Jewish Economic Privileges Prewar Poland Medykowski

The First To Be Destroyed, by Witold Medykowski…Tuvia Horev (eds.) 2019

Jewish Privileges in Poland. Skewed Occupations and Minimal Jewish Physical Labor. Secret Graves for the Victims of the Germans Complicate Death-Toll Estimates of Murdered Poles

This work includes fascinating data from archival materials, which I emphasize in my review. Under the Partitions, this area was part of Prussia and then Russia. After WWI and again after WWII, Kleczow again became part of Poland.

PRE 20TH-CENTURY EVENTS: JEWS IN CONFLICT WITH SOCIETY

The authors exaggerate the pogroms that occurred in pre-Partition Poland. They say that, in 1648, Ukrainian Khmelnytskyi’s (Chmielnicki’s) hordes had slaughtered 50,000—100,000 Jews. (p. 10). The actual number was less than 15,000. See my review of JEWS AND UKRAINIANS (the POLIN series, Volume 26).

In 1846, the Konin District Magistrate’s Court investigated local Jews for embezzlement and fraud. This included six named shysters (unscrupulous lawyers). (pp. 66-68).

In a separate matter, in 1829, seventeen-year old Szmul Grembart gave the following reason for his decision to convert from Judaism to Catholicism, “‘Of my own will. (sic) I observed the wonderful Catholic rituals and came to realize that Jews mostly try to live on cheating, which I did not experience among Catholics. So I figured that that religion leads to a goal. Living an honest life will at the same time bring about the redemption of the soul.” (p. 69).

POLAND’S SECOND REPUBLIC (1918-1939): JEWS WERE GENERALLY BETTER OFF THAN POLES

The authors unhesitatingly point out that, “The Jews of Kleczow were distinguished for their affluence—a predictable generalization about Jews, but one that the sources in this case confirm.” (p. 85).

Based on archival data for 1919, the authors identify two classes of the affluent—those with assets worth 30,000—75,000 mp (MARKAPOLSKA, that is Polish marks) and those with assets worth 10,000—30,000 mp. (p. 85). Among Kleczow’s inhabitants, Jews accounted for 48% of affluent people in the first category and 49% of the latter—against the fact that Jews were only 32% of Kleczow’s inhabitants. (p. 85).

[This is not an isolated instance. The fact that Jews were generally better off than Poles can be generalized for all of pre-WWII. See, for example, my review of SOCIAL AND POLITICAL HISTORY OF THE JEWS IN POLAND 1919-1939, by Marcus.]

THE SKEWED JEWISH OCCUPATION STRUCTURE: JEWS LARGELY EXEMPT FROM HEAVY PHYSICAL LABOR

Base on archival data, the authors (p. 82) tabulate an aggregate of 629 Jews, apportioned in accordance with 32 occupations, covering 1919-1935. Especially keeping in mind that most Poles were peasants, the imbalance in vocations is staggering. Of the 629 Jews, only a total of 27 were laborers or farmers. The two most common occupations, by far, were merchants and traders (336 total participants), and tailors (103 total participants). (p. 82).

Among the Jewish traders themselves, here are the items most frequently traded: Archival data, pertaining to 1919, for 100 Jewish trading companies, apportioned according to 23 types of trading businesses (p. 83), show that five types accounted for 67 of the 100 trading companies. That is, of the 67 trading companies, a total of 34 dealt with trading in groceries, 16 with trade in haberdashery, 12 with trade in tobacco, and 5 with trade in restricted merchandize. (p. 83).

During 1919-1939, 20 of 34 major trade and industrial companies in Kleczow were Jewish-owned. (p. 88). (Without the much-maligned Polish government-sponsored discriminatory acts against Jews, the imbalance would have been even greater.)

The authors mention the Endek-led boycotts of Jews, as well as sporadic acts of anti-Semitic violence. However, they fail to make the connection to the Jewish privileges that had provoked these unfortunate events.

JEWISH RITUAL SLAUGHTER (SCHECHITA) PLAYED A MAJOR ROLE IN THE FUNDING OF THE JEWS’ LOCAL GOVERNMENT

The authors comment, “Between 1919 and 1936, customer payments for ritual slaughter brought in 48%–64% of the kehilla’s total income; in most years, depending on the season, the two sources [kosher slaughter and membership dues] together accounted for 80%–100% of the revenue.” (p. 117).

[Clearly, ritual slaughter was economically very important to Jews. Poland’s 1937 schechita law, which restricted but did not abolish Jewish ritual slaughter, was not an attack on Jewish religion. It was an economic handicap imposed upon the Jewish community in order to help reduce the Jewish economic hegemony over Poles. It also served to reduce the Jewish dominance of Poland’s meat industry.]

THE HOLOCAUST AND THE POLOKAUST (POLOCAUST)

During WWII, after the 1939 German-Soviet conquest of Poland, this land was directly annexed into the Third Reich. In order to delegitimize Poland completely, the Germans named this territory Wartheland (the land of the Warthe [Warta] River) and made it into Warthegau. The authors identify the reason that the Germans could not follow through on their plans to expel all the Jews and Poles of Warthegau, and dispatch them to the GG (Government General—a Nazi euphemism for central German-occupied Poland): “The General Government, however, had a serious food problem at the time of the conference, which coincided with the harvest season. The area was densely populated, and not self-sufficient in food.” (p. 179).

[The desperate food shortage facing Poles was a feature of the entire Nazi German occupation. It enables the reader to understand why many Poles did not want to share their meager foodstuffs with fugitive Jews, and why Poles sometimes reacted, against the known or suspected banditry of fugitive Jews, with denunciations and killings of Jews.]

The reader learns, in considerable detail, that most of Kleczow’s Jews perished in the German-made Shoah. However, unlike most Holocaust books, this one is not completely Judeocentric. It also freely discusses the multitudes of Poles murdered the Germans.

GERMANS DISGUISE THE GRAVES OF VICTIMS: BROADER IMPLICATIONS

When the Germans shot Jews or Poles, they commonly did so in the forests. Mass graves were camouflaged with leaves, shrubs, newly-planted trees, or cut-down forests and replanted trees. In addition, Germans allegedly added carbide, or other chemicals, to the graves, in order to hasten the decomposition of the corpses. (pp. 313-315).

There are unstated implications of the disguised graves. A large fraction of Poles who were murdered by the Germans ended up in such secret graves in the forests. Since these graves can seldom be discovered, it is impossible to know how many Poles lost their lives to the Germans during WWII.