Poland's Deputy Foreign Minister Pawel Jablonski said Monday that he hopes Israel would change its view on draft legislation that could cut off World War II restitution claims. The controversial move has sparked a bitter diplomatic row between Jerusalem and Warsaw.
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The bill, which passed Poland's lower house of parliament last week, intends to provide greater legal certainty for current owners of pre-war properties against claims dating back to the years of the Nazi-German occupation.
However, it drew criticism from Israel as it could effectively block descendants of Jewish families from claiming properties left empty during the Holocaust. Foreign Minister Yair Lapid accused Warsaw of trying to erase the memory of the Holocaust and condemned the legislation as "immoral."
Jewish claims on the property were frozen during the Communist era and, unlike other countries in the region, Poland has never had a comprehensive law on restitution claims since the fall of Communism in 1989.
Some families who lost property have since sought restitution or compensation, but the process has been chaotic and long. In some cases, there have been fraudulent claims for restitution.
The new law, which still has to be passed by the Senate and signed by Poland's President Andrzej Duda before it comes into effect, sets a 30-year statute of limitations on such claims.
This means that if a person bought a pre-war property in 1989 and has a specific official confirmation from that time proving their right to own it, any previous historical owners would now be excluded from contesting that right.
In an interview with Israel Hayom, Jablonski said that Poland did not expect to be accused of attempting to erase the memory of the Holocaust over the bill.
"We knew that Israel might have concerns about the new law, that is why we passed on to them all the facts concerning the law," he said.
"We assumed that the law would be a matter of controversy, but what surprised us was that the response was so disconnected from the facts. Lapid tried to shift focus onto the claim that Poland was erasing the memory of the Holocaust. These are ridiculous assumptions, and the law does not address the Holocaust in any way."
Warsaw was wary about Lapid's appointment as foreign minister. In 2018, he lambasted the Polish government for proposing a controversial bill that sought to outlaw accusing Poland of crimes committed during the Holocaust.
"I think attacking Poland serves the political needs of Lapid and other politicians," Jablonski said. "I know that there are a lot of people in Israel who are extremely critical of Poland, just as there are people in Poland who are critical of Israel or are even anti-Jewish and anti-Israel. It is very tempting for politicians to escalate such conflicts to gain points.
"We would like to remain on good terms with Israel and support it in international forums. But being attacked in such a way does not bode well with the Polish people. There is pressure from our side to change our attitudes towards Israel.
"We did not expect to find ourselves in a situation where the bill would be presented as an attempt to erase the memory of the Holocaust, as Foreign Minister Lapid tweeted. That is simply not the case."
Q: What is the purpose of the new law?
"The main idea is to set a time limit for revoking administrative decisions. There are people in Poland who purchased properties many years ago, and they still cannot be at peace that one day their ownership will not be revoked.
"This lack of legal certainty has been deliberated on many times, and in 2015 our Constitutional Court decided that a time frame should be set to prevent it. Therefore, they decided to limit the right to appeal to 30 years in order to avoid never-ending uncertainties for property owners.
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"There have been many cases where dubious individuals or businesses came to a Polish court and presented documents – sometimes original, sometimes forged – and claimed to represent descendants of Holocaust victims or other victims of the war, and said they were applying on behalf of people who are still alive.
"There was one case where they claimed to represent a client who was 130 years old. Obviously, that is a person who could never appear in court. They then persuaded the court to grant ownership of the property to them, and took the property from the [Polish] owners that were living there."
Q: Is there a way for Israel and Poland to get back on the right track?
"I am sure there is a way to stop this. So far we have only been accused of "erasing history" and that we are immoral. These are harsh accusations and do not take the wording of the law into account.
"I believe both sides would like to discuss the content of the law, but such a message needs to be conveyed in a completely different way. We are open to discuss this, and that is why we Israel's ambassador to Poland [Anna Azari]. We were open and honest, and I hope we can find a solution that way."
i24NEWS contributed to this report
