Jewish Museum Becomes Latest Flashpoint for Polish Government
- Donors, Jewish groups call on government to name new director
- Lack of leadership at museum hurts its reputation, funds
The Museum of the History of Polish Jews in Warsaw.
Photographer: Janek Skarzynski/AFP via Getty Images
Warsaw’s award-winning Jewish museum has become the latest source of tension between Poland and the Jewish community after the government has repeatedly clashed with international allies over the telling of the country’s World War II history and the memory of the Holocaust.
The latest row is over the fate of the director of The Museum of the History of Polish Jews, Dariusz Stola, who joined the international criticism of a law from 2018 that criminalizes any suggestion the nation was responsible for the mass murder of Jews. Culture Minister Piotr Glinski is ignoring the result of an open contest, which Stola won two months ago, and is refusing to reappoint him.