Few countries suffered as much under the Nazis as Poland did during the Second World War.
And yet, more than 70 years later, it has become a center on the continent for the far right, and liberal critics say the government isn’t doing anything about it. In fact, they say, the Polish far right feels increasingly emboldened by what it perceives as governmental recognition.
On Saturday, an estimated 60,000 people marched alongside ultranationalists and Nazis to mark the 99th anniversary of Polish independence. As my colleague Avi Selk summarized, some of the protesters carried banners and held up signs that had a clear far-right extremist message:
“Clean Blood,” as seen by Politico.
“Pray for an Islamic Holocaust,” per CNN.
The march was distinct from other European far-right events
European Nazis and members of the far right have co-opted other commemorations and celebrations around Europe in the past, as well. In the eastern German city of Dresden, for example, Nazis march every February to mark the destruction of the city by Allied forces during the Second World War. Officials usually condemn such marches as a misguided and dangerous form of nationalism that crosses the line into white supremacy and Nazi ideology. In Germany, leading politicians frequently join rallies in protest of the marches, which have taken place for decades.
That was not the case during this weekend’s rallies in Warsaw, which elicited little government condemnation.
The origins of Poland’s “independence march” are fairly recent and date to 2009. The annual event has attracted an increasing number of supporters over the years and is now considered one of the world’s biggest far right marches. It not only draws visitors from other Eastern European countries, where ultranationalist tendencies have become particularly pronounced since the 2015 refugee crisis, but also from Western Europe and the United States.
Liberals allege government support for ultranationalists
Saturday’s march was not organized or officially promoted by the governing right-wing Law and Justice party. Yet, despite the extremist slogans and posters, officials refrained from condemning the march, and even publicly voiced support: In a statement on Monday, Poland’s Foreign Ministry defended the march as a largely patriotic event and “a great celebration of Poles,” although the ministry condemned racist, xenophobic and anti-Semitic remarks. The interior minister had previously called the rally “a beautiful sight.”
Even if he may have been unaware at the time of some of the posters held up at the rally, he probably must have known who was behind this annual protest. The organizers include anti-Semitic and anti-Muslim radical groups such as the All-Polish Youth and the National-Radical Camp, according to the Associated Press.
Members of the All-Polish Youth movement have had strong ties to the Law and Justice party in the past. In 2006, the former chairman of the movement was named as Poland’s vice prime minister.
On social media, critics of the government accused the ruling party of trying to silence people opposed to ultranationalism, pointing to the arrests of counterprotesters on Saturday and the possible prosecution of a journalist who read out some of the extremist slogans on live TV. Of the 45 people arrested on Saturday, none were far-right extremists. Only anti-fascist demonstrators were detained.
“The apparent tolerance shown for these purveyors of hate — and, let’s be clear, that’s exactly what they are — by some Polish government officials is particularly troubling,” Agnieszka Markiewicz, director of the American Jewish Committee’s Warsaw office, told the AP.
The European Jewish Congress worried about the “normalization” of such protests and what it deemed an insufficient government response.
