The truth should be taught about the1948 war

H/T Margie.  This essay (and introductory quote below) was written by Shlomo Avineri and published in the June 17th edition of Ha’aretz.

“Just as nobody, even in German schools, would dream of teaching the German ‘narrative’ regarding World War II, the 1948 war should also not be taught as a battle between narratives. In the final analysis, there is a historical truth.”

On September 1, 1939, Nazi Germany invaded Poland. That is truth, not narrative. On December 7, 1941, Japanese planes attacked and destroyed the U.S. Pacific Fleet at Pearl Harbor. That is truth, not narrative.

Of course, there are also narratives. For example, the Germans had quite a few complaints against Poland. First, that in the 1919 Versailles Treaty, the victorious Western powers stripped Germany of territories with a large ethnic German population and annexed them to Poland (the “Polish corridor” ), while declaring Danzig, which had been a German city for generations, an international city. Moreover, Nazi Germany accused the Polish government of discriminating against ethnic Germans under its jurisdiction.

Women in Berlin’s ruins, c. 1947. The truth is clear: It was Germany that attacked Poland.

Not every claim in the German narrative was baseless, but the factual truth is clear: On September 1, 1939, it was Germany that attacked Poland, not Poland that attacked Germany.

Read the rest of the essay, here.

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