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POLAND AND THE J.N.WS.* " EVIAT sect saith : Oh, give me liberty I But give him it, and, to his power, he will5not yield it to anybody else." Crom- well's words are a fitting commentary on Mr. Israel Cohen's revelations of the recent pogroms in Poland and Galicia. In November last year it was reported in London that " the emotions of the Poles on securing their long-awaited independence found expression in an extensive outbreak of anti-Jewish excesses, to which the nearest possible parallel is the epidemic of pogroms that swept over Russia in 1905 and 1908." The British Government were moved to issue a warning to the newly formed States in Eastern Europe against any continuance of these outrages, and the Zionist Organization in London, with the sanction of the British Foreign Office, eent our Mr. Israel Cohen as a Special Commissioner to investigate the situation. It was impossible for Mr. Cohen in his brief visit to go to every scene of reported outrage :- " I found that the excesses had been far more numerous than I had believed, and that they were distributed over a vast area, including the whole of the Galician territory from Cracow to Lemberg and various districts in Congress Poland. There were not fewer than 130 towns, townleta, and villages in which anti- Jewish outrages had occurred."
Everywhere he found that, though "the number of deaths had been somewhat exaggerated in the first reports of certain pogroms, doubtless due to the panic-striker condition of the fugitives from whom these reports emanated . . . the assaults were much more systematic, vindictive, and destructive than I had been led to believe from Press accounts." The attacks took different forms. " In most places they were assaults by towns- folk, peasants, and bandits upon Jewish dwellings and shops for the single purpose of plunder, whilst in others they took the form of military expeditions organised to punish alleged Jewish disloyalty towards the Polish State." Recognizing the danger to the Jews from the disorders consequent on the war between Poland and Ukrainia, the Polish Liquidation Com- mission, the Provisional Government established on October 28th, 1918, permitted the formation of Jewish Self-Defence Corps in various towns, which, had they been allowed to exist, might have been some protection, but in the majority of cases " they were disarmed and disbanded by order of the Polish Military Authorities." As the Jews were also prevented from joining the Civil Militia, " and the latter actually took a leading part in the rioting, their position became utterly helpless." The extent and nature of the outburst of savagery which followed are eeen from the summary of the outrages which Mr. Cohen gives. Murder, assault, plunder, arson, and profanation of synagogues played their terrible part in this eruption of racial intolerance which marked the first days of a free Poland. The worst pogrom of all, says Mr. Cohen, took place at Lemberg, the centre of the fighting between the Poles and the Ukrainians, which was captured by the Poles on November 22nd :— " The Polish triumph was followed by the Jewish tragedy. The Jews had had a foreboding of evil, for those who had pre- viously escaped from the Polish side warned their brethren that the soldiers said they would be allowed to plunder in the Jewish quarter for forty-eight hours. The first act of the Polish troops was to disarm the Jewish Militia, officers and men, and imprison them. Then a military cordon was drawn round the Jewish quarter, machine-guns were posted at the top of each street, and systematic looting began. One shop after another was forcibly entered, the iron ehutters were broken open by means of guns or hand-grenades, and the windows were smashed. Only Jewish shops were looted : the premises of Poles and Ukrainians were spared. Private dwellings were also raided by armed bands of civilians and soldiers, of ten led by officers. All who resisted were brutally assaulted or shot, and many women and girls were outraged. The orgy of plunder and massacre continued thoughout the 32nd and 23rd November, culminating in the setting fire to several blocks of houses and some synagogues. Those who tried to escape from the burning houses were hurled back again into the flames or shot."
" Over 500 families are homeless," adds Mr. Cohen, " over 2,000 families have been totally ruined, and another 4,000 families have sustained considerable lose." A postscript to Mr. Cohen's Report shows that since his visit, and in defiance of the Allies' warning, a fresh cyclone of pogroms broke out early in March, which was still continuing at the time of publication in April.
Mr. Cohenmade careful inquiryinto the causes of the pogroms,
• d Report on the Pogrom h, Poland. By Israel Cohen. London: Central Office of the Zionist Organization, 175 Piccadilly, W. 1. 1011
and was forced to conclude that the outrages arose mainly from anti-Jewish feeling. "In most cases no official reason
for the outrage was advanced at the time," and the authorities generally seem to have been half-hearted in punishing the rioters and dilatory in considering Jewish protests. The usual charge brought against the Jews was that of siding with the Ukrainians. Such an accusation was made particularly in the towns of Preempt, Ustrzyki, and above all, and with the most destructive effects, in Lemberg. " The baaeleseness of the charge that the Jews had fought on the Ukrainian side," says Mr. Cohen, is proved by the fact that both at Prxemysl and at Lemberg proclamations of Jewish neutrality had been issued and recognized by the Committee of the United Polish Parties. When the Ukrainians claimed possession of Lemberg the Jews organized a Jewish Militia which was recognized both by the Ukrainians and the Poles, " and formal agreements were made both with the civil and military authorities." But racial feeling could not tolerate the declaration that the Jews " were neither Poles nor Ukrainians but only Jews, and they were to be punished not with a fine but with a pogrom." No login could stand against the onrush of racial antagonism, which, arising partly from economic and partly from political causes, had always been latent, and had been kept in cheek only " as long as both nations were equally subject to another Power" :- " The tenacity with which the Jews clung to their own national 'culture had made the Poles, whether under Russian or Austrian rule, look upon them as. an obstacle to the realisation of their national aspirations, whilst the existence of a large Jewish commercial and trading class amused among the Poles, who desired to create molt a class of their own, a feeling of rivalry and irritation. The feeling of antagonism was exacerbated during the war, for whilst the Pelee aimed at the restoration of their independence, the Jews, who were harassed by the Polish bureaucracy in Galicia and suffered from a severe boycott in Russian Poland, started long before the war under the zealous guidance of M. Dmowski, the leader of the National Democrats, continued loyal towards the sovereign State."
The Report is painful reading, riot only from its revelations of the brutality to the unhappy Jews in Galicia, but for the disappointment it must bring to all friends of Poland. It may be urged that Poland's side of the question has not been sufficiently considered or her provocations recognized, and, again, that Mr. Cohen may not have been as dispassionate an inquirer as he represents. But the pogroms have not, so far as we know, been denied, only excused. Further, quite apart from Mr. Cohen's evidence, the Western Powers, as we have stated, felt compelled last year to tell the new States that " if they indulged in bloodshed at the birth of their independence they could not reckon upon the help of the Western Powers in the task of their construction." Again, Mr. Cohen's Report shows that he was careful to consult Polish authorities as well as to go to Jewish sources for his information. Finally, R8 regards provocation, though no doubt a great many Poles have suffered at the hands of clever Jewish financiers, who are the great financial experts of Poland, and though again the presence in their midst of a large alien population, antipathetic to their ideals and suspected of pro-German tendencies, must have been in the highest degree inflaming to the Poles, these things do not excuse the outrages. No provocation can justify wholesale murder and pillage, rape and arson. It has been a tradition in this country to sympathize ardently with Poland during her years of agony and to long for her release. She has stood for us as the archetype of the oppressed and despoiled nation, and her emancipation was one of the most glorious achievements of the Great War, and one of our greatest rewards for the sacrifices we ourselves made in it. History over and over again has taught us the bitter truth of Cromwell's words, quoted by us at the beginning of this notice. We hoped that Poland would show herself a shining exception to the unhappy rule. Hers was a wonderful oppor- tunity, and it is not yet past. Her people, with their imagina- tion, their brilliant gifts, their capacity for appreciation of what is noble and beautiful in the arts, could easily be an example of what a freed State should be, to the many small States now emerging into liberty and facing its perils as well as its privileges. At the moment the moderating influences that first showed themselves have become superseded. M. Padereweki has felt compelled to leave the Government, and the military party, ambitious abroad and intolerant at home, are in power. Friends of Poland must earnestly hope that this time of passion, of violent revulsion from suppression to oppression, may quickly pass and leave her with a clearer vision, in which she will realize
that no State can truly endure that is not founded on justice and liberty.
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