The Palestine Jewish labor federation, Histadruth Haovdim, which numbers 125,000 industrial and agricultural workers, today announced plans for compulsory enlistment of all members between the ages of 20 and 35 for military service.
The Histadruth Council, meeting in Tel Aviv, decided to hold a census of members between 20 and 35 and to name a special recruiting committee to carry out speedy compulsory recruiting. All military enlistment in Palestine hitherto has been on a voluntary basis. The Histadruth’s daily paper, Davar, published an editorial stressing the urgency of increasing the Jewish armed forces and demanding that every able-bodied union member enlist immediately.
More than 8,000 Palestinians, most of them Jews, are already enrolled in the British armed forces and many of them have seen action in the North African desert and in Greece. British officers have praised the performance of Palestinian units in the Eritrean campaign.
At the same time the Municipal Council of Tel Aviv, largest city in Palestine with a population of 200,000, completed plans for new public air-raid shelters for 12,000 persons, in addition to existing shelters capable of holding 10,000. The Municipal Council is also planning two new hospitals, one in the city and another in the suburbs. Approval of the Palestine Government for the plans is being sought.
The Chief Rabbinate issued posters calling for permanent daily prayers for British victory and proclaiming next Monday as a general fast day, with visits to the holy graves and the Wailing Wall in Jerusalem.
Despite activity on military fronts and transport difficulties, Jewish immigration to Palestine is continuing, Eliahu Dobkin, head of the Jewish Agency’s Immigration Department, reported at a meeting of the Histadruth Immigration Department.
April immigration amounted to 1,400, the immigrants coming from Rumania, Hungary, Yugoslavia, Turkey, Greece and Lithuania, Dobkin said. They included 670 in the Youth Aliyah classification, 140 in the capitalist category, 50 rabbis, 190 with special permits, 200 in the labor category and 80 relatives of Palestine residents.
Total Jewish immigration since January was 3,500. Another 1,600, with immigration certificates under the previous schedule, are waiting in Sweden, Japan and Bombay, from where exit is still possible.
It was announced that 151 Palestine Jewish settlements absorbed 24,000 persons in 1940. The influx of Jewish capital to Palestine last year totalled L5,000,000.
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.
