President Lech Kaczynski has said he was shocked by the views expressed by Polish MEP Maciej Giertych in his recent publication Civilisations at War in Europe.

In a statement to the French Press Agency, the president wrote: ‘I was stupefied when I read that he believes that Jewish civilization, which was born from the Torah, cannot coexist with the Christian civilization in Europe. Such views fly in the face of the teachings of that great Pope, Pope John Paul II’.

In his pamphlet, Maciej Giertych, a Euro-deputy of the Leaque of Polish Families, denounced the Jews’ ‘programmed differentiation from the surrounding communities’, adding that Jews ‘form the ghettoes themselves’ resulting in ‘biological differences’.

He also said that in Europe the ideas of ‘integration, middle ground and the melting pot are not possible, and that the continent should keep its ‘Latin civilisation’.

Earlier this week, the Israeli Foreign Ministry said in a statement that the publication by the Polish MEP includes anti-Semitic stereotypes that any civilization must reject clearly and strongly.

During a meeting with the Israeli Ambassador to Poland, a senior Polish Foreign Ministry official expressed the Polish government’s and people’s rebuttal of the Giertych publication.