(Reprinted from yesterday???s late edition)
Senator Alfred M. Cohen, international president of the Independent Order B’nai B’rith, today scathingly condemned the attack of the Nazi government on the German B’nai B’rith lodges as “an exhibition of senseless, wanton cruelty.”
In an exclusive statement issued through the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Senator Cohen declared:
“For a long time I have feared what has just now befallen the B’nai B’rith in Germany. Logically the B’nai B’rith would have been the first of the great international fraternities to have felt the effects of the Nazi government but strangely enough it is the last. The Masonic order and the Odd Fellows disappeared in Germany almost a year ago. They were ordered to disband and submitted.
“The same word was conveyed to the B’nai B’rith leaders, but the answer was, ‘we shall remain until forced out.’ The solicitude and anxiety of the American B’nai B’rith for their brethren, I am sure, are well understood by the German officials. These have been made known to them frequently and forcibly, but tactfully. They were informed that the B’nai B’rith was an American institution with branches in nearly all parts of the world where Jews congregate.
CLOSING CURTAILS CHARITY WORK
“Except it be in furtherance of its design to harass Jews in every conceivable way and make living in Germany impossible, sealing the doom of the B’nai B’rith in Germany can only mean the closing of orphans homes that have been the pride of all classes of the German people, depriving aged men and women of the refuges in which they are spending the last years of their lives, and depriving thousands of men of the opportunity of the cultivation of the highest things in life, including patriotism, loyalty and love for country.
“I realize of course that the persecution is one aspect of the tragic situation in which 600,000 Jews find themselves. To all of them in their indescribable distress, I pledge that the B’nai B’rith will make every possible effort to arouse the conscience of the world against the utter disregard of human rights of which they are the victims.”
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.
