Zydokomuna Elite USSR Hertz

The Jews in Polish Culture, by Aleksander Hertz, Lucjan Dobroszycki (Editor), Richard Lourie (Translator). 1988

Poland Harmed by Jewish Separatism, Jewish Germanophilia and Russophilia, and the Very Real and Substantive Zydokomuna

This is a “meaty” book. Its vintage (1961) may be advantageous in terms of a unique perspective that preceded political correctness.

TO WHAT DOES JEWISH SEPARATISM OWE ITS ORIGINS?

Jewish self-imposed apartheid did not reduce to a simple dialectic: “Anti-Semites have heaped the entire responsibility for the caste organization onto the Jews; the Jews and their non-Jewish defenders, onto the Christian environment.” (p. 63). [In fact, Jewish separatism had long predated Christianity, an had been predicated on the ancient belief in Jewish Chosenness.]

Early pro-assimilationist Polish Jews had the following opinion: “Czynski the Frankist and Hollaenderski and Lubliner, who kept their old religion, all shared the view that Polish Jews were ‘sunk in superstition’ and were thereby alienated from Polish life, economically unproductive, and deficient in civic virtue. The source of the problem was ignorance, superstition, the Talmud, the rule of the rabbis.” (p. 22). Early assimilated Polish Jews were ennobled. (p. 64).

Jews opposing assimilation contended (as some Orthodox Jews do even today) that assimilation equals a repudiation of Judaism. (e. g., p. 27, 65, 119). For their part, Polish nationalists often saw assimilated Jews as alien infiltrators. (p. 119). Hertz implicitly identifies the reason, and these essentially concur with the Endek position, “There were various degrees and shadings of assimilation…This did not necessarily mean a total identification with Polishness and, especially in the later years, could go hand in hand with a growing national Jewish consciousness.” (pp. 125-126). Jews who converted to Christianity did so for various non-religious motives. (p. 113).

OPPRESSED AFRICAN-AMERICANS AND “OPPRESSED” POLISH JEWS: A TOTALLY FALSE EQUIVALENCE

Throughout this work, Hertz makes misleading comparisons between African-Americans and Poland’s Jews. Let us examine some basic facts. Blacks came by force, were slaves with no rights, could not emancipate themselves, did menial labor, were mostly poor, and were at the very bottom of society. Jews came to Poland voluntarily and could leave at any time, served as traders, were largely exempt from the menial labor of the Polish masses, and–as middlemen situated between the nobility-few and the peasant-majority, enjoyed more rights and privileges than most Poles. The Jews’ long-term advantaged position no doubt facilitated their becoming a literate class (p. 101), and of many Jews becoming wealthy. (pp. 107-108). Finally, discriminatory laws and policies against blacks served primarily to keep them inferior–those against Jews primarily to reduce their advantages and their economic hegemony over Poland.

ANTAGONISMS AGAINST JEWS AS MERCHANTS RATHER THAN AGAINST JEWS PER SE

Hertz recognizes the very variegated nature of anti-Semitism (p. 192-on), but considers the “Jews are crooks” notion as follows: “It would be no exaggeration to say that the Polish people ascribed to Jews characteristics no different from those that all the peoples of underdeveloped countries ascribe to all professional merchants, regardless of religion or origin. ‘Swindler”, ‘slippery’, ‘bloodsucker”—epithets of this sort are common in colonial countries and are applied to the local merchants, who are rarely Jewish. The Chinese merchants in Indonesia and Malaysia are the object of widespread aversion and innumerable accusations, often not without some basis.” (p. 201).

WHAT ABOUT JEWISH PREJUDICES AGAINST POLES?

Consider antigoyism. jewish ideation, equating as it did illiteracy with unintelligence, led to mostly-covert snobbery against the lowly Pole. Hertz writes: “Hence the Jew’s contempt for the peasant, who in the Jew’s eyes was twice a CHAM (boor), once as a peasant so defined by the world of the nobility, and again as a stupid, ignorant creature to whom knowledge was alien.” (p. 77). Hertz adds: “Because it was incontrovertible that the goy stood above the Jew in the social hierarchy, that contempt could never be expressed. One had to submit. But could there be anything wrong with knowing how to take advantage of the goy’s stupidity?” (p. 78). [Note the Talmudic teaching that allows the taking advantage of a goy’s mistake in a commercial situation.] Clearly, Jewish thinking could include the Pole as a legitimate object for exploitation. [On the other hand, the Polish peasant could do little besides retaliating by violence—hence the pogroms.]

POLISH PEASANTS (THE MAJORITY OF POLES!), AND NOT THE JEWS, WERE AT THE BOTTOM OF THE HEAP

This “pecking order” clearly shows that, contrary to the ambiguity suggested by Hertz as to whether peasants or Jews were lower (p. 74), and notwithstanding the Polish nobles’ disdain for Jews and commerce (p. 69), it was the Polish commoner, and not the Jew, who was the lowest caste in Polish society. To illustrate: “The Jew was a tradesman, itinerant peddler, source of credit. Very often he was also an intermediary between the peasant and the lord or the lord’s representatives in dealings with the peasant.” (p. 82).

JEWISH GERMANOPHILIA AT POLAND’S EXPENSE

Now consider the late 19th/early 20th centuries. Although Hertz denounces Polish nationalists for seeing Jewish nationalism as an intrigue of Russia and Germany, he turns then around, on the very same page (p. 144), and admits that: “During World War I, the German occupation authorities took a favorable view of signs of Jewish nationalism in Poland.” Also: In the kaiser’s Germany and the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Jews were ideologists of unity of the state. The German Jews even became zealous Germanizers in areas ethnically non-German…” (pp. 178-179).

THE SIGNIFICANCE OF THE LITVAKS (LITWAKS)

In like manner, while downplaying the Litvaks (Litwaks), he admits that: “The Russian Jews had a large share in the history of Jewish nationalism in Poland.” (p. 144). Also: “The Jews of the eastern frontiers of Poland were very much under the sway of Russian culture and had little in common with Poland.” (p. 173).

A JEWISH ELITE: THE ZYDOKOMUNA WAS REAL AND SUBSTANTIVE

Consider the 20th century. While providing the usual superficial exculpations for the Zydokomuna, Hertz states that: “Poles returning from Russia would relate their experiences with the Bolshevik commissars, who most frequently were Jews.” (p. 172). “Jews played a prominent role in the Bolshevik Revolution, providing it with outstanding leaders. There were many Jews in the Polish Communist Party, especially on its leadership team.” (p. 179).