Following a diplomatic crisis that left Israel without an ambassador from Poland for nearly four years, the rift between the states is finally history, as Polish Ambassador Maciej Hunia presented his letter of credence and that of the recall of his predecessor to President Isaac Herzog.
Another envoy, Maltese Ambassador Claude Bonello, also showcased his authority to represent his country to Herzog on Monday. Each is a first-time ambassador with a distinguished career background.
“We have been waiting for this for a long time,” Herzog said as he greeted Hunia, a former chief of the Polish Foreign Intelligence Agency. “We are especially happy after four years...”
A downgrading of diplomatic relations between Israel and Poland had its genesis in August 2021 when Israel recalled ambassador Alexander Ben Zvi for consultations after Poland introduced legislation imposing a time limit on property claims regarding possessions initially confiscated by the Nazis, then by the Communists after the Holocaust.
Most of these property claims were by Jews.
Opposition leader Yair Lapid, who was then Israel’s foreign minister, pronounced the legislation to be antisemitic and accused Poland of failure to respect the greatest tragedy in history.
Lapid also advised then-Polish ambassador Marek Magierowski, who was on vacation before concluding his tenure in Israel, not to return.
Naftali Bennett, who was then the prime minister, endorsed Lapid’s move and declared that Poland was in contempt of the memory of the Holocaust.
Not the first time Israel and Poland disagreed over the Holocaust
This was not the first time that Israel and Poland were in disagreement over Holocaust memory and property claims, but this time it was more serious.
As it happened, Ben Zvi had been in the process of winding up his service in Poland and was subsequently sent to serve as Israel’s ambassador to Russia. As for Magierowski, he was sent to Washington to act as Poland’s ambassador to the US.
In February 2022, Lapid announced that Yacov Livne would be sent to Poland to serve as Israel’s ambassador. Livne duly presented his credentials to Poland’s President, Andrzej Duda, in July of that year.
In his conversation he had back then with Herzog, who engages in considerable behind-the-scenes diplomacy, Duda said that Poland would soon send an ambassador to Israel. That did not happen.
In July 2024, Poland’s Foreign Affairs Ministry announced that Hunia had been appointed as Poland’s ambassador-designate to Israel.
A little under a year ago, Hunia, who had previously visited Israel in other capacities, paid a preliminary visit to get to know the embassy staff and some of the Israelis with whom he would be dealing regularly.
He was introduced to everyone as the new ambassador. But when he returned in October 2024, it was not as ambassador, but as a charge d’affaires.
HUNIA HAD not been demoted before taking up his post. It was simply a refusal by Duda to sign the appointments of new ambassadors. Duda is aligned with Poland’s previous conservative, right-wing Law and Justice coalition, which, in December 2023, was defeated by the rival alliance headed by the current Prime Minister, Donald Tusk.
With Tusk’s approval, Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski terminated the service of 50 ambassadors, who had been appointed by the previous regime, in March 2024.
Duda was furious. This was a breach of standard procedure, whereby the president and prime minister of the state typically agree upon ambassadorial appointments and dismissals. Duda had not been consulted and therefore refused to sign the new appointments, thereby causing widespread diplomatic chaos.
In February 2025, Duda stated that he had reached an agreement with the government to end the dispute and that standard procedure was being restored.
The subject came up again in April when Herzog was in Poland for the March of the Living in which Duda also participated.
Agata Czaplinski, the charge d’affaires during the period when there was no Polish ambassador in Israel, did not return to Poland or take up a posting in another country. She remained in Israel, where she now heads the embassy’s political and economic division.
Ben Zvi has retired, and Magierowski is no longer a member of Poland’s foreign service. Livne completed his tenure in Poland, and Yaakov Finkelstein, the current ambassador, presented his credentials to Poland’s Undersecretary of State, Anna Radwan-Rohrenschef, in April of this year.
Duda, who officially leaves office in August, has been on a series of farewell tours abroad.
At their meeting on Monday, Hunia and Herzog discussed the common history of Jews and Poles. Both have met with numerous Holocaust survivors. In Hunia’s case, he has also met with non-Jewish survivors who lived through the war.
Moving on to discuss the present war in which Israel is embroiled, Hunia said that he had visited Kibbutz Kfar Aza, and had met there with survivors of the Hamas massacre.
Regarding the numerous contributions of Polish Jews to Polish culture, Hunia made particular mention of noted historian Shalom Ashkenazi.
Herzog, who has visited Poland several times, recalled that his trips were always for commemorative events. He said that he would rather come for cooperative initiatives, as there were numerous existing and potential bilateral collaborative ventures to explore.
Herzog also mentioned that his father, Chaim, had been the first president of Israel to visit Poland and had traveled all over, including to Lomza, where his father had been born.
During that visit to Poland in May 1992, Chaim Herzog had dedicated a monument in Auschwitz. The memorial had been fashioned from Jerusalem stone, a symbolic feature that underscored the failure of the Final Solution.
ISRAEL AND Malta established diplomatic relations in 1965, and over the years there have been ups and downs between the two countries. “I come in friendship,” Bonello told Herzog.
The president responded by saying that Roberta Metsola, the Maltese President of the European Parliament, is known to be a great friend of Israel.
Herzog and Bonello discussed the history of Jews in Malta, where Jews have lived for two millennia, though most were expelled in 1492.
Today, there is a small Jewish community with a synagogue there. Additionally, according to the ambassador, the history of the Jews of Malta is well-documented in Malta’s national archives.
They also discussed Malta’s economy and its potential for heavy tourism from Israel, given the direct flights between the two countries and Malta’s location within the Mediterranean basin.
Bonello was particularly pleased to be taking up his post during the 60th anniversary year of diplomatic ties between Malta and Israel.
Notably, Gil Haskel, the chief of state protocol, estimates that a large number of new ambassadors will arrive in Israel during the summer, presenting their credentials in mid-September.