ISRAEL’S Yad Vashem Holocaust Memorial says it is “deeply disturbed” by a Polish court’s instruction to two Holocaust researchers to apologise for their work on Polish complicity in the murder of Jews under Nazi occupation.

Historians Barbara Engelking and Jan Grabowski were instructed to apologise on Tuesday on the grounds that their book Night Without End: The Fate of Jews of Selected Countries of Occupied Poland slandered Edward Malinowski by suggesting he helped kill Jews during the second world war. The case was brought by his niece, Filomena Leszczynska.

“As with all research, this volume about the fate of Jews during the Holocaust is part of an ongoing discussion and as such is subject to critique in academia, but not in courts,” Yad Vashem said.