Is it a crime for the Polish Jews to appeal to the Jews abroad for aid?
Illogical as this question sounds, it nevertheless came up this week in the Polish parliament, where anti-Semitic deputies made an issue of it. From the tribune of the Polish Sejm leaders of the anti-Semitic National Democratic party expressed the opinion that by appealing to the Jews abroad for relief Polish Jewry is exposing Poland to unfavorable comment in foreign countries.
BIALECKI DEMANDS OUSTER OF ALL JEWS
The speakers of the National Democratic party did not find it necessary to urge the Polish government to look into the catastrophic position of the Polish Jews; they did not see fit to recommend that the government itself help the Jews or at least not discriminate against them. A simpler solution of the Jewish question was urged by Dr. Bielecki, the National Democratic deputy. Dr. Bielecki demanded clearly and simply that the government oust all the Jews from Poland and thus once and forever get rid of them.
Dr. Bielecki was not the only Polish deputy who from the platform of the parliment advocated anti-Jewish persecutions in the country now ruled by Marshal Pilsudski. Dr. Bielecki’s denunciations were followed by those of other anti-Semitic deputies. They were not contradicted by any of the other members of the parliment. Not even by the Socialists.
SEJM HEARS MANY ANTI-SEMITIC SPEAKERS
One who has watched closely the proceedings of the Polish parliament this week could have thought that the present session of the Sejm was called for the sole purpose of giving the anti-Semitic deputies a chance to spread anti-Jewish propaganda openly through the medium of the parliamentary platform. Not a single word in favor of the Jews was paid by any one. Not a single remark was made concerning the miserable position and the economic plight in which the three and a half million Polish Jews are situated at present.
It is therefore no wonder that the Jewish members of the Polish parliament have this week, as never before, declared their distrust of the present Polish regime. This distrust was expressed, first, in the fact that the Jewish parliamentarians demonstratively refused to vote for the government budget, and secondly, by the statement which Dr. Joshua Thon read in behalf of the Jewish parliamentarian club, placing on record for the first time the statement that, “feelings of indignation and embitterment are growing among the Jewish population against the government for ousting the Jews from every sphere of public life.”
SEVERE INDICTMENT OF POLISH REGIME
The statement which Dr. Thon, the venerable Jewish leader, read in the Sejm on behalf of the three and a half million Jews of Poland, is a severe indictment of the Polish government. It is a document which will go into history. Every civilized person in the world will expect a definite reply from the Polish government to the grave charges voiced in this statement. It will be quoted again and again until a satisfactory answer will have been given by the Polish authorities to every point enumerated by Dr. Thon.
The statement read by Dr. Thon shows that Jewish patience in Poland has reached its limit. It makes it clear that anti-Jewish discriminations are practiced not only by individual anti-Semites, but that they constitute a part of the general government policy. The government actually strives to get rid of its three and a half million Jews by forcing them either to emigrate or to die of starvation.
SUFFERING HELD UNEQUALLED IN WORLD
In no country in the world have three and a half million inhabitants suffered such moral and economic torture as the Jews are suffering today in Poland. The indictment read by Dr. Thon against the Polish government would shock any member of the League of Nations. It would shock any person interested in fighting for human rights. It would startle any international commission if such were sent into Poland to investigate how the Jews are treated in Poland today.
Dr. Thon, in his statement, charges the government, among other things, with crushing the Jewish population by heavy taxation, with not making the slightest endeavor to ease the fate of the Jews, with hampering their efforts towards productivization, with systematic ejection of the Jews from the economic system of the country, with eliminating the last vestiges of the Jewish autonomy guaranteed to the Jewish communities under the constitution, with undermining the Jewish school system and—what counts most— with showing definite ill-will towards the Jews.
CHARGES DESERVE TO BE PROVED
All these charges are sufficient to provoke the indignation of even a smaller population than the one which the Jews present in Poland. All these charges deserve a serious investigation on the part of an impartial international body. All these charges should be taken up by the American Jewish Committee and the American Jewish Congress in the United States, as well as by similar Jewish bodies in England and in other countries.
A great injustice is done the Jews of Poland by the silent attitude which our central Jewish organizations have adopted towards their situation. What the Jews of Poland need is not only financial relief. Political pressure may prove much more helpful to them than the funds which our Jewish philanthropic organizations may send them.
Poland today is practically isolated from the world. Because of its alliance with Hitler it has lost the sympathies of the western world. Only this week Sir John Simon stated in the British parliament that England as well as other countries represented in the League of Nations do not consider the unilateral renunciation of the national minority pacts by Poland valid.
WAY STILL OPEN FOR LEAGUE PROTEST
The way is still open, therefore, for a complaint to the League of Nations against the mistreatment of the Jews in Poland and for a request to the League that a special investigating committee be sent to Poland. Such a complaint may now, under the present anti-Polish sentiments prevailing in the western world, be taken up by the League despite Colonel Beck’s declaration of last Autumn. It may become an issue which the Council of the League of Nations would like to take up.
When hundreds of Jewish houses are sold at auction in Poland for unpaid taxes, when Jews are compelled to sell their beds and pillows for a paltry few cents, when the Polish ministry of commerce is ousting the Jews even from trade with Palestine—as Deputy Rottenstreich disclosed in his speech in the parliament this week—there is no reason why the Jews in America should remain silent about the fate of Polish Jewry.
FATE OF DANZIG JEWS HANGS IN BALANCE
Simultaneously with paying more political attention to the situation of the three and a half million Jews in Poland, it is high time for central Jewish organizations in America and in England to begin to pay more attention to the fate of the Jews in Danzig. Otherwise the Danzig Jews may face the same fate as the five thousand Jews of the Saar.
Reports reaching New York this week from Danzig make it very clear that the Nazis the have mobilized their forces emulate their brethren in the Saar and to take definite steps towards reunion with the Reich. Being a majority in the Senat# of the Free State of Danzig they are asking for new parliamentary elections which will probably take place early in April and which will practically convert Danzig into a Nazi state.
The anti-Jewish discriminations being practiced in Danzig, even before the Nazis have become the actual rulers there, are well known here. Not a week passes without news from Danzig that the anti-Jewish propaganda there is daily assuming larger proportions. It is s##cient to say that anti-Semit## propaganda in Danzig has reached such heights that Sean Lester, the League of Nations High Commissioner for Danzig, finally found it necessary for the first time to report on it to the Council of the League of Nations
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.
