The Jewish Agency for Palestine is faced with the collapse of the majority of its activities in Palestine, because funds for the maintenance of these projects have fallen far behind the budget, Louis Lipsky, National Chairman of the American Palestine Campaign, revealed to a meeting of the Executive. Committee of the fund-raising effort.
Mr. Lipsky’s warning was issued on the basis of financial reports made at a recent meeting in London of the Administrative Commitee of the Jewish Agency which Mr. Lipsky attended. Declaring that the continuous expressions of support for Palestine which emanate from American Jewry must take the form of “money, not sympathy,” Mr. Lipsky said that harm had been done to the cause of Palestine by tourists who returned from there with statements that “the crisis has not touched Palestine.” While the general economic situation is fairly good, Mr. Lipsky pointed out that the activities of the Jewish Agency, including immigration, colonization, education and land development, have been curtailed so drastically as to imperil even those projects not directly dependent on the resources of the Jewish Agency. Mr. Lipsky added that American Jewry was faced with the necessity of deciding whether it will, by its indifference, permit the destruction of an undertaking into which it had poured “millions of dollars and years of eager hope.”
He asserted that it was an evasion of reality for Jews to say that the “economic situation” in the United States made further aid impossible. The Jewish people started rebuilding Palestine because it was an historic necessity and not merely a luxury of boom times. If the Jewish National Home was urgent before 1929, events of the last three years have shown that it is even more vital today for the preservation of our national integrity.”
“By the end of the year, the Executive of the Jewish Agency in Jerusalem expects that the income will be at least $200,000 less than last year,” Mr. Lipsky said. “The deficit will be due largely to the inadequate response of American Jews, for European Jewry has met its fixed obligations. In the meantime, schools must be closed. Colonies, which have been maintained for years by the sacrifices of chalutzim, must be abandoned. Thousands of Jews in Poland and other European lands, who have waited for years to escape the misery of life in the land of their present residence, are doomed to disappointment, for which American Jewry must hold itself responsible.
“If the Jewish Agency is to be saved,
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.
