Lecture: Can we have two homelands? Zionism in the Second Polish Republic.

The extraordinary dynamics of the Zionist youth movement caused Betar - one of the biggest youth movements in interwar Poland - to organize his congregations on the model of Polish patriotic celebrations, to call on his members to "behave like Poles" and to invite representatives of the Polish government to celebrations organized by him. During the lecture the participants will consider why the youth Zionist movement in Poland in the 1930s perceived participation in Polish patriotic demonstrations and joint exercises with Polish paramilitary militias as Zionist activity. Prof. Daniel Kupfert Heller will reconstruct the image of the turbulent life of Polish-Jewish youth on the eve of the Holocaust, based on the accounts of Betar members.

Daniel Kupfert Heller is a professor at McGill University in Montreal. He specializes in the history of Jews in Eastern Europe during the 20th century, Zionism and modern Israel. He also deals with the history of Polish-Jewish relations and the history of humanitarian aid.