The Polish president has said he will sign into a law a bill making it illegal to blame Poland for crimes committed by Nazis, despite protests from Israel and accusations that Warsaw was trying to airbrush war crimes against Jews.

In a televised address on Tuesday Andrzej Duda announced he would put his signature to the legislation that also makes it a criminal offence, punishable with up to three years in prison, for describing Nazi concentration and death camps as “Polish”.

“The historical truth is that Poles did not participate in the Holocaust in an institutionalised or systematic way,” said Mr Duda during his speech, adding that any accusations that they had done so caused pain to Poles.

Controversy over the law has sent Israel-Poland relations nosediving, owing to Israeli fears the Polish government was trying to deny cases of Poles betraying Jews to the Nazis, murdering them or even instigating massacres.

In an apparent attempt to appease Israeli anger, Mr Duda did say he would refer the law to the country’s constitutional tribunal to make sure it complies with the Polish constitution. The tribunal has the power to ask for changes to the law, although the Polish press speculated it may refrain from doing so because of the influence Law and Justice, Poland’s governing party, has over it.