4 MAY 1944, Page 11

POLAND AND JEWS

Sig,—The recent discussion on the question of some Jews who left the Polish Army aroused a vital issue which has been overlooked and strangely neglected by those who should be most concerned. As I just recently left Poland and know the position there from my own experience I would like to point out the precarious conditions in which about half a million Jews still live on Polish territory thanks to the help extended to them by the Poles. It is a well-known fact that both those sheltering and sheltered are exposed to death every day and even every hour. I shall not go into details to show how the Jews are being saved from utter destruction. But I most earnestly consider it as my duty to say that German propaganda and German authorities most cunningly were and are exploiting every opportunity to find out the sheltered Jews and Poles who are helping them. It is more than obvious that the publicity given to the question of a small number of Jews who left the Polish Army served well the German barbarians as a new pretext. I think that already many Poles and Jews in occupied Poland paid with their lives for the unbelievable carelessness and disregard of those who for some mysterious reasons want to disrupt the stronger than ever common understanding existing between the equally suffering Jews and Poles at home. Indeed, this is not the kind of help the oppressed Jews in Poland expected from their western friends. No one in this country can possibly know or even have the slightest idea of their plight. None the less, a sense of propor- tion should be preserved in order to avoid everything that could addition- ally expose them. With regard to the small number of Jews who left the Polish Army, no truthful observer could deny that the news about their ill-treatment has been grossly exaggerated, and that the isolated cases of verbal arguments between Polish and Jewish soldiers are almost insignifi- cant when compared with the self-denial and complete friendship in common suffering between the Jews and Poles at home.—Yours faithfully,