In 1968 Pogonowska accompanied her daughter Janina and her family to Israel. Janina later became Professor of medical Microbiology at the Tel Aviv Medical University. Maria cared for her grandchildren and later great-grandchildren and, for a time, worked a job renting out rented Polish books. She went through a formal explanation of the circumstances of her husband's death in 1990 and in 1994 participated in a ceremony that planted thousands of trees near Jerusalem to symbolize the Katyń Woods. A piece written by her between 1995 and 2000 called Memoirs Warszawianka appeared on the pages of the "Quarterly Jewish History" in 2009. In 1980, at her request, Maria Palester was honored Righteous Among the Nations title. One of Pogonowska's great-grandchildren through Janina is mathematician Tomer Schlank.