Poland’s Deputy Foreign Minister Władysław Bartoszewski did his countrymen a great disservice last month when he announced that Benjamin Netanyahu would face arrest if he attended the Jan. 27 ceremonies marking the 80th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz. He said membership in the International Criminal Court obligated Poland to respect its warrants for the arrest of Israel’s prime minister and defense minister.
Almost immediately, Prime Minister Donald Tusk and President Andrzej Duda stepped in to guarantee that there would be no arrests. The Polish government declared that ensuring the safe participation of Israeli leaders was “part of showing respect for the Jewish nation, whose millions of daughters and sons became victims of the Holocaust carried out by the Third Reich.” This revised decision reflects less on Israel’s attendance than on the nation Poland chooses to be.
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