How should we understand this often talked about “Jewish revival” in Poland? What does it mean for a country that had more than three million Jews before the war and where only a few thousand live today? Sociologist Geneviève Zubrzycki shows that the memory of the Holocaust in Poland has given rise to a wide variety of practices, ranging from unscrupulous exploitation of the Jewish past and the Holocaust by tourists, to a sincere commitment to Jewish history and culture. But it is important to contextualize this “Jewish revival” within the political environment in which it is taking place. It is being mobilized by the progressive camp to break the hegemony of a national right that defines the Polish nation in ethnic terms and is closely associated with the Catholic Church. Thus, this “revival” is a weapon for the opposition to illiberal nationalism. To explore this topic further, Ewa Tartakowsky interviews Geneviève Zubrzycki, who recently published ‘Resurrecting the Jew: Nationalism, Philosemitism, and Poland’s Jewish Revival‘ (Princeton University Press, 2022).
Still in the East of Europe, but much further South, in Greece. We publish a tribute to Moses Elisaf, the mayor of the northwestern city of Ioannina, the capital of Romaniot Judaism, which is perhaps one of the oldest Jewish communities in the Diaspora, dating back to Alexander the Great. The Romaniotes are Greek-speaking Jews, whose existence as a group precedes the names Ashkenazi or Sephardic. Léon Saltiel met Moses Elisaf a few weeks before his death, and began a dialogue with this political figure, who was unanimously respected in his country, on the history and current situation of the Jews of Greece.
