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Zionists Vow Resistance to British Policy; 2 New Settlements Founded

May 5, 1939
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Convening of the 21st biennial World Zionist Congress early in August was approved at yesterday’s session of the Palestine subcommittee of the Zionist General Council, it was announced today in an official communique.

the meeting heard David Ben Grunion, chairman of the Zionist Executive, warn that the Zionist movement and the Palestine community would meet the forthcoming White Paper “not merely with mourning and protest, but deeds and sacrifices aimed to defeat intrigues against the Jewish people. We will fight, not the British people but the false Government policy aiming to surrender British’s friends to Britain’s enemies.”

All parties represented in the subcommittee unanimously approved a proposal by Ben Grunion for appointment of a committee to carry out the body’s decisions.

The meeting was opened by Menachem M. Ussishkin, chairman of the Council, who announced, as president of the Jewish National Fund, establishment of two new colonies of a projected cluster of six agricultural settlements in the not-easternmost corner of Palestine.

Undaunted by expectation of a British policy unfavorable to the Jewish homeland, 100 Jewish pioneer families established the two colonies a few hundred years from the ruins of ancient Dan. One settlement each will be developed by the Shomer Hatzair, the Kibbutz Meuchad, the Noar Zioni Aleph, Noar Zioni Beth, the Poel Hamizrachi and Oriental Jews, thus representing most sections of the Palestine Jewish community. The project is jointly named Metzudath Ussishkin, in honor of Mr. Ussishkin’s birthday. The colonies are financed by a great of 60,000 (about $300,000) from the J.N.F.

The tract on which the colonies were established adjoins the Syrian border. It comprises 10,000 dunams (about 2,500 acres) of an area of 20,000 dunams recently purchased. The land, lying in a valley, is well watered from sources flowing from the Jordan River. It is in the most fertile region in Palestine, producing three crops annually. The pioneers moved with great secrecy from Metulla, Kfar Giladi and Tel Hai across the trackless wilderness. The settlements will be isolated until the building of projected roads. Eventually the settlements will includes 400 families.

Meanwhile, the upbuilding of the Jewish homeland went forward on another front when the Hadassah Medical Organization conducted a press preview of the completed $1,000,000 Hadassah-Rothschild-Hebrew University Medical Center stop Mount Scopus near Jerusalem, which will be opened on May 9 with international ceremonies.

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