strictly Orthodox and did not know thernHaskalah. Such Jews as those portrayedrnin Eliza Orzeszkowa’s Meir Ezofovitch orrnMaria Dabrowska’s Nights and Days are,rnI feel, an unwelcome memory for sophisticatedrnAmerican Jews. They are rememberedrnas victims of the holocaustrnbut not as part of the Polish nation,rnAmerican Jews of Eastern Europeanrndescent do not wish to know that theyrnmatured as a political entity within arnmid-sized Catholic nation in East-rnCentral Europe, a nation which did notrnrun its own affairs very well and eventuallyrnwas swallowed up by its neighbors.rnAs regards Messieurs Weiss and Dershowitz,rntheir eagerness to shout aboutrnPolish dirty laundry is a preemptive attack,rnin view of the fact that during thernSoviet period there accumulated quite arnbit of Jewish dirty laundry in Poland,rnstartmg with Jakub Berman, eminencerngrise of Stalin’s security police in thern1940’s and 50’s, on whose conscience liernthe tortured deaths of some 20,000 PolishrnHome Army soldiers. Berman died inrnhis bed.rnJohn Sack points out that, after WorldrnWar II, the institutions of the State SecurityrnOffice were “full of Poles, 150,000rnPoles from the antecedents of Solidarity.rnIn places like Gleiwitz, the Poles stoodrnagainst the prison wall as Implementationrntied them to big iron rings, said,rn’Ready!’ ‘Aim!’ ‘Fire!’, shot them, andrntold the Polish guards, ‘Don’t talk aboutrnthis.’ The guards, being Poles, weren’trnpleased, but the Jacobs, Josefs andrnPineks, the Office’s brass, stayed loyal tornStalin, for they thought of themselves asrnJews, not as Polish patriots. And that’srnwhy the Good Fairy Stalin, the man whorndidn’t hate the Germans but who abhorredrnthe Enemies of the People, thernAgents of Reactionary Elements, thernOppressors, Imperialists and Counterrevolutionaries,rnbe they the Germans,rnRussians or Poles, had hired all the Jewsrnon Christmas Eve, 1945, and had packedrnthem into his Office of State Security,rnhis instrument in the People’s Republicrnof Poland.rn”And now, 1945, the Poles went to warrnwith the Office, shooting at Jews in Intelligence,rnInterrogation and Imprisonment,rnthe Jews concluding that the Polesrnwere antisemitic, the Poles contendingrnthat no, they yere only anti the Office.”rnIntimidated out of their wits, the Polesrnin this country do not even dare to mentionrnin public this dark chapter in EasternrnEuropean history. The recent bookrnon the subject by Jewish author JohnrnSack, An Eye for an Eye, has been greetedrnnot with rebuttal, but with silence.rnIt is a remarkable fact that the fall ofrncommunism in Central and Eastern Europernhas brought forth nothing like arnNuremberg commission. The Nazisrnruled Poland for six years, the communistsrnfor 45; arguably the communists ruinedrneven more lives than did the Nazis.rnBut any investigation of the terror apparatusrnin Poland would yield such a disproportionatelyrnhigh number of secularrnJews that Poles dare not undertake it.rnThe search for justice, which Sack rightlyrnnotes as a hallmark of Judaism, is a luxuryrnwhich the Poles cannot, under therncircumstances, afford.rnBut Professor Gottfried has taken arnbig step toward seeking a just presentationrnof the Polish nation, a nation whichrnhe clearly understands far better than dornsome PoHsh intellectuals today. His articlernis more than a mitzvah, and if thernPoles are ever granted breathing space tornbuild their own Yad Vashem, the namernof Paul Gottfried should feature prominentlyrnon the roll of the righteous.rn—Ewa M. ThompsonrnProfessor of Slavic StudiesrnRice UniversityrnHouston, TXrnPaul Gottfried’s “Polonophobia” in thernJanuary issue was a pleasant surprise.rnGottfried is right; Poland has become arn”whipping boy” for the American media.rnIt is not the tendency to find morernand more reasons to speak badly aboutrnPoles and Poland that bothers us at thernPolish National Alliance, but the tendencyrnto rewrite the real history of WorldrnWar II, both prewar and postwar. As ProfessorrnRichard C. Lucas (author of ThernForgotten Holocaust) stated: “History isrnno longer a science, but a tool of the partisanrnviews, indeed, the propaganda.”rnProfessor Gottfried has touched therntip of the iceberg. For the past severalrnvears we haye tried to respond in a civilizedrnway to the false accusations and attacksrnbased on false presumptions, to thernlack of real knowledge and, in most cases,rnthe cumulated ethnic hatred towardrnthe Poles and Poland, from people whornare not historians and who have personalrngrudges and faulty memories. The casernof Yaffa Eliaeh and her anti-Polish campaignrnand the list of new accusations inrnthe summer editions of the New YorkrnTimes based on twisted facts and totallyrnwrong assessments (Polish Home Armyrnand the Government-in-Exile in Londonrnas perpetuators of Hitler’s plans)rndemonstrate that what we are dealingrnwith is a kind of maniac obsession hayingrnnothing to do with “new discoveries” inrnhistory but a lot to do with dirty psychologicalrncompensation.rn—Dr. Wojciech A. WierzewskirnThe Polish National AlliancernChicago, ILrnOn Religious StudiesrnCongratulations to Philip Jenkins for hisrnbalanced article “Teaching Religion andrnReligious Teaching” (December 1996).rnI witnessed the peculiar status of religiousrnstudies programs during my undergraduaternyears (1976-80), when mostrnmajor public university humanities programsrnvyere dominated by people whosernvarious political disagreements werernbridged by a shared hostility toward traditionalrnJudaism and Christianity. Thatrnhostility translated into an aggressivernmisinterpretation of the First Amendmentrnwhich absolutized the establishmentrnclause (freedom from religion),rnwhile trashing the free exercise (freedomrnfor religion) and freedom of speechrnclauses.rnThis hostility toward Jewish andrnChristian faith combined with naiveternregarding religio-political passions, leavingrnmore moderate academics defenselessrnagainst movements claiming secularhumanistrnjustification (i.e., based onrnequal rights and personal responsibility).rnWhile militant Afroeentrists, feminists,rnand Hispanic and “queer” nationalistsrnbelieved neither in equality nor personalrnresponsibility, secular humanists, alreadyrnin thrall to therapeutic notions opposedrnto equality and responsibility, no longerrnknew what they believed.rnDespite their own internal chaos, therninsurgents won through aggression andrnthe appearance of certainty. Secular humanistsrnfancied themselves as being universallyrntolerant, but thev were simultaneouslyrnfascinated with and afraid ofrnthose who seemed certain and ruthless.rnOnee ensconced in their own autonomousrnprograms, the insurgents setrnabout taking over, beefing up, and agitatingrnfor one program after another (remedialrnskills, minority counseling, Englishrnas a Second Language, education,rnEnglish literature, comp lit, etc.). Need-rn6/CHRONICLESrnrnrn