Polish court clears book publisher of Holocaust denial charges

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Notes from Poland is run by a small editorial team and is published by an independent, non-profit foundation that is funded through donations from our readers. We cannot do what we do without your support.

A Polish court has acquitted a book publisher of charges related to Holocaust denial. Tomasz Stala, who has close ties to the far-right Confederation (Konfederacja) party, published a book that questioned the role of gas chambers in German Nazi death camps.

Under Polish law, public denial of Nazi or communist crimes is punishable by up to three years in prison. The notice of a possible criminal offence was filed against Stala in 2024 by the Auschwitz-Birkenau State Museum in relation to a book written by the historian Dariusz Ratajczak.

However, the court ruled that Stala’s role as a publisher did not fulfill the criteria for criminal liability, as he was not the author of the book. He is still facing separate charges concerning other works that he has published.

During the investigation, dozens of copies of books issued by Stala’s publishing house, 3DOM, were seized. Those included Ratajczak’s book Dangerous Topics in which he claimed that Zyklon B – a chemical used to murder people in gas chambers in German Nazi death camps – was used only for disinfection.

In the book, Ratajczak also claimed that most prisoners in Nazi camps died of “malnutrition, poor hygiene conditions, murderous work” and their bodies were incinerated in crematoriums to prevent an epidemic.

In fact, the majority of prisoners who died were murdered in gas chambers in death camps. That includes most of the 1.1 million people killed in Auschwitz.

Other books seized by the authorities included The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, an antisemitic publication detailing a fabricated Jewish plot for global domination. 3DOM is known for offering other controversial works such as Face to Face, a set of transcripts of Adolf Hitler’s private conversations from 1941-1944.

Last week, the regional court in Częstochowa found Stala not guilty of publicly denying Nazi crimes, because he was the publisher of the book rather than its author.

“During the hearing, the judge took the liberty of making the very reasonable comment that there is no index of banned books in Poland,” Sala said after the court’s decision, quoted by the Rzeczpospolita daily.

“I am not surprised by the court’s ruling, and I found ridiculous the very fact that the prosecution took up the case,” he added.

Stala is still facing criminal charges for incitement to hatred based on national, ethnic or racial differences, in connection with other books published by 3DOM.

But he defends the publishing house’s catalogue, saying that “most of the books questioned by the prosecution have been in circulation for 100 years. You can get them in public libraries, digital libraries and bookshops.”

Stala is closely associated with the far-right Confederation. He unsuccessfully ran as the party’s top candidate on the electoral list in Częstochowa in the 2023 parliamentary elections and as its mayoral candidate in Częstochowa last year.

He remains connected with Confederation politicians, working as an assistant to MP Grzegorz Płaczek, chairman of the party’s parliamentary caucus, and a coordinator for MEP Marcin Sypniewski.

3DOM has also published books authored by the Confederation MP and presidential candidate Sławomir Mentzen and former Confederation MEP Grzegorz Braun.

After the latter caused a scandal by using a fire extinguisher to put out Hanukkah candles that had been lit during a ceremony involving Polish-Jewish leaders and the Israeli ambassador, 3DOM offered mugs and T-shirts promoting his behaviour.

Most recently, the publisher expressed support for Janusz Waluś, a Polish white nationalist who assassinated the black anti-apartheid leader Chris Hani in 1993 with the aim of sparking a race war. After Waluś was deported from South Africa to Poland last year, 3DOM announced that it would donate sales profits to him.

Notes from Poland is run by a small editorial team and published by an independent, non-profit foundation that is funded through donations from our readers. We cannot do what we do without your support.

Main image credit: Grzegorz Skowronek / Agencja Wyborcza

Agata Pyka

Agata Pyka is an assistant editor at Notes from Poland. She is a journalist and a political communication student at the University of Amsterdam. She specialises in Polish and European politics as well as investigative journalism and has previously written for Euractiv and The European Correspondent.