Marek Edelman, a prominent heart surgeon and one of the last survivors of the 1943 Warsaw Ghetto uprising, was fired from his position at the Lodz hospital last week and denied a passport to travel abroad, it was reported Sunday by Le Monde. His wife and family live in France.
According to Le Monde, Edelman, 65, was dismissed without explanation. The paper noted that because of the shortage of medical practitioners in Poland, physicians are generally allowed to continue working after retirement age.
The paper quoted Edelman as saying he was refused a passport because “it was probably considered that such a visit (to France) would endanger the security of the Polish State.”
As a young medical student in 1943, Edelman helped organize and then led the ZOB (Zydowska Organizacja Bojowa — Jewish Fighting Organization). He was one of a handful of Jews who managed to flee the ghetto before it was razed by the Germans.
After the war he completed his medical studies in Poland and worked as a surgeon, chiefly in his native city of Poznan. Although he avoided polities, he became one of the main spiritual leaders of the Solidarity Movement. He was imprisoned in 1981 for his statements in favor of Solidarity and its leader, Lech Walesa.
In 1983, Edelman refused to join the Honorary Committee to commemorate the 40th anniversary of the Ghetto uprising because of its official sponsorship by the Polish government.
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
