Z kart polskiej obecności w pozaeuropejskiej części świata śródziemnomorskiego po II wojnie światowej

Although the Poles had reached the countries of the Middle East and North Africa already in the Middle Ages, yet it was only in the nineteenth century that more permanent communities, such as Adampol in Turkey, the only still existing region of uniform Polish settlement in Asia and Africa, began to be created here. The Poles who had found their way to these territories, following the year 1945, can be divided roughly into several groups: (1) descendants of pre-war emigrants, most numerous in Turkey, (2) the relatively small number of refugees who remained here during and after the Second World War (mainly in Lebanon), (3) employees of Polish companies and enterprises, as well as academic and technical staff employed on contracts, mainly in the Arab countries (in the sixties, seventies and eighties of the twentieth century), (4) clergymen and missionaries conducting missionary and pastoral activities, (5) Polish co-spouses, mainly women and their offspring, (6) soldiers in Polish military contingents making up the UN Relief Forces in the Middle East conflict and (7) a group of Polish economic emigrants, partly temporary workers who came to Israel and in smaller numbers also to Cyprus, following 1989. In most cases, the Poles who came here belonged to the middle and upper classes and they enjoyed a high social status. Among those who were active in the Polish organizations abroad, there were many persons who were not of Polish descent, but who felt an affinity with Poland (graduates of Polish universities who had a Polish spouse etc.). Due to the precarious and uncertain political situation in the countries of this region, the number of Polish emigrants here was small and relatively unstable. According to the Association ‘Wspólnota Polska’ (Polish Community), in the year 2001, the number of Poles in this area amounted to about 8,5 thousand, out of which 4 thousand were in Israel, one thousand in Turkey, 700 in Lebanon, 600 in Egypt and 500 in Morocco, Tunisia, and Cyprus each.