News
Who Built the Auschwitz German Concentration Camp?
Who Built the Auschwitz German Concentration Camp? A Controversial Statement by an Official of the World Jewish Congress
Polish Government Calls for Name Change on UNESCO List
In late March, the Polish government requested that UNESCO change the name of the concentration camp site. Polish deputy minister of culture Tomasz Merta wrote to the UNESCO World Heritage Center in Paris asking that the site, entered on the UNESCO list as “Auschwitz Concentration Camp,” be renamed. The proposed new version is “Auschwitz-Birkenau Former Nazi German Concentration Camp.”
The change is intended as a way of correcting the unfortunate term “Polish concentration camp,” which regularly appears in the world media, and even in the German press—as in a recent issue of the news magazine Der Spiegel, for instance.
“The old name is no longer comprehensible, especially to the younger generation. The new, more precise term associates the place with the Nazi regime in Germany,” said Merta, adding that he “did not expect the negative reaction to the new name. Germany today is a country that is not afraid to take responsibility for history.”
Criticism from the World Jewish Congress
In the “Global News” section of the World Jewish Congress website, an item dated April 7, 2006 stated that the Polish government’s suggestion about changing the official name of the "Auschwitz-Birkenau Concentration Camp" to "Former Nazi German Concentration Camp Auschwitz-Birkenau" had met criticism. Maram Stern, deputy secretary general of the World Jewish Congress, said that "[the Poles] want to redefine history by changing the name."
“Although the camp had been built and run by Nazi Germany, everybody in the area had known about its existence and workers were recruited from the Polish population in the neighboring village,” the item continued. “The government in Warsaw wants the history of Auschwitz, which is listed as a UNESCO world heritage site, to be separated from Polish history and make it clear that Poland had no involvement in the death camp. Officials in Warsaw expect an answer to the renaming request from UNESCO later this year,” the item concludes.
Reaction from the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum
In response to the information contained in the item suggesting that Poles living near the camp participated in its construction, the Museum director’s office has published a letter to Maram Stern, author of this unfortunate statement, from Henryk Świebocki of the Museum Historical Research Department.
The office of the director of the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum in Oświęcim fully endorses Dr. Henryk Świebocki’s view of the statements by Maram Stern of the World Jewish Congress and regards Dr. Świebocki’s view of the matter as correct:
Oświęcim, 10 April 2006
Henryk Świebocki
Senior Curator
The Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum
in Oświęcim
Mr Maram Stern
Deputy Secretary General
of the World Jewish Congress
World Jewish Congress
PO Box 90400
Washington,
DC 20090 USA
From the media I have learnt about your statement of 7 April 2006 in connection with renaming KL Auschwitz. Let me cite its fragment, “The Polish government redefine history by changing the name. […]Although the camp had been built and run by Nazi Germany, everybody in the area had known about its existence and workers were recruited from the Polish population in the neighboring village. The government in Warsaw wants the history of Auschwitz to be separated from Polish history and make it clear that Poland had no involvement in the death camp”.
I wish to believe, that when you made the statement you were not driven by ill will. But it rather resulted from your unfamiliarity with the subject. I do not dare to suspect you of making a suggestion that Poles are, to a certain degree, responsible for Auschwitz, and “The government in Warsaw wants […] make clear that Poland had no involvement in the death camp”.
Are you aware of the fact, that Auschwitz, before it became one of the death centers for Jews, had been established by Nazi Germany to exterminate Polish population? And of the fact that its first victims were Polish citizens? And that at least 75 000 Poles perished in the camp, being the second largest group of victims?
Among the victims was also my father, Karol Świebocki, a catholic, member of the Resistance Movement, who as a political prisoner survived only a month and a half in the camp and was killed in the gas chamber in Birkenau (KL Auschwitz II) at the beginning of August 1942.
You state that everybody in the area had known about the existence of the camp and workers were recruited from the Polish population. It is true. Everybody had known about the camp. Not only local population, but also the whole Poland knew the truth about KL Auschwitz, as well as the Allies, Western World, World and European Jewish Congresses, International Red Cross and Vatican. Due to secret contacts between the Polish underground, Polish local population and prisoners, documents and reports on the SS crimes were collected, handed over to the Polish Resistance Movement and then sent to the West. These materials consisted of data on the mass murder of Jews and extermination of Poles, Roma and Sinti, the Soviet POWs and other national and ethnic groups. The Polish Government in Exile in London published documents, reports and organized press conferences on the crimes being committed in Auschwitz. Even in its diplomatic notes, the Polish Government in Exile informed the Allies and neutral countries about KL Auschwitz. The public was aware of what was happening at KL Auschwitz, for instance, from BBC broadcasts, newspapers and publications or press conferences of the Polish Government in Exile in London.
You state that workers in the camp were recruited form the local Polish population. From the context, it seems to be an accusation, that they worked there. The implied meaning even suggests collaboration! I would like to explain that workers did not volunteer to work in the camp. In Poland under German occupation, there was a work constraint for people of both sexes over 14. Who did not obey the orders was subjected to persecutions, for instance: arrest, interrogation, imprisonment, concentration camp or forced labor in Germany. The workers, who were recruited from the local population, but mainly from the Upper Silesia population, were sent by German companies, which employed them, to conduct various works in the camp and adjacent area. Also, local farmers were forced to work, using their own means of transport - they had to deliver construction materials to the camp. Again, I would like to emphasize they were forced to conduct these works. Similarly, between May and June 1940, the Jewish Community from Oświęcim was forced to assign 300 Jews to work in order to prepare the grounds for the future KL Auschwitz. Should they be blamed for this?
I would like to emphasize that the Polish forced workers kept secret contacts with prisoners and provided them with assistance, food, medicine and smuggled their letters out of the camp. They also smuggled out of the camp documents concerning the Nazi crimes, which were sent to the West by the Polish Resistance Movement.
Miriam Jahaw, a Jewish survivor, recalls a Polish man, Oświęcim citizen, 22-year-old Janek, who as a civilian worker, electrician, worked in Birkenau (KL Auschwitz II) and helped selflessly her and her Jewish fellow prisoners to survive the camp. Secretly, risking his life, he smuggled food, medicine, cigarettes and pieces of clothes to the camp. Once Janek smuggled some yeast, which later turned out to be excellent and effective remedy for boils and open wounds of one prisoner, a Jewish woman, Lubka. Thanks to that during the selection she escaped the gas chamber. “I tried to find him after the war,” writes Miriam Jahaw-Szewach in her letter of 19 July 2004 to the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum in Oświęcim, “find his traces, thank him, that he passed the examination of humanity ‘in the times of disdain’, that he risked his life, showed us so much heart, understanding and provided with selfless help, unfortunately, I did not find him and I will never have a chance to tell him, how much I value his courage, which determined our survival. Until now, I have been recalling Janek with a deep emotion and I admire him for his attitude, which deserves a full recognition and gratitude.”
Please find enclosed my lecture (about assistance to KL Auschwitz prisoners) which was given at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington in 1999. It was published in the form of an article in Australia in 2006 (Henryk Świebocki, “How Poles Reacted to the Extermination of Prisoners at KL Auschwitz.” (In:) Genocide Perspectives III. Essays on the Holocaust and Other Genocides. The Australian Institute for Holocaust and Genocide Studies. Sydney 2-6, p. 198-213). In the notes on the authors of the publication, under the name Henryk Świebocki, you can find titles of my extensive works in English and German about attitudes of Polish population towards what was happening at KL Auschwitz. I recommend that you familiarize yourself with these works and form your own view on the subject.
Unfortunately, I can not offer you the last-year publication edited by me, 636 pages in length, because it was published only in Polish (Ludzie Dobrej Woli. Księga Pamięci Mieszkańców Ziemi Oświęcimskiej niosących pomoc więźniom KL Auschwitz [People of Good Will: Memorial Book of Oświęcim Land Residents Who Aided Auschwitz Concentration Camp Prisoners]. Ed. Henryk Świebocki, Oświęcim 2005). The book includes over 1200 names of Poles from the area adjacent to the camp and describes forms of their assistance as well as persecutions they suffered from the German occupant. Many of them paid with their lives for their activities. If a book is published in English, I will send it to you.
Yours sincerely,
Henryk Świebocki
