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Objection to the raising of public funds by Jews for the defense of Schwartzbard is made by S. Rosenfeld (the “Day.” May 30), who especially criticizes the “Jewish Morning Journal” of New York, which was the first Jewish newspaper to start a Schwartzbard defense fund. Mr. Rosenfeld thinks such activity will be interpreted as an identification of the Jewish public with Schwartzbard’s act and fears the possible consequences to the Jews in Ukrainia.
Expressing the belief that “Schwartzbard’s act was of a private character, the revenge of one man against another, which is a matter for the courts,” Mr. Rosenfeld says: “By making a national issue of this, we offer an opportunity for the charge that he is a messenger of the Jews,” sent by us to kill Petlura; is this not a provocation for Petlura’s followers also to make a national issue of the affair?
“This is not a matter for the public, it is not a task for the Jewish community.” the writer argues, concluding: “There were no funds for Beilis or more recently, for Steiger. Yet there was no lack of defense counsel. Private individuals can identify themselves with whomever they please, but the Jewish public must not be mixed up in the matter.”
Replying to Mr. Rosenfeld, Jacob Fishman in the “Jewish Morning Journal” (May 31) calls attention to the fact that by conducting the Schwartzbard defense fund that paper is “not seeking to identify Jewry with Schwartzbard’s act” but on the contrary “we have tried in every way to prevent such an impression and in our appeal for the fund we stated clearly that we are opposed to such acts of vengeance even in the case of bloody pogromists like Petlura.
“If we stand by Schwartzbard.” Mr. Fishman further explains, “It is not in defense of his act but in order to bring out once and for all before the civilized world through a great trial the story of the horrible pogroms in the Ukraine which deprived Schwartzbard of his peace and self-control, which drove him to desperation and made him unresponsible for the act he committed.”
As regards the fear of a misrepresentation of the Jewish position in the matter. Mr. Fishman declares in conclusion: “Only pogromists and their sympathizers will interpret a defense fund as a sign that Schwartzbard is our ‘messenger.’ Every decent sensible Christian will realize at once that were this the case we would have prepared a defense fund in advance instead of appealing to the public now.”
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
