On Wed, 2 Mar 2005, Wojtek Sokolowski wrote:
> In my own experience, I did not encounter much anti-Semitism in the
> socialist Poland, except perhaps stereotypes stemming largely from
> ignorance. I have not heard of anyone being socially excluded because of
> the Jewish origins, and of course no institutional barriers to employment
> or education existed. However, that started to change after the so-called
> "democratic reform," but this was clearly the work of the Catholic clergy
> and the right wing.
When you say the "democratic reform" do you mean Solidarity, or some other turning point? Because my impression was that Solidarity was marked if anything by an absence of anti-semitic appeals, as well as by having several Jewish intellectuals among its leaders.
But I was under the impression that there was a fairly virulent anti-semitic purge inside the communist party in 1968 in the wake of the 6 Day War, when about 10 or 20,000 otherwise loyal communists had to leave the country, much to their shock, the most famous among whom was Zygmunt Bauman.
Michael