The activities of Jewish political parties in Poland during 1918-1926

• Main Author: Evhen Gorb
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Published: Ukrainian Center for Cultural Studies 2013-09-01
• Series: Cхід
• Subjects: асимілятори; ортодокси; сіонізм; фолькізм
• Online Access: http://skhid.kubg.edu.ua/article/view/15934

The position of the Jewish minority in the political life of the Second Polish Republic was markedly different from that of other ethnic minorities. The Polish authorities to restrict, and even suppress the activity of Jewish political organizations. In the inter-war Poland were five main areas of the political movement of the Jewish community - assimilation, orthodox, Zionist, socialist and folkists. Assimilators treated Jews as an integral part of the Polish people. They were fully committed to the ideals of the Polish national liberation movement. Party orthodox direction characterized by protection of the rights of Judaism, the educational activities, a certain degree of conservatism (due to the fact that the religious factor they have always dominated the political).The main feature of the Zionists had the idea of creating an autonomous (or independent) of a Jewish state in Palestine. Jewish socialists predominantly showed solidarity with the Polish workers movement. Folkists Party of the main backbone of the ideology have done thesis on national-personal autonomy of Polish Jews. Political organizations of Polish Jews covered the full range of social and political movements. However, the popularity of the communist parties of the Jews was much higher than that of the Poles. Most of the Jewish political parties in one way or another supported the idea of a Jewish national-cultural autonomy in Palestine. Only for the Jewish Communists, this idea was not acceptable, as they sought to neutralize the national component - a revolutionary factor they always put above the national. Far more significant differences were in the forms of Jewish political parties. Some of them are confined to the cultural and educational activities, others - protests and demonstrations, but some did not stop before terrorist attacks. Unique phenomenon in the political life of Polish Jews from the interwar period was assimilators who do not recognize the Jewish national identity. A wide variety of areas of social and political life of the Jewish minority prevented a united political front of the Polish Jews, who have championed the rights of national minorities.