Pinchas Menachem Joskowicz

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Pinchas Menachem Joskowicz ( 1924 in Zduńska Wola - November 26, 2010 in Jerusalem ) was an Israeli-Polish rabbi and chief rabbi of Poland and Warsaw from 1988 to 1999.

Life

Joskowicz's parents were Hasidic Jews. During the Second World War he was interned in the Lodz ghetto and from there deported to Auschwitz-Birkenau . He was sent to the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp , where he was liberated in 1945. He emigrated to Palestine, where he took part in the Israeli War of Independence and completed his studies as a rabbi. For 17 years he was a military rabbi in the Israeli armed forces. He then started a family in Tel Aviv and built up a pharmaceutical company.

In 1988 he was appointed Chief Rabbi of Poland on the basis of an agreement between the governments of Israel and Poland. At first he was the only rabbi in Poland. In the early 1990s, he was attacked by Polish skinheads and sustained a head injury.

After Joskowicz had agreed to resign as chief rabbi in 1999, he caused a scandal while still in office when he publicly demanded the removal of a seven-meter-high wooden cross, which the Order of the Carmelites had at a meeting between Pope John Paul II and representatives of other religious communities Auschwitz concentration camp was established in 1988. Joskowicz's actions were criticized as undiplomatic by representatives of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum , the Association of Jewish Communities in Poland and the chairman of the Anti-Defamation League Abraham Foxman . However, he met with understanding from Foxman, as well as from the director of the World Jewish Congress Elan Steinberg .

Joskowicz returned to Israel in 1999.

literature

  • Matthew Brzezinski: Casino Moscow , Simon and Schuster, 2002, pp. 255-256
  • Geneviève Zubrzycki: The Crosses of Auschwitz , The University of Chicago Press 2008, pp. 1–4

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ M. Brzezinski: Casino Moscow , 2002, p. 256
  2. ↑ Eric J. Greenberg: Fallout From 'Mr. Pope 'Comment ( Memento of the original dated May 2, 2014 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. , The Jewish Week , June 18, 1999 @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.thejewishweek.com
personal data
SURNAME Joskowicz, Pinchas Menachem
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Joskowicz, Menachem
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Israeli-Polish rabbi
DATE OF BIRTH 1924
PLACE OF BIRTH Zduńska Wola
DATE OF DEATH November 26, 2010
Place of death Jerusalem