1968 exodus. "Poland of those times did not want us." "But with our suitcases we took a little bit of Poland that was with us for 40 years. Today, in some symbolic way, we return it to end this sad chapter," he said.
Kaczynski has come under fire for not inviting Adam Michnik, the editor in chief of a leading Polish daily and former dissident, to an award ceremony earlier this week commemorating the student uprising. The arrest of Michnik and another student leader on March 8, 1968, led to a wave of protests that were bloodily put down by the police. Kaczynski's twin brother Jaroslaw, the former prime minister, had been at odds with Michnik's Gazeta Wyborcza for criticising his government.
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