WARSAW, POLAND — Chief Rabbi of Poland Michael Schudrich led a delegation of four other Polish Jewish community leaders to visit Israel this week to show solidarity with Israelis in the wake of the October 7 massacre.
The group met with the families of hostages, evacuees from the Gaza area, soldiers, and President Isaac Herzog. They visited the sites of the massacres and fighting in Israel, including Netivot, Sderot, Re’em, Kissufim, and Be’eri.
While normally it is Israelis sending delegations to Poland to visit Holocaust sites, Schudrich said the objective was to show Israelis “We’re with you, we’re one people,” and “also to see for ourselves and tell about it to more of our people, not only the Jewish community, but the [Polish] community at large.”
Shudrich said that at the beginning of the war, when many other solidarity missions arrived, his community was busy in Poland “getting the message out.”
“We’ve never done a solidarity mission before from Poland,” said Shudrich. “All five of us feel the obligation to go back and tell others.”
October 7 was a terrible pogrom, but Shudrich said that it wasn’t the Holocaust because the State of Israel and the Israel Defense Forces exist.
“While it didn’t work perfectly on 7 it did on October 8,” he said.
The pogrom and the Holocaust were “not the same thing, but on the other hand, we hear things on the human level that resonate in the same way.”
'I feel great hope for the beautiful Jewish people'
Shudrich said that he had the honor of helping soldiers stationed at a base near Kissufim. They had ordered tactical pants and shirts from Poland, but the shipments were canceled due to Houthi maritime terrorism. The soldiers contacted Shudrich, and he brought the tactical uniforms with him.
“To be able to see our soldiers, these gibborim, was incredibly important,” said Shudrich.
The rabbi said he also found his meeting with Herzog inspiring, because the president asked about the Jews of Poland, while Polish Jews were worrying about Israelis. Due to the capacity of being able to show so much care for one another, “I feel great hope for the beautiful Jewish people.”
The idea for the trip was his, said Shudrich. World Mizrachi said it worked to coordinate the delegation. The movement has worked to organize dozens of delegations from communities across the globe.
“In a time when the State of Israel is in deep pain and we are confronting an ongoing security threat on multiple fronts, it has been so encouraging to see how the Jewish people have a real desire to be here with us,” said World Mizrachi acting COO Rabbi Danny Mirvis. “The missions that we are able to facilitate are designed to be far more than ‘bearing witness’ trips but give people the sense that they are truly experiencing what Israel is going through and are able to demonstrate that the concept of one people with one heart is really what defines us as a nation.”