If you want to generalize based on actions of individuals, then guess who else was complicit? Jews themselves! https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jewish_Ghetto_Police
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Judenrat https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C5%BBagiew
While indeed plenty of individual Poles were complicit, for various reasons - fear, greed, hatred - then there was NO institutional polish participation in the holocaust. Official authorities were german, and resistance authorities weren't antisemitic.
The purpose of this bill is to set straight things like that.
Well after reading the article it seems you may have misrepresented the issue
Including the first line makes it clear that the death camp part is an additional thing not the issue Netanyahu is quoted as objecting toIsraeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has criticised a draft Polish bill to make it illegal to accuse Poles of complicity in the Nazi Holocaust.
"I strongly oppose it. One cannot change history and the Holocaust cannot be denied," he said in a statement.
The bill, which is an amendment to an existing Polish law, would also make it illegal to describe Nazi death camps in Poland as Polish.
If some people from Poland were complicit (and some were) then the law is probably wrong (and so it seems it is)
The question is though to what extent the issue already exists if it is an existing law being amended.
Reading posts about my country (Poland) on MMo-champ always makes me laugh... and scares me at the same time.
Lack of basic political/historical knowledge is overwhelming.
The law speaks explicitly about the polish nation and the polish state, not about individual people.
„Kto publicznie i wbrew faktom przypisuje Narodowi Polskiemu lub Państwu Polskiemu odpowiedzialność lub współodpowiedzialność za popełnione przez III Rzeszę Niemiecką zbrodnie nazistowskie lub za inne przestępstwa stanowiące zbrodnie przeciwko pokojowi, ludzkości lub zbrodnie wojenne lub w inny sposób rażąco pomniejsza odpowiedzialność rzeczywistych sprawców tych zbrodni, podlega karze grzywny lub karze pozbawienia wolności do lat 3. Wyrok jest podawany do publicznej wiadomości. Przepis ten stosuje się do obywateli polskich i do cudzoziemców.”
I think it was said by Israeli finance minister and soon after Israel said that it's false. Of course, there were Poles killing Jews or at least partially responsible for their death but hundreds of thousands is taken out of his ass.
Here's the bill in Polish:
"Art. 55a.
1. Kto publicznie i wbrew faktom przypisuje Narodowi Polskiemu lub Państwu Polskiemu odpowiedzialność lub współodpowiedzialność za popełnione przez III Rzeszę Niemiecką zbrodnie nazistowskie określone w art. 6 Karty Międzynarodowego Trybunału Wojskowego załączonej do Porozumienia międzynarodowego w przedmiocie ścigania i karania głównych przestępców wojennych Osi Europejskiej, podpisanego w Londynie dnia 8 sierpnia 1945 r. (Dz. U. z 1947 r. poz. 367) lub za inne przestępstwa stanowiące zbrodnie przeciwko pokojowi, ludzkości lub zbrodnie wojenne lub w inny sposób rażąco pomniejsza odpowiedzialność rzeczywistych sprawców tych zbrodni, podlega karze grzywny lub karze pozbawienia wolności do lat 3. Wyrok jest podawany do publicznej wiadomości.
2. Jeżeli sprawca czynu określonego w ust. 1 działa nieumyślnie, podlega karze grzywny lub karze ograniczenia wolności.
3. Nie popełnia przestępstwa sprawca czynu zabronionego określonego w ust. 1 i 2, jeżeli dopuścił się tego czynu w ramach działalności artystycznej lub naukowej. "
1st point:
Untill bolded it's about putting the blame for Third Reich actions on Polish Nation and I totally agree with that (no more polish death camps)
but the bolded part ("putting the blame for other crimes against peace, humanity or war crimes") should be gone. It kind of makes teachers meet the condition when they mention, for example, Jedwabne (Polish Mnister of Education says that it's just an opinion that Poles killed Jews there while she avoids saying who did)
After bolded part there is one more condition - lessening the guilt of true preparators (but negating the Holocaust has been a crime not only in Poland but in many other countries for a long time) and the sentence - either a fine or up to 3 years of prison - and a note that the sentence will be made public.
2nd point:
If it's said unintentionally (for example someone is so uneducated), the sentence is changed to either a fine or freedom restricion other than prison (I assume some community work but it's not specified)
3rd point:
If that who commits the crime described above does it for science or art purposes will not be sentenced.
I've heard that this has been sent to Israel in this form some time ago and no objections have been made. Now they woke up that it indeed should be slightly changed but instead of sending an official letter, they make a world public fuss.
Because Jews weren't collaborating with GERMANS , right? Why don't they talk about that.
Nonsense inflation? I don't know the details about Poland, but in a lot of countries, collaboration was fairly widespread, and trying to pretend it didn't happen is silly. Yes, I know the Polish resisted the Nazis more than most, but that does not mean other parts of society did not collaborate, and it does not mean the government should legislate in an attempt to silence people. You spak of baby steps? I see baby steps on the way to widespread censorship, and that's never OK.
I know that, as someone who is part French, I would absolutely refuse for the government to pretend that the Vichy regime wasn't a pack of collaborators who threw Jews at Hitler in an attempt to garner his favor, and would be simply outraged if said government legislated in this direction. It is a denial of history.
Israel shouldn't talk about other countries.
Let me shed some light on it as a Polish person that can read the actual controversial part of the novelisation of the already existing bill in Polish instead of relying on silly articles that don't even quote the translation and engage in coming up with flashy headlines. The novelisation explicitly states it penalizes claims that the Polish NATION or STATE are responsible or co-responsible for the Holocaust. It says nothing about single cases - and that is exactly what they were, single cases - of collaborators who were mostly stigmatised during and after the war. It only penalizes phrases like "Polish death camps", which have strong implication of Poland and Polish nation as a whole being responsible for the Holocaust.
Noone is going to lock people up in prisons for researching confirmed or possible cases of collaboration or acts of violence against Jews.
"Art. 55a. 1. Kto publicznie i wbrew faktom przypisuje Narodowi Polskiemu lub Państwu Polskiemu odpowiedzialność lub współodpowiedzialność za popełnione przez III Rzeszę Niemiecką zbrodnie nazistowskie określone w art. 6 Karty Międzynarodowego Trybunału Wojskowego załączonej do Porozumienia międzynarodowego w przedmiocie ścigania i karania głównych przestępców wojennych Osi Europejskiej, podpisanego w Londynie dnia 8 sierpnia 1945 r. (Dz. U. z 1947 r. poz. 367) lub za inne przestępstwa stanowiące zbrodnie przeciwko pokojowi, ludzkości lub zbrodnie wojenne lub w inny sposób rażąco pomniejsza odpowiedzialność rzeczywistych sprawców tych zbrodni, podlega karze grzywny lub karze pozbawienia wolności do lat 3. Wyrok jest podawany do publicznej wiadomości.“
Here's the translation: "Whoever publicly, and against facts, holds Polish State or Nation responsible or co-responsible for crimes commited by Nazi Germany as stated in art. 6 of International War Tribunal Bill (blah blah), or for other crimes against peace and humanity or by other means drastically understates the responsibility of the actual perpetrators of said crimes, is subject to fine or imprisonment for up to 3 years."
So yeah, judge for yourself what the bill actually does.
1. The bill explicitly states the blame must be against facts
2. Jedwabne wasn't a crime by polish nation, but by a group of individual people, who didn't have any right or mandate to represent the nation, they weren't part of any national institution. In my opinion there is no way you could punish someone for talking about Jedwabne massacre based on this law.