BLOW TO ZIONISM: YOUNG ISRAELIS EMIGRATE TO BERLIN, OF ALL PLACES IN THE WORLD

Even The New York Times could not stay away this time from reporting on the strange phenomena of emigration of talented young Israelis to Berlin. Of all the places in the world, the capital of Germany appears to be a favorite destination city of the young professional and artistic elite of Israel. Apparently, Berlin's cosmopolitan flair, vibrant arts scene and advanced public transportation are huge draws to the young Israelis, faced with higher and higher costs of living in Israel and no prospects for decent middle class life. In many circles in Tel Aviv the fact of young Israelis happily emigrating to Berlin, the place in which Adolf Hitler designed the final solution of Jews, is met with horror and considered the ultimate failure of Zionism. The Israeli hipsters in Tel Aviv sport now T-shirts with inscriptions: "I love Berlin" or "I also want to go to Germany". While Berlin's Israeli community grows in numbers, in Israel grows the demand for teachers of German language... Strange times, indeed!

Janusz Andrzejewski, New York City based attorney, writes on legal and other community important topics. You can contact him by telephone (212-634-4250), or, through e-mail: janusz@januszandrzejewski.com

POLAND STUNNED WORLD CHAMPIONS GERMANY WITH A 2:0 VICTORY

National team of Poland finally managed to beat Germany on a football pitch. Saturday's 2:0 win at the beautiful National Stadium in Warsaw, in the qualifications to EURO 2016, was long overdue. Poland played Germany 18 times before, and never was able to record a win, even though all the football matches played between these two nations, except for one or two, were always evenly fought ferocious battles. Because of the history of German invasions of Poland and infliction of death and destructions of Polish cities and towns throughout the centuries, any encounter between the national teams from these nations always brings Poland to a stop during the game (same story as with respect to matches against Russia, another of our invading tormentors).
The most famous match between Germany (then West Germany) and Poland was played in Stuttgart, during the 1974 World Cup. Poland was the sensation of the tournament, to which they qualified by beating England 2:0 and then drawing at Wembley 1:1. During the World Cup itself, Poland was unstoppable by beating Argentina, Haiti, Italy, Sweden and Yugoslavia. The match in Stuttgart was to decide who would meet Holland in the big final in Munich. The Poles were the highest scoring team of the tournament, with Grzegorz Lato (7) and Andrzej Szarmach (5) being two leading scorers in the World Cup 1974. The unstoppable in his dribblings winger Robert Gadocha created 9 goals himself, whereas legendary playmaker Kazimierz Deyna, was voted one of the top 3 players of that world cup, together with such greats of the game as Johan Cruyff and Franz Beckenbauer. Germans, on the other hand, boasted - besides Beckenbauer - such stars as Meier, Breitner, Overath, Netzer and Gerd Muller. Had the match been played on a normal pitch, Poland would have likely won with their brand of quick-lightning football, and deadly forwards. Unfortunately, an hour before the match the pitch was flooded by heavy rains, and in current football the match would have to be postponed. However, the Germans pressed the officials to play the game as they realized that speed of Polish players would be neutralized by the puddles of water on the pitch. Since Poland then was subjugated by the Soviets and had no clout whatsoever with FIFA, the officials sided with West Germany, and the game was allowed to proceed. Notwithstanding the conditions, the match was dominated by Poland who created multitude of scoring opportunities, yet the ball would not cross the line, either because it would stop in the puddles of water, or in the arms of Sepp Meier, German goalkeeper playing the match of his life. On the other end, Jan Tomaszewski palmed away Uli Hoeness's penalty shot, but he was unable to stop a low shot by Gerd Muller. In the next match, the final against Holland, Germany beat the latter 2:1 and bagged their second world championship, whereas Poland went on to beat Brazil for the 3rd place in the world.
The German approach to the matches against Poland was summarized by coach Jurgen Klinsmann who in 2006 World Cup famously motivated the German national team ahead of the match against Poland, by saying something to the effect: "We can lose against anybody, but never can we allow to be beaten by Poland, never...". That game was also ferociously fought and the score stood at 0:0 until the last minute, when Oliver Neuville managed to somehow beat Artur Boruc, by sliding his body to push the ball through the goal line.
In 2011, in a friendly preparation game to Euro 2012, Poland was leading 2:1 in the last minute, yet the Germans equalized in the last gasp of the match through naturalized Brazilian, Cacau, and denied the Poles the elusive victory. Before Saturday's match, theses teams met the last time in May, 2014 in Hamburg, both in depleted squads, and the game ended again in a 0:0 draw, exactly as in 1971 in the same Hamburg stadium, during qualifications to EURO 1972, incidentally won by West Germany.
Last Saturday, the conditions were favorable to Poland, as Germany is currently in transition, after retirement of Lahm, Klose and Mertesaker, and injuries of Schweinsteiger, Khedira, Ozil and Reuss
had an impact on the Germans. Poland was also missing its best technical and creative player, Jakub Blaszczykowski, known by fans all over the world as Kuba. Yet Adam Nawalka, one of the young stars of 1978 World Cup, whose career was quickly finished by injuries, is rather a smart coach, and he knows Germany as he played against them himself. He improved dramatically Polish defense, and decided to surrender the midfield whereas he concentrated on quick transition from defense to attack. Poland did not have many breaks, perhaps 5 or 6, and ended up with 3 shots on target, yet 2 of them reached home. Clinical! Our best centre-half, Kamil Glik, finally showed why in Serie A he is known as the Wall, and whatever he could not stop, was stopped but our young goalkeeper Wojtek Szczesny (he earns his living at Arsenal London)  who smartly positioned himself on all German scoring opportunities, and probably had a better game than Jan Tomaszewski had at Wembley in 1973. The most decisive was though the role of Robert Lewandowski, who played huge role in diverting the attention of German defenders from Arkadiusz Milik and, after his substitution, from Sebastian Mila. On the first goal, Piszczek crossed toward Lewandowski and Milik, however, German defenders paid attention only to deeper placed Lewandowski, what allowed Milik to attack the ball freely, ahead of Neuer, the German goalkeeper, who attempted to correct his defenders' mistake, and Milik's glancing header ended up in the German's net. On the second goal, the ball was thrown to Lewandowski, who controlled it in the right corner of German penalty area, and cleverly shook off Durm, then seeing the other German defenders converging on him, Lewandowski passed the ball calmly to arriving in Sebastian Mila, who struck it immediately home with his left foot. Apparently, Neuer did not know that Mila is a left-footed player, for he expected Mila to control the ball with left foot and to strike it with his right foot.  Immediately, the National Stadium went in delirium for it became apparent that the first victory over Germany in football was in the bag. The vodka must have been streaming in Poland all night, as online readers of Guardian commented on. So, finally we took that monkey of our back, and future matches against the Germans would be from now on a less tense affair for the Poles.
The Warsaw victory is one of the string of recent successes by Polish sport, which is somehow catching up with Poland's economic success and is the next sign of normalcy of life in Poland. Three weeks ago, Poland's volleyball team won the men world championships and two weeks ago young Michal Kwiatkowski won the world championship in road cycling, whereas another young cyclist, Rafal Majka was the revelation in Tour de France, where he won the best climber jersey. Poland was recently also successful in track and field, speedway, team handball and tennis, and improved considerably in basketball, in addition to recording best ever medal catch in the Winter Olympic Games in Sochi.
Tomorrow comes match against Scotland, even more difficult than the one against Germany, as Scotland will likely "park the bus", leaving the attacking to Poland, who is not used to positional football, particularly without injured Kuba Blaszczykowski, the most creative Polish midfielder. As I am certain that counterattacking Polish team will handily beat Scotland in Glasgow, I am not so sure about the game played in Warsaw, notwithstanding the higher technical level of Polish team. The Scots are technically limited and although they can play quick physical football, they are predictable in their usual automatic schemes of play. I believe, though, thanks to the huge motivational kick in the form of victory over Germany, that we will prevail over Scotland, after all.  Godspeed, Poland! Naprzod, Polska!

Janusz Andrzejewski, a New York City based attorney, writes on legal and other important community topics. You can reach him by telephone (212-634-4250), 

 or, through e-mail: janusz@januszandrzejewski.com

TO THE SIMPLISTIC AMERICAN AND BRITISH MEDIA: POLAND IS NOT A PART OF EASTERN EUROPE

Reading the American or British newspapers or listening to their audio or visual media, one gets very often aggravated by constant description of Poland as an Eastern European nation. Frankly speaking, I'm tired of the media's ignorance, simplifications, shoddy journalism, sloppiness and constant inability to liberate themselves from the shackles of convenient stereotypes.
Even Wikipedia knows better, as describing Poland it properly says: "a country in Central Europe". The truth is Anglo-Saxon media description of present day Poland as an Eastern European nation is groundless and unjustified geographically, politically and culturally.
1) Geographically, Poland lies in the center of Europe and therefore it is a Central European country. If one draws the line between Portugal's Atlantic Coast on the western border of Europe, and the Ural Mountains on the eastern border of Europe, with the line between the northern tip of Scandinavia on the northern border of Europe and the southern tip of Sicily on the southern border of Europe, those lines will cross each other near Lodz in Poland. Therefore, the precise center of Europe is located near Lodz in Poland, which is at the same time the center of Poland, and consequently, Poland lies in Central Europe. Prior to World War II, when Poland was reaching much further to the east as it consisted of major parts of Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania, whereas some of the western territories of present day Poland were in Germany, describing Poland as being part of Eastern Europe was almost justified. Not at present though, I must repeat, as Poland is undoubtedly a Central European country.
2) Politically, Poland is in the Western Europe nowadays. Of course, during the Soviet domination of Poland after World War II (domination caused by the sell-out of Poland to Stalin by F.D.R., with weak resistance from Churchill, at Yalta Conference - an unprecedented betrayal of their biggest ally which came up with the 4th biggest allied military forces and military contribution, notwithstanding being occupied by Germany), Poland was politically part of Eastern Europe, however, it is no longer the case as Poland recovered its democratic system structures in 1989, became part of NATO in 1999 and a member of EU in 2004.
3) Culturally, Poland is part of the West for more than a thousand years as it accepted Latin Alphabet and Christianity, in the form of Roman-Catholic religion, in 966. Since then, all its literature, arts and culture otherwise is that of a western nation.
Perhaps it is the time for the managers of the western media to change your manuals of style and usage, with respect to Poland's location, or its description in political, cultural or geographical terms, since your education system is incapable to break out of the stereotypes formed during the cold war and your writers are still ignorant of basic facts concerning one of the big nations of Europe.

Janusz Andrzejewski, a New York City based attorney, writes on the legal and other important community topics. You can contact him by telephone (212-634-4250),  or through e-mail: janusz@januszandrzejewski.com