Polish priest says on public TV that truth for Jews is whatever is beneficial to them

Representatives of Polish Jews complained to the state watchdog on media over a public broadcaster’s airing of an interview with a priest who said Jews have a unique understanding of the concept of truth.

Henryk Zielinski, editor-in-chief of the Catholic weekly Idziemy, said this on Saturday during an interview with TVP, according to the complaint that the Union of Jewish Communities in Poland filed on Monday with Poland’s National Council of Radio and Television.

Jews have “a completely different system of values, a different concept of truth,” Zielinski said. “For us, the truth corresponds to facts. For the Jew, truth means something that conforms to his understanding of what’s beneficial. If a Jew is religious, then truth means something God wants.”

In nonreligious Jews, “the truth is subjective or whatever serves Israel’s interests,” he added.

Zielinski cited the Passover Haggada. “Often these stories have nothing to do with facts,” the Catholic priest said.

The interviewer, Michal Karnowski, did not contest Zielinski’s assertions, according to the complaint.

Zielinski’s remarks violated the National Council of Radio and Television principles for content on public media, including its ban on ideas that “incite to hatred or discriminate on the grounds of race, disability, gender, religion or nationality,” the Jewish union wrote in its complaint.

The interview with Zielinski comes amid an increase in antisemitic rhetoric following a row between Poland and Israel, as well as with international Jewish groups, on a law passed in Poland last month that limits rhetoric on the Holocaust.

The law criminalizes blaming Poland for the Nazis’ crimes. Its opponents said it would complicate research and impede free speech on the genocide, in which thousands of Poles betrayed Jews to Nazis. Thousands of Poles also rescued Jews from the Holocaust. (JTA)