Brothers Betrayed: Jews and Poles from 1500 until Today

Jews have lived on Polish lands for some nine hundred years. In that time, they and their non-Jewish neighbors have interacted in a wide range of ways, from friendship and co-operation to hatred and violence. In this course, we examine this centuries long relationship, focusing particularly on how peaceful co-existence between Poles and Jews could rapidly change to bitter hostility. Topics include: Jews and the early-modern nobility; the nineteenth-century “Polish-Jewish Brotherhood”; the exclusionary politics of the interwar Polish republic; Poland’s role in the Holocaust; the post-war Communist regime and the Jews; Polish-Jewish relations following the collapse of communism.