Protest

We are Polish Child Survivors of the Holocaust. Most of us lived in the ghettos and were even born there. Others survived in hiding. We were upset and offended by many public statements and especially appalled by the saying that: "the Jews confined in ghettos were in the beginning, much better off, than the non Jewish Poles, outside of its walls”. In reality they were many lonely children without any chance to survive as they're died on the ghetto's streets from hunger and diseases. When trying to escape from the closed ghettos we were denounced and brought to the Gestapo by Polish "black mailers; szmalcownicy” waiting outside. Only few of us survived, smuggled and hidden by some Righteous and exceptionally courageous Poles. Most of our families were assassinated by Germans and many of us, saved children, didn't even know our own identity.

Nowadays, in our eighties we're meeting with school pupils to tell them our life stories and to testify about the war atrocities committed by Germans on our Polish soil. Our mission is to teach them the truth and prevent the similar tragedies from occurring in the future. and tell the facts as we see them. We say: "never again”. We do not agree to be punished for telling the Truth.

We're deeply concerned by the awakening of the old demons of Nationalism and anti-Semitism. It's unforgivable mistake to awake those destructive forces for political purposes and short term gains in popularity. We call upon you to assume your historical responsibility and stop encouraging those harmful activities. We're calling on our fellow citizens to resist the proposed limitations of our right to speak freely.