AJC Mourns First Anniversary of Polish Plane Crash

["Ari Gordon" <gordona@ajc.org>]

AJC Mourns First Anniversary of Polish Plane Crash

April 10, 2011 - New York - On the first anniversary of the Polish plane
crash that killed Polish President Lech Kaczynski, his wife and the 94 other
passengers on board, AJC bowed its head in painful memory, sorrow and
solidarity with the Polish people.

The crash, as the plane approached Smolensk, Russia, in inclement weather on
April 10, 2010, left no survivors. The group was going to the Katyn Forest
to mark the 60th anniversary of the Soviet massacre of 20,000 Polish
military officers, when Moscow was aligned with Hitler's Germany.

In addition to the president and first lady, leaders of the Polish military,
other government officials, members of the Polish Parliament, religious
leaders, relatives of the Katyn victims, and the flight crew were all among
the victims.

When the news of the disaster first arrived, AJC issued a statement that
read in part:

"We knew President Kaczynski very well, as we did several members of his
entourage who also lost their lives in the accident. We last met the
President in Warsaw in February (2010), where we thanked him for his
powerful speech at the 65th anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz a few
weeks earlier, agreed on the profound danger posed by the Iranian nuclear
program, and discussed the current state of Polish-American bilateral ties.
That meeting followed many earlier AJC meetings in the Polish capital, as
well as in Israel, when he attended the country's 60th anniversary
celebration, and the United States, when he made official visits here."

Among the others who lost their lives a year ago, AJC had two very special
friends, the organization's executive director, David Harris, recalled:

"Andrzej Przewoznik was the Secretary-General of the Polish Council for the
Protection of Struggle and Martyrdom sites. In that role, he was AJC's
indispensable partner in the landmark project, coordinated by the Polish
government and AJC, to demarcate, protect and memorialize the site of the
Nazi death camp in Belzec, located in southeastern Poland. In less than a
year, approximately 500,000 Jews were killed in an area barely the size of a
few football fields. Only two Jews survived. Until the massive collaborative
project was completed in 2004, thanks in such large measure to Andrzej's
efforts, the area had been completely neglected.  

"Mariusz Handzlik was an exceptional Polish diplomat who served in
Washington, at the UN and, at the time of his death, was on President
Kaczynski's staff. His friendship for Israel and the Jewish people knew no
bounds. He was always eager to find new ways to reinforce those ties. Like
all of us at AJC, he was also a steadfast admirer of Jan Karski, the Polish
wartime hero who tried in vain to alert the world to the Nazi Final
Solution. Mariusz was thrilled when AJC named an award after Karski, who
passed away in 2000, to honor individuals who struggle against
anti-Semitism."

"On this sad anniversary for Poland and its friends, the vibrant lives of
those on that ill-fated flight will continue to loom large for us. They went
to mourn at the Katyn Forest. Instead, it is now we who mourn them. Their
lives were a blessing and shall always serve as an inspiration," Harris
concluded.

>Ari M. Gordon
>Special Advisor 
>Interreligious and Intergroup Relations
>American Jewish Committee
>165 E56th Street
>New York, NY 10022
>(212) 891-6717