The attitude of Palestine Jews in the present crisis was described to the Conference of the Zionist Federation of Great Britain and Ireland by Mr. Isaac Gerstenkorn, the founder and President of the Hassidic Colony, Bnai Brak, in Palestine, when he addressed the delegates, conveying the greetings of Palestine Jewry.
I have listened here to criticism and complaint, Mr. Gerstenkorn, who is in London in connection with the affairs of his colony and is proceeding on the 22nd. inst. to South Africa, probably together with Dr. Weizmann, who is to head the Keren Hayesod campaign there, said, but I have not heard here any expression of the feeling of certainty in our victory and the confidence and calm which animates Palestine Jewry. The Jews in Palestine are convinced of success, they know that Palestine will be ours, and that is why they go on with their work quietly and proudly, undiverted by anything. That, in his view, he said, was the difference between a Zionist in Palestine and a Zionist in the Diaspora. In Palestine there is the feeling of actually being on the spot and engaged in the building. Other peoples, the Hitlerists and their like, are
thinking to build their future on Jewish blood and Jewish misery. We Jews in Palestine are also building with blood, but our own blood.
The Bnai Brak colony was founded in 1924, at the time of the Fourth Aliyah by middle-class orthodox Jews from Poland and is situated between Tel Aviv and Petach Tikvah. Without assistance from the Zionist funds it has built up its-life, consisting now of 1,200 souls, with its own synagogue, Talmud Torah and school. There is also a textile factory and a bank and each colonist has an orange grove, a brick-built house, and the colony has an excellent water supply. The colony is on the road to becoming self-supporting, and Mr. Gerstenkorn has succeeded in obtaining help in England to further this goal.
Dr. Brodetsky informs the J.T.A. in connection with his speech at the luncheon given to Mrs. I. M. Sieff by the Federation of Women Zionists (reported in the J.T.A. Bulletin yesterday) that in speaking of her member ship of the small band of helpers which Dr. Weizmann had around him in Manchester in the very early stages of the present phase of Zionism, he had spoken of them as “dreamers”, not as “greenhorns”, as he was misheard to say.
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.
