Paid Greedy Rescuer Myth Promulgated Grabowski

Rescue for Money: Paid Helpers in Poland, 1939-1945, by Jan Grabowski. 2008

“Greed and (What Else?) Anti-Semitism” For Paid Polish Jew-Rescuers. (Were the Usually-Paid Endlessly-Glorified Danish Rescuers of Jews Also Animated by Greed and Anti-Semitism?)

This book repeats one of the accusations of neo-Stalinist Jan T. Gross, and suffers from all of the same flaws as Gross’ Polonophobic screeds, such as the citation of selectively chosen anecdotes, reliance on postwar trails that occurred in an atmosphere of rampant Communist terror, etc. It also fails to inform the reader about the death-defying codependence that was true of both the Polish rescuer and rescued Jew, and how this forced some Polish benefactors to kill or denounce the Jews they had been helping. (Please go to THE HUNT FOR THE JEWS and read the detailed Peczkis review.)

Author Jan Grabowski vel Abrahamer has been identified as a neo-Stalinist. A neo-Stalinist in this case is not a modern admirer of Stalin: It refers to a modern author that copies the old Stalinist tactic of demonizing devoutly Catholic and non-leftist Poles as anti-Semites, fascists, Nazis, Nazi collaborators, and other smelly species. For derivation of the term neo-Stalinist, see my review of GOLDEN HARVEST OR HEARTS OF GOLD, by historian Marek Jan Chodakiewicz.

RECYCLED OLD COMMUNIST PROPAGANDA

True to his neo-Stalinist ideation, Jan Grabowski vel Abrahamer openly copies Communist propaganda in smearing the Polish Underground NSZ as opposed to the rescue of Jews. (p. 16). Whatever the source of the cited document, it is contravened by many other accounts of the NSZ rescuing fugitive Polish Jews. [Again, see the Chodakiewicz book cited above.]

TRYING TO PIN THE BLAME FOR THE GERMAN-MADE HOLOCAUST ONTO POLES—YET AGAIN

As occurs in JUDENJAGD (THE HUNT FOR THE JEWS), the author (p. 15) cites Barbara Engelking’s SZANOWNY PANIE GISTAPO, about Polish denunciations, in a misleading fashion. (See the Peczkis review). The Polish denunciations featured in her book, far from proving “Polish complicity in the Holocaust” (whatever that is supposed to mean), involved Polish as well as Jewish targets, and actually preceded the Holocaust!

DISMISSING EVIDENCE THAT HE DOES NOT LIKE?

Author Grabowski alludes to studies from the early 1980’s that characterized the relative infrequency of Polish benefactors that required payment in order to help Jews. He questions this, but provides no evidence that materially contradicts the facts that are evidently not to his liking. (p. 12).

POLISH “GREED” OR NOT?

Is requiring payment a form of Polish “greed”, as characterized by the likes of Jan T. Gross? Hardly. Grabowski notes that, “The expansion of the black market successfully defied German plans to starve the Polish population into submission…” (p. 15). However, Grabowski does not internalize or develop the fact that the Poles lived under near-starvation conditions at the hands of the German conquerors and occupants of Poland. This, more than anything else, explains the fact that some Polish benefactors of Jews required payment for such help, and some of these ceased their aid when the Jews’ valuables ran out.

And then Grabowski turns around, and levels the accusation of Polish “greed” anew:

MORE FRIVOLOUS ACCUSATIONS AGAINST POLES

Jan Grabowski vel Abrahamer (p. 28) notes that paid Polish rescuers commonly charged by the person, not the room, and insinuates that this was a form of exploitation. It was not. Every additional person was an additional mouth to feed. Every additional person hidden meant a greater chance of a fatal slipup. Every additional person hidden created exponential difficulties in taking care of all of them. (For example, the owner had to make several trips to buy groceries daily in order to avoid being seen taking implausibly high amounts of food into his home).

A LITTLE BIT OF OBJECTIVITY FROM THE AUTHOR

Grabowski cites Icchak Cukierman (Yitzhak Zuckerman) and his SURPLUS OF MEMORY (p. 9). Zuckerman has an understanding attitude towards Poles who required payment for help to Jews. However, Grabowski does not go nearly far enough. Other Polish Jews who went through the Holocaust also appreciated the situation facing Poles, and exonerated Poles for charging them. For example, read the detailed Peczkis reviews of: The Death Camp Treblinka: A Documentary and Country of Ash: A Jewish Doctor in Poland, 1939-1945.

WHY NO INTEREST OR INDIGNATION IN THE “GREEDY” AND “ANTI-SEMITIC” PAID DANISH RESCUERS OF JEWS?

Consider the situation in Denmark, where the German occupation was incomparably milder than in Poland, and where the people did not live under near-starvation conditions. The much-publicized and much-honored Danish rescuers of Jews required payment, often considerable in amount, for shipping Jews to neutral Sweden. For illustration, please see: Rescue in Denmark., and read the detailed Peczkis review. Yet we hear not a hint about any of this from author Jan Grabowski vel Abrahamer.