The Palestine-Germany transfer agreement was defended by Prof. Selig Brodetsky of London, member of the World Zionist Executive, in an address Saturday night before the sixteenth annual conference of the Women’s Zionist Federation.
In answer to critics who had charged the agreement made it possible for Germany to send large shipments of goods to Palestine, Prof. Brodetsky pointed out that only fourteen per cent of Palestine imports come from Germany.
While he agreed that no Jew should trade with Germany, the Zionis leader maintained that the transfer is not a matter of trading, since under the Palestine schedule Jews not entering under the labor quota must bring capital while under the Reich laws Jews are not permitted out of the country with capital, but only goods He pointed out that the transfer agreement made it possible for Jews emigrating from Germany to Palestine to withdraw part of their holdings.
Prof. Brodetsky referred to an assertion in the London Times that while Zionists are loyal to Great Britain, the Revisionists, a right-wing independent faction, are loyal to Italy. “I myself have heard the Revisionists deny this,” he asserted, adding that the denial doesn’t carry one hundredth of the weight of the assertion in The Times.
Prof. Brodetsky stated that Jews have no quarrel with Italy since Italy’s treatment of the Jews has been admirable, but he declare that nevertheless the Palestine mandate is under Britain. He said, “We stand or fall by the British mandate. We must fight any international maneuvre that might cloud this clear understanding.”
He appealed to the women Zionists to aid in raising the shekel membership to 2,000,000 for the next Zionist Congress in 1937.
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.
