
-
Tsunoda vows to bring 'something different' after Red Bull promotion
-
Verstappen not happy with Tsunoda-Lawson Red Bull swap
-
Experts accuse 54 top Nicaragua officials of grave abuses
-
Remains of 30th victim of Los Angeles fires found
-
EU to target US online services after Trump tariffs: France
-
How Trump's 'liberation day' tariffs will impact China
-
Malaysia suspends search for long-missing flight MH370
-
Search for long-missing flight MH370 suspended: Malaysia minister
-
Europe hits out at Trump tariffs, keeps door open for talks
-
Myanmar's junta chief to head to Bangkok summit as quake toll surpasses 3,000
-
Lawson vows to prove he belongs in F1 after shock of Red Bull axing
-
Australia sweats through hottest 12 months on record: official data
-
Livestock theft is central to jihadist economy in west Africa
-
South African artist champions hyenas in 'eco-queer' quest
-
Danish PM in 'unity' Greenland visit amid US takeover threats
-
Taiwan says US tariffs 'highly unreasonable'
-
Lawson says ruthless Red Bull axing was 'tough to hear'
-
Heat humble Celtics for sixth straight win, Thunder roll on
-
Trump escalates trade war with sweeping global tariffs
-
Japan says US tariffs 'extremely regrettable', may break WTO rules
-
South Koreans anxious, angry as court to rule on impeached president
-
Juve at in-form Roma with Champions League in the balance
-
Injuries put undermanned Bayern's title bid to the test
-
Ovechkin scores 892nd goal -- three away from Gretzky's NHL record
-
Australian former rugby star Petaia signs for NFL's Chargers
-
China says opposes new US tariffs, vows 'countermeasures'
-
Athletics world watching as 'Grand Slam Track' prepares for launch
-
Heat humble Celtics for sixth straight win, Cavs top Knicks
-
Quake-hit Myanmar's junta chief to head to Bangkok summit
-
New Spielberg, Nolan films teased at CinemaCon
-
Shaken NATO allies to meet Trump's top diplomat
-
Israel's Netanyahu arrives in Hungary, defying ICC warrant
-
Shiny and deadly, unexploded munitions a threat to Gaza children
-
Stocks tank, havens rally as Trump tariffs fan trade war
-
Altomare hangs on to tie defending champ Korda at LPGA Match Play
-
Paraguay gold rush leaves tea producers bitter
-
Health concerns swirl as Bolivian city drowns in rubbish
-
Syria says deadly Israeli strikes a 'blatant violation'
-
Financial markets tumble after Trump tariff announcement
-
Starbucks faces new hot spill lawsuits weeks after $50mn ruling
-
Europe riled, but plans cool-headed response to Trump's tariffs
-
'Shenmue' voted most influential video game ever in UK poll
-
New coal capacity hit 20-year low in 2024: report
-
Revealed: Why monkeys are better at yodelling than humans
-
Hemogenyx Pharmaceuticals PLC Announces FDA Annual Report
-
Pantheon Resources PLC Announces Participation in Upcoming Investor Conferences
-
Key details on Trump's market-shaking tariffs
-
'A little tough love': Top quotes from Trump tariff talk
-
US business groups voice dismay at Trump's new tariffs
-
Grealish dedicates Man City goal to late brother

Politicians put spin on story of Poles who saved Jews: experts
The beatification of a Polish family who sheltered Jews during the Holocaust has given the government in Warsaw a chance to promote a one-sided narrative about attitudes of Poles in the war, experts have said.
Ahead of a ceremony on Sunday bestowing the Catholic honour on the Ulma family, who were killed by the Nazis, their story is being widely shared in Poland, with exhibitions, concerts and new books, including for children.
Presidential adviser Marcin Przydacz told Polish radio PR1 that the event has "a dimension of building up the image of Poland, and of historical truth".
Six million Polish citizens, including three million Jews, were killed by the Nazis.
The Yad Vashem memorial, which is dedicated to the memory of the Holocaust, honours 7,232 Poles as "Righteous among the Nations" for helping Jews during the Nazi occupation at a time when doing so was punishable by death.
- Heroic and tragic -
But historians say the sacrifice of those who helped Jews cannot be used to whitewash the past.
For years the authorities have denied the collaboration of some Poles with the Nazis and the indifference of a large part of the population to Jewish suffering.
"History is not a buffet where you can pick and choose what you want but that is how politicians are treating it," said sociologist Agnieszka Haska of the Polish Center for Holocaust Research.
"The story of the Ulma is heroic and tragic but cases of Jews being saved were not as numerous as politicised history now would have you believe... The Righteous were an extreme, just like those who collaborated," she said.
Haska said that "as victims of the Second World War, we are incapable of accepting that we were not as noble as we think."
For more than a year, the Ulma family hid eight Jews of the Goldmann and Grunfeld families in the village of Markowa in southern Poland.
Turned in by a Polish policeman, they were all executed -- including the children -- by Germans on March 24, 1944.
The mother was pregnant with her seventh child and began giving birth during the execution. The baby did not survive.
In 1995, the family were awarded the medal of Righteous among the Nations from Yad Vashem.
Since 2016 there has also been a museum in Markowa and the government has decreed March 24 the "National Day of the Memory of Poles who saved Jews".
- Patriotic discourse -
"Their story is used as a counter-argument to accusations of anti-Semitism and to polish Poland's image abroad," Zuzanna Radzik, an expert in Polish-Jewish dialogue, told AFP.
For her, the Ulma story "has become a choice excerpt for patriotic discourse because it was a family of peasants with many children and Catholic, which died."
Jan Grabowski, a Holocaust historian at the University of Ottawa, says, however, that after the execution of the Ulmas, 24 Jews in Markowa were killed by their Polish neighbours.
The example of the Ulmas allows politicians to make declarations not supported by historians.
Polish President Andrzej Duda in a speech in Markowa in March said that "thousands of the million Poles who helped Jews... were assassinated in this way", while Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki has said "millions" of Poles helped.
Historians estimate that around 30,000 Poles actively helped Jews.
"In Markowa, a village of 1,000 homes, around 20 Jews survived. It's not a lot" compared to 120 Jewish inhabitants before the war, said Grabowski.
Along with other Holocaust historians, including Barbara Engelking, Grabowski has become the target of various trials brought by government-financed bodies for "defamation" and "anti-Polish activities".
In June, Education Minister Przemyslaw Czarnek said he would cut financing for Holocaust studies carried out by Engelking at Warsaw University saying her research was of a "disgusting stupidity".
Grabowski said that exploiting the image of the Righteous serves to "hide the things Poles cannot face".
Y.Aukaiv--AMWN