They were angered that such a prominent figure in the Warsaw Ghetto resistance chose to continue to live in Poland after the war ( a place they regarded simply as a Jewish graveyard) and had the chutzpah not to take his political lead from less heroic Zionist spokespersons and cheerleaders.

According to Edelman “to be a Jew always means always being with the oppressed and never the oppressors”. He was angered by the attempt by Israel to appropriate the Holocaust and use it to justify its political actions, and he also opposed Israel’s continued occupation of Palestinian territory. He met with Palestinian political figures and expressed support for their struggle against occupation while at the same time urging them to firmly reject terroristic methods of advancing their struggle.

He remained sceptical of nationalism in general and of excessive state power. He had been an open critic of the Stalinist regime in Poland and in the ’80s was supportive of the Workers Opposition movement.

In 1983 – on the 40th anniversary of the Warsaw Ghetto uprising, he snubbed the official commemoration in Poland attended by Stalinist dignitaries from Poland and Zionist dignitaries from Israel, in favour of an alternative ceremony.

He remained a consistent fighter for humanism, democracy and egalitarianism.