Poland arrests three in connection to antisemitic book burning rally

Police arrested two organizers of the rally in Kalisz, and a provocateur from a different city with a history of staging antisemitic displays

Poland's police arrest three in connection to antisemitic book burning rally (Jerusalem Post)
Officers arrested Wojciech Olszański and Marcin Osadowski, two organizers of the rally in Kalisz, and Piotr Rybak, a provocateur from a different city with a history of staging antisemitic displays, the Gazeta Wyborca daily reported on Monday.

The rally in Kalisz, a city of about 100,000 inhabitants situated 120 miles southwest of Warsaw, was part of a series of nationalist events on November 11, National Independence Day, the anniversary of when Poland regained its sovereignty in 1918.

Olszański was filmed lighting up a red-covered book that was meant to symbolize the Statute of Kalisz. The document issued in 1264 by Prince Bolesław the Pious regulated the legal status of Jews living in Poland and afforded some protection through penalizing attacks on them. The statute served as the legal foundation for relations between non-Jews and Jews in Poland for centuries later.

Photo: Demonstrators carry Polish flags during a march marking the National Independence Day in Warsaw, Poland November 11 (Dawid Zuchowigz/Agenca Wyborcza/Reuters)