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Hundreds of academics and institutions, including Yad Vashem, condemn Polish government’s attack on Holocaust historian
(JTA) — A Polish political feud over Holocaust history has widened into an international condemnation of the government’s attempts to silence a leading scholar on Polish-Jewish relations during World War II.
More than 300 academics and institutions around the world — including Yad Vashem, Israel’s Holocaust history authority and memorial — issued a statement condemned the Polish government-led attacks against Polish historian Barbara Engelking, director of the Polish Center for Holocaust Research, for publicly stating that Poles “failed” during the Holocaust and Jews were “unbelievably disappointed with Poles during the war.
One letter in support of Engelking released Thursday and signed by 11 Israeli organizations, such as Yad Vashem, the Ghetto Fighters’ House Museum and Massuah Institute for the Study of the Holocaust, decried her critics’ attack on “academic freedom and historical facts.”
The dispute reflects the governing Law and Justice party’s ongoing push for a patriotic narrative of the past that scholars such as Engelking say erases Polish crimes against Jews during the war. The party’s campaign on this front led to a years-long series of diplomatic spats with Israel.
The latest fracas began on April 19, the 80th anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising, when Engelking made an appearance on the country’s largest private television station, TVN.
“Poles had the potential to become allies of the Jews and one would hope that they would behave differently, that they would be neutral, kind, that they would not take advantage of the situation to such an extent and that there would not be widespread blackmailing,” she said, adding that Poles today exaggerate how much they helped Jews during the war.
In response, Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki lashed out at Engelking in a nearly 900-word tweet, accusing her of expressing an “unwarranted opinion” that distorted reality. He emphasized that the Nazi Germany’s destruction of the Polish state is what enabled the murder of 1.1 million Polish Jews during the Holocaust, and he suggested that those who did not sufficiently acknowledge Polish efforts to aid Jews during the war “commit a crime on human valor, heroism, on good,”
In addition, the government’s broadcasting regulator announced it would conduct legal proceedings against TVN, which is owned by Warner Bros. Discovery, over the Engelking interview because “if the guest on a program is lying, the journalist must tell viewers that it is a lie.”
Poland’s education minister, Przemysław Czarnek, threatened to defund Engkelking’s research institute, which is part of the Polish Academy of Sciences, claiming he did not wish to support her insult to the Polish nation. Joining the chorus of critics was a member of the European Parliament from Poland’s ruling Law and Justice party, Dominik Tarczyński, who said he would file for a request for Engelking to be criminally prosecuted for insulting the Polish nation with her remarks. Tarczyński made headlines in 2019 when he told CNN that antisemitism does not exist in Poland.
This is not the first time Engelking has come under attack by the right-wing Law and Justice-led government for expressing her views on Polish attitudes during the Holocaust. In 2018 she co-edited a book, “Night Without End: The Fate of Jews in German-Occupied Poland,” about Polish betrayals of Jews during the war which was widely condemned by Polish officials as diminishing Polish suffering under the Nazi occupation.
It is estimated that the Nazis murdered up to between 1.9 million non-Jewish Poles about 3 million Jewish citizens of Poland.
There are more than 7,000 Poles recognized by Yad Vashem for aiding Jews during the Holocaust, about a quarter of all those the memorial has recognized as Righteous Among the Nations. In German-occupied Poland, those who aided Jews, as well as their families, were killed by the Nazis.
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Pope Leo Says Those Who Wage War Are Thieves Stealing Away Our Peaceful Future
Pope Leo XIV looks on as he meets with Catholic religious education teachers attending a national meeting organised by the Italian Bishops’ Conference (CEI), in the Paul VI Hall at the Vatican, April 25, 2026. Photo: REUTERS/Yara Nardi
Pope Leo on Sunday described those who wage wars and appropriate the earth’s resources as thieves who rob the world of a peaceful future, issuing a warning about the use of nuclear power on the anniversary of the Chernobyl reactor accident.
Ukraine is commemorating the 40th anniversary of the world’s worst nuclear disaster on Sunday amid lingering fears that Russia’s four-year-old war could spark a repeat of the tragedy.
In his weekly address after the Angelus prayer, the Pontiff said the Chernobyl accident had left a mark on humankind’s collective conscience.
“It remains a warning over the use of ever more powerful technologies,” the Pope, who has just returned from a 10-day tour across four African nations, said.
“I hope that at all decision-making levels, wisdom and responsibility always prevail, so that atomic power can always be used to support life and peace,” he added.
Commenting on the Gospel of the day, which contained the metaphor of a sheep thief, Pope Leo said thieves came under many appearances, listing as examples “superficial lifestyles driven by consumerism,” prejudices and wrong ideas.
“And let’s not forget also those thieves who, by plundering the earth’s resources, by fighting bloody wars or feeding evil in whichever form, are simply taking away from all of us the chance of a future of peace and serenity,” he added.
Leo, the first US pontiff, has attracted the ire of President Donald Trump after becoming more outspoken against war and despotism.
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UK’s Starmer and Trump Discuss ‘Urgent Need’ to Restore Shipping in Strait of Hormuz
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer and US President Donald Trump (not pictured) hold a bilateral meeting at Trump Turnberry golf course in Turnberry, Scotland, Britain, July 28, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Evelyn Hockstein
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer and US President Donald Trump discussed the urgent need to get shipping moving again in the Strait of Hormuz during a call on Sunday, a Downing Street spokesperson said.
“The leaders discussed the urgent need to get shipping moving again in the Strait of Hormuz, given the severe consequences for the global economy and cost of living for people in the UK and globally,” the spokesperson for Starmer’s office said in a statement.
“The prime minister shared the latest progress on his joint initiative with President (Emmanuel) Macron to restore freedom of navigation,” the spokesperson added.
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Palestinian Leader’s Loyalists Win Local Elections, Including Some Seats in Gaza
A Palestinian man votes during the municipal election at a polling station in Deir al-Balah, central Gaza Strip April 25, 2026. Photo: REUTERS/Mahmoud Issa
Loyalists of President Mahmoud Abbas won most races in Palestinian municipal elections, election officials said on Sunday, in a vote that for the first time in nearly two decades included a city in the Gaza Strip run by rival Hamas.
Saturday’s ballot marked the first elections of any kind in Gaza since 2006 and the first Palestinian polls since the Gaza war began more than two years ago with Hamas’ cross‑border attack on southern Israel.
Abbas’ West Bank–based Palestinian Authority (PA) said the inclusion of the Gaza city Deir al‑Balah, which suffered less damage than other areas of the coastal territory during the war, was intended to show that Gaza was an inseparable part of a future Palestinian state.
The elections, in which voter turnout was low, had been held “at a highly sensitive moment amid complex challenges and exceptional circumstances,” Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammad Mustafa said as results were announced on Sunday.
But they represented “an important first step in a broader national process aimed at strengthening democratic life … and ultimately achieving the unity of the homeland,” he said.
POSSIBLE INDICATOR OF HAMAS SUPPORT
Hamas, which ousted the PA from Gaza in 2007, did not formally nominate candidates in Gaza and boycotted the race in the Israeli-occupied West Bank, where Fatah’s victory was widely expected.
But some candidates on one of the Deir al-Balah lists were widely seen by residents and analysts as aligned with the movement, making the vote a potential indicator of support for the Islamist group.
Preliminary results showed that the list, known as Deir al‑Balah Brings Us Together, won only two of the 15 seats contested in Gaza.
The Nahdat Deir al‑Balah list, backed by Abbas’ Fatah party and the Western-backed PA, secured six seats. The remaining seats were won by two other Gaza-based groups, Future of Deir al‑Balah and Peace and Building, not affiliated with either faction.
Abbas loyalists swept the election in the West Bank, running unchallenged in many seats.
Fatah spokesperson Abdul Fattah Dawla noted that turnout was close to that for the last municipal elections in the West Bank, in 2022, praising voters for participating despite ongoing violence by Israel.
“By electing figures linked to Fatah, voters appear to be seeking unrestricted international support for municipal governance and a gradual political shift that could extend beyond the local level,” said Palestinian political analyst Reham Ouda.
The recent war has left much of Gaza reduced to rubble, with many residents displaced and focused on survival. Israel has continued conducting strikes despite an October ceasefire.
In Gaza, voter turnout reached just 23 percent, while in the West Bank it was 56 percent, according to Chairman of the Central Elections Commission Rami al‑Hamdallah.
Al‑Hamdallah said some of the ballot boxes and voting equipment did not make it into the enclave because of Israeli security restrictions, though those challenges were overcome.
Hamas’ Gaza spokesperson, Hazem Qassem, downplayed the significance of the election results, saying that they had no impact on wider national issues.