A political storm erupted in Poland after a parliament member known for his antisemitic views, Grzegorz Braun, delivered an inflammatory speech outside the gates of the Auschwitz-Birkenau extermination camp over the weekend.
Braun attacked Jews, claiming they sought "special treatment" in Poland, and accused the police of favoring them.
He declared, "Poland is for Poles", and added that other peoples, including Jews, "have their own states."
He mocked government efforts to strengthen Jewish culture in the country, comparing it to "inviting a dangerous neighbor to live next door."
Braun also claimed that the site of the former Nazi extermination camp is "effectively extraterritorial", and threatened that if his party came to power it would dismantle the International Auschwitz Council.
The remarks came at a sensitive time, while the Polish government is advancing a national plan to combat antisemitism and strengthen Jewish life in Poland for 2025-2030.
Waldemar Żurek, Poland's justice minister and attorney general, said he would take legal steps against Braun. "Antisemitic rhetoric has no place in Poland - it harms the country's standing in the world", he stressed, and accused Braun of turning Auschwitz, a symbol of Nazi atrocities on Polish soil, into a "political playground."
This is not the first time Braun has provoked an antisemitic controversy. In 2023 he tried to extinguish a menorah placed in the Polish parliament. In July this year he denied in a radio interview the existence of gas chambers at Auschwitz and called them "fake" - and was taken off the air in the middle of the interview.
Braun also consistently opposes paying compensation to Holocaust survivors, and has faced attempts to strip his parliamentary immunity over remarks that downplay Nazi crimes - an act prohibited under Polish law.