news brief Israeli Knesset speaker pans passing of Polish Restitution Law, urges Polish president 'to veto this wrongful law'

The Polish parliament passed yesterday the controversial restitution law meant to end claims for confiscated property compensation from the Holocaust period.

Relations between Poland and Israel – as well with Jews worldwide – have been stained over the highly-charged law.

In response to the Polish parliament's approval of the law, Speaker of the Knesset Mickey Levy decided not to re-establish the Israeli-Polish parliamentary friendship group.

He issued a statement – including a personal appeal to the Polish president – through the Government Press Office:

"The anti-restitution law restricting property claims by victims of the Holocaust is a daylight robbery that desecrates the memory of the Holocaust. Poland’s decision to pass this immoral law harms the friendship and bilateral relations between Israel and Poland. Consequently, there is no place to re-establish the parliamentary friendship group between the Israeli Knesset and the Polish Sejm and Senate, which regularly holds various activities to strengthen ties between the countries.

I urge the President of the Republic of Poland, H.E Andrzej Duda, to veto this wrongful law.”

The law only goes into effect after the president approves it. Duda has 21 days to either sign it into the statute books or veto it.