Jan Tomasz Gross

Neighbors: The Destruction of the Jewish Community in Jedwabne, Poland

The reason why half a Polish village one day in 1941 killed the other half was -alledgedly- anti-Semitism. Actually it could have been any other reason, as it could have been any other place in the world. When hatred, envy, and the darkest in the human soul is countinuously aroused against a population, then these things happen, even today. This book serves as a warning to evil sowers of propaganda in their own political benefit, demogogues of all nationalities.

Just after the Second World War 1,600 Jews (all the population except for 7) in a small town in Poland were killed by their murderous neighbors. The author does the daring job of exposing the facts as a true historian must, without sentimentalism or sentationalism. Just plain facts. Interviews with neighbors who remember the facts well after so many years and who know where the guilt lies because they stood by while the killing took place; and the documents of the investigation which ended with only one person sentenced to death.

The Jews couldn't believe that the neighbors they met everyday in the street would dare to literally gather them together and burn them up in a barn (or kill them with forks, axes, sickels). But it did happen. Only one person in town would take the risk to hide 7 of the would-be victims in her house. Amazing.

What a warning for all of us: there's a killer sleeping inside of each one of us. Don't let the devil stir him up.