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What I learned as a Venezuelan when the Iran war sent me to Poland - opinion

From Jerusalem Post · (1d ago) English

Summarized and contextualized by DistantNews.

TLDR

  • A Venezuelan journalist's planned media tour in Israel was rerouted to Poland due to the Iran war, offering an unexpected historical perspective.
  • The experience in Poland, including visits to Warsaw and Auschwitz, provided crucial historical context for understanding contemporary antisemitism and global conflicts.
  • The journalist highlights the resurgence of antisemitism on college campuses and draws parallels to the risks faced by the Latino community, emphasizing the collapse of distance between past atrocities and present-day realities.

As a Venezuelan journalist, my journey to Poland, initially intended to cover events in Israel, took an unexpected turn due to the Iran war. Instead of reporting from Tel Aviv, I found myself in Auschwitz, a place that profoundly reshaped my understanding of history and its echoes in the present.

I walked on tiptoe so as not to step on the skeletons that are surely there beneath the surface.

— Irene ShasharRecounting her experience surviving the Holocaust as a child after escaping the Warsaw Ghetto.

Our fellowship with Fuente Latina, meant to explore the aftermath of the October 7 attacks, was disrupted by the conflict. However, this disruption led us to Warsaw, where the palpable scars of past destruction coexist with the resilience of life. This tension between devastation and renewal became a central theme of our experience.

Engaging with Holocaust survivors and descendants of survivors, like Irene Shashar and Ofer Laszewicki, brought the horrors of the past into sharp focus. Their personal stories, from escaping the Warsaw Ghetto to confronting modern-day antisemitism, underscored the enduring nature of hatred. The chilling encounter of Agata Miodowska with a taxi driver in Paris, who questioned her Jewish identity and ordered her out of the car, served as a stark reminder that the antisemitism that led to industrialized mass murder has not vanished.

Hitler was right.

— Unknown womanApproaching Ofer Laszewicki, a Spanish-Israeli journalist and grandson of Holocaust survivors, at a Jewish monument in Warsaw.

These encounters in Poland dissolved the abstract distance I once felt from such events. The rise of antisemitism on college campuses and the quiet tensions experienced by the Latino community due to immigration policies now feel less like distant headlines and more like immediate realities. Poland offered not just historical context, but a visceral understanding of how the past continues to inform the present and shape our world.

Are you Jewish?

— Taxi driverAsking Agata Miodowska, a guide at Auschwitz, in Paris after overhearing her discuss Shabbat plans.
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Originally published by Jerusalem Post. Summarized and contextualized by our editorial team with added local perspective. Read our editorial standards.

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