Failure of the Christian world to take action to save the Jews of Europe from Nazi extermination was severely criticized today by Dr. Stephen S. Wise, president of the American Jewish Congress, in a statement issued by him in connection with the protest demonstration which will be held on March 1 at Madison Square Garden, sponsored by the American Federation of Labor, the C.I.O., the Church Peace Union, the American Jewish Congress and twenty-six other national Jewish organizations.
“A Christian world that will permit millions of Jews to be slain without moving heaven by prayer and earth in every human way to save its Jews has lost its capacity for moral and spiritual survival,” Dr. Wise declared. He scored the failure of the United Nations to implement as yet the Declaration issued three months ago, condemning the Nazi massacres of Jews and pledging action to punish the guilty and to rescue those who could be saved.
“If Germany had said,” Dr. Wise asserted, “we will exterminate all the Catholics within our reach, the Vatican would move, Catholics would move, Protestant would intervene. No people would be left to extermination without organized, effective intervention except Jews. That is the real tragedy.”
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.
