(By our Berlin Correspondent)
Dr. Bernhard Kahn, the European Director of the Joint Distribution Committee, who has just returned here from an extended tour in Roumania and Czecho-Slovakia, after which he met Mr. Felix M. Warburg, President of the Joint Distribution Committee. in Hungary and reported to him, has given an interview to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, in which he has indicated the lines along which the future activity of the Joint will be conducted.
My journey through Roumania and Czecho-Slovakia, Dr. Kahn said, had the same purpose as my journey a year ago through Poland, that is, to establish to what extent the activity of the Joint Distribution Commitee and the American Joint Reconstruction Foundation (Ica-Joint) has been successful, how far the work carried on in various directions among the Jewish populations has been stabilized and to what extent it is necessary to continue this work, and also whether it is necessary to open up any new branches of activity.
What I have learned on this journey: Dr. Kahn proceeded, will naturally be placed before the Joint Distribution Committee and the Foundation and so far as the financial means will allow, the necessary practical results will follow. The entire Jewish population, without distinction of religious or political views, utilitized the opportunity provided by my visits to demonstrate how highly they value the work done on their behalf by American Jewry. Wherever I came big manifestations and receptions were arranged, and not only the Jewish population, but the authorities, the Mayors of the various towns and representatives of the non-Jewish welfare organizations took an active part in them.
In view of my conversations with members of Governments, like M. Duca and M. Lupu in Roumania. I assume that in our efforts for the improvement of the position of Roumanian Jewry we shall find understanding on the part of the authorities. M. Duca’s representative in the course of a public address at a gathering held in Bucharest turned to me and said: I feel the need of expressing to the representative of America. who is here among us, our appreciation of the way in which the wonderful people he represents understood to solve the social problems. There is a tremendous welfare organization in America, which has borne its fruits in due season, and which we admire, an organization to which people turn when they are in want, This American welfare work deserves recognition so much the more because its help is given with discretion and with a fine feeling of delicacy. We must repudiate with indignation the doctrines of hatred which have caused disturbances, destructions and divisions, from which the people are still unable to recover. It is a necessity for me to be able to assure you that it will be the primary task of the political leaders of this country to see to it that the Jew shall never suffer as a human being and that in our State, which we wish to guide through order and culture to a great future, they should be granted equal participation in all the rights and duties of citizenship.
In Czecho-Slovakia, the authorities, practically everywhere, cooperated with the Jewish organizations in the various conferences and receptions, so that we can expect that here too our work will continue to receive the support of the authorities, as it has done in Czecho-Slovakia in the past.
Naturally, Dr. Kahn said, I am in touch with the leaders of the Joint Distribution Committee who are now in Europe. I have seen Mr.Felix M. Warburg in Hamburg and have submitted to him a complete report. I shall soon meet Mr. Louis Marshall also and will report to him regarding our work.
There has been a good deal of talk about the Joint Distribution Committee proceeding to liquidate its activities, Dr. Kahn continued. In a certain sense that is right. The Joint is an organization established for the purpose of relieving the sufferings caused among the Jews by the war, and not in order to conduct a permanent activity. The position in all the countries of Europe and Eastern Europe, including Russia, is however, not of such a character that it is possible to suspend completely the American aid-work. Liquidation is proceeding only in the sense that certain elementary welfare activities must be taken over by the local populations. But American Jewry will endeavor to supply further assistance in a productive and constructive form. An effort will be made in the first place in conjunction with the Ica to ensure over a long period a systematic activity on the part of the Foundation, which already maintains a network of more than 600 credit and other cooperatives. The Joint Distribution Committee will continue to endeavon to promote all activities aiming at strengthening the economic basis of existence of the Jewish populations. The Joint Distribution Committee will in its further work continue to see to the maintenance of the standard of education among the Jewish youth and the safe-guarding of the health conditions of the Jewish populations. Assistance will be given to all efforts which seek to restore the community sense of the Jewish populations. The aim will be to strengthen all those insitutions which are able to form a central point around which Jewish social life can group itself. It is necessary, however, to emphasize that the success of the work depends on the local population taking the initiative.
How far the plans of the American Joint Distribution Committee can be carried out Dr. Kahn concluded, depends, of course, on the raising of funds in the United States for these purposes. It is to be hoped that after the leaders of American Jewry have examined for themselves the conditions obtaining in Europe they will succeed in their appeal to American Jewry to raise new funds for this essential work.
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.
