Israel demands changes to 'Polish death camp' bill

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Sunday that his country could not tolerate a proposed law in Poland that distances Warsaw from responsibility for the Holocaust. Israel also summoned Poland's deputy ambassador to express its outrage.

At a cabinet meeting, Netanyahu said that Israel has "no tolerance for the distortion of the truth, the rewriting of history and the denial of the Holocaust."

The bill that passed the lower house of Poland's parliament on Friday bans the use of the term "Polish death camp" to refer to concentration camps built by the Nazis on Polish soil. It also places fines on certain mentions of Polish complicity in the Holocaust.

'Poles being blamed for German crimes'

"We have had enough of Poland and Poles being blamed for German crimes," said Beata Mazurek of the ruling Law and Justice (PiS) party, defending the bill, which still has to pass the Senate and be signed by the president before it becomes law.

The bill hits at Poland's fight for its own legacy. The narrative put forward by Poland's nationalist conservative government posits that Poland was only a victim of Nazi terrorism and acted heroically under horrible circumstances. However, most historians agree that the truth is more complicated, and many Poles collaborated with the occupying forces and committed terrible crimes.

Israel has criticized the bill for its potential to "harm freedom of research, as well as prevent discussion of the historical message and legacy of World War II," and taken issue with the timing, coming the day before International Holocaust Remembrance Day.

Deputy Ambassador to Israel Piotr Kozlowski rejected the idea that his government was trying to "whitewash" history.

"It is to safeguard it, to safeguard the truth about the Holocaust and to prevent its distortion," he told reporters after his meeting at the Israeli Foreign Ministry.

In the wake of the criticism, Polish President Andrzej Duda said he would send a top policy advisor to meet with Israeli diplomats on Monday and discuss the bill's wording.

es/jlw (AP, AFP, Reuters)