Warsaw, Poland – In an try to lift consciousness concerning the abuse and humiliation suffered by Palestinians who’ve been arrested and tortured by Israeli troops, Igor Dobrowolski, a Polish painter and efficiency artist, dressed up in a purple total in March and positioned a yellow sack over his head.
In a video of the efficiency posted to Instagram, he’s seen kneeling on a concrete ground, his palms zip-tied behind his again. An individual beside him in khaki inexperienced enjoying the position of an Israeli soldier holds up a stick to laughing emojis – a nod to the proof that many are livestreaming potential struggle crimes on social media.
Dobrowolski is seen urinating in concern, simply as Palestinian prisoners did in footage posted earlier by Israeli troops, throughout which one is heard mockingly saying, “Oh no, what occurred? He peed himself.”
These phrases echo over the efficiency by Dobrowolski, who has devoted his artwork this previous yr to the topic of Israel’s genocide of Palestinians in Gaza – no simple activity in a rustic nonetheless grappling with its Holocaust historical past.
“While you watch movies concerning the Holocaust on TV, they’re very critical, the perpetrators are proven as devoid of feelings. However the genocide which is occurring at the moment appears very humorous to the perpetrators,” stated Dobrowolski, referring to the movies uploaded by Israeli troopers. “I made a decision to kneel in the course of all that.”
Throughout the Holocaust, greater than three million Jews have been killed in Nazi-occupied Poland, and 1000’s died in pogroms dedicated by native Poles. Due to the tragic reminiscences, criticising Israel stays taboo.
Earlier than World Battle II, 10 p.c of the Polish inhabitants was Jewish, the best quantity in Europe. After the Holocaust, few Jews remained within the nation, and plenty of of those that stayed fell sufferer to the 1968 communist purges.
Following the collapse of communism, Poland has maintained diplomatic relations with each Israel and Palestine. Whereas it has not been actively concerned in resolving the historic disaster, it helps the thought of a two-state answer.
Based on an IBRIS company ballot final Could, greater than 66 p.c of Poles say that Poland ought to stay impartial within the Israel-Palestine battle.
However tensions between Poland and Israel come up periodically over Holocaust reminiscence and politics.
In 2018, Poland handed a controversial regulation, making it unlawful to recommend Poland’s complicity in Nazi crimes. One yr later, Israel Katz, then-foreign minister, stated “Poles imbibe anti-Semitism from their moms’ milk”.
In 2021, Poland proposed a regulation to place a statute of limitation of restitution claims concerning Jewish property seized throughout World Battle II, which Yair Lapid, overseas minister on the time, described as “immoral and a shame”.
Final Could, Poland supported a decision granting Palestine observer state standing inside the United Nations. Israel’s Ambassador to Poland Yacov Livne warned that the choice would “hurt Poland”.
Radek Sikorski, Poland’s overseas minister, responded that it’s “the Polish authorities, not overseas ambassadors, who will determine what is sweet for Poland”.
However past the diplomatic rows, most Poles take into account the Holocaust because the worst tragedy in current historical past and discover it arduous to grasp that Israelis may very well be perpetrators of humanitarian crimes.
“In Poland, it’s unthinkable to check something to the Holocaust and any such comparability sounds controversial. The Holocaust has a really symbolic and private which means to individuals,” Ewa Gorska, a doctoral pupil of sociology of regulation specializing in the Center East, instructed Al Jazeera.
“Poland and the remainder of Europe have by no means labored by means of the anti-Semitism which made the Holocaust attainable. On the identical time, after the creation of Israel, our feelings and prejudices in opposition to the Jews have been simply transferred onto the Arabs and Muslims within the types of anti-Arab racism and Islamophobia.”
Israel’s struggle in Gaza has killed no less than 43,922 Palestinians and wounded 103,898 since October 7, 2023, when an estimated 1,139 individuals have been killed and greater than 200 have been taken captive in the course of the Hamas-led incursion into southern Israel.
‘If I saved silent, I wouldn’t be capable to have a look at myself within the mirror’
Throughout one other efficiency on the Cliche and Wall House galleries in Warsaw, the Polish capital, Dobrowolski kneeled for seven hours surrounded by mannequins of infants folded in white cloths, symbolising the relentless nature of what a UN company has referred to as a struggle on youngsters, given the tens of 1000’s who’ve been killed in little greater than a yr.
Throughout one among his performances, Mahmoud Khalifa, the Palestinian ambassador to Poland, positioned a keffiyeh on Dobrowolski’s again and whispered: “Thanks.”
Yara Al Nimer, a Poland-based Palestinian singer who has seen Dobrowolski’s efficiency, described them as “one of the highly effective issues I’ve ever seen”.
However his work sparks criticism.
He has beforehand described the onslaught in Gaza as a “psychopathic actuality” and in different works, immediately in contrast the atrocities dedicated by Israeli troops to these of Nazi struggle criminals.
On the gates of Auschwitz-Birkenau, the biggest Nazi focus and extermination camp, he raised banners studying “Is ‘by no means once more’ for everybody?” and “Israel exploits Holocaust reminiscence to hold out genocide” in a one-man picket protest.
Greater than 1.1 million individuals – the vast majority of them Jews, but in addition Poles, and Roma individuals amongst others – perished between 1941 and 1945.
Within the eyes of many Poles and Jews, he violated a sacred place.
“Some galleries and artwork collectors [have] commented that I’m an anti-Semite,” stated Dobrowolski. “I do know that elevating the problem of the scenario in Palestine may be detrimental to my profession, that I gained’t be capable to present my work in museums, and that some auctions won’t promote my work. But when I saved silent, I wouldn’t be capable to have a look at myself within the mirror. I don’t make excuses.”
Based on Gorska, most Polish millennials grew up studying concerning the wrongs of anti-Semitism, however there was not sufficient dialogue on Holocaust trauma.
This is among the the reason why some concern commenting on Israel’s therapy of the Palestinians, she stated.
However the youthful technology within the pro-Palestinian motion, which incorporates college students who’ve occupied college buildings in Warsaw and Krakow, now not share the fears of their older compatriots.
“These are individuals who care about their language and inclusivity. There isn’t a place for racism or anti-Semitism. It’s a fully completely different sensitivity and one other approach of understanding the world, which permits them to work by means of points that have been uncared for earlier than,” Gorska stated.