After two weeks of deliberations, the World Zionist Conference closed here last night with a public statement endorsing the demand of the Jewish Agency for an immediate decision on the establishment of Palestine as a Jewish States.
A Mizrachi proposal to elect a new executive of the World Zionist Organization was voted down by the conference by 53 votes against 16. Following the vote the Mizrachi announced that their representatives would continue to remain out of the executive.
The conference adjourned with a strirring appeal by David Ben-Gurion, chairman of the executive of the Jewish Agency, to bend all efforts “to end the Jewish tragedy and build a Jewish State.” A number of matters before the conference were referred for decision to the Zionist Actions Committee. The conference in its public statement calling for an immediate decision by the British Government on the demand for a Jewish State, proposed also the following:
1. The Jewish Agency for Palestine be vested with authority to bring into Palestine as many Jews as possible and to develop the resources of the country to the maximum.
2. The granting of an international loan to the Jewish Agency for the transfer of the first 1,000,000 Jews from Europe to Palestine.
3. Repartions in kind be exacted from Germany for Jews for the rebuilding of Palestine, all German real estate in Palestine to be used for the settlement of European Jews.
4. International facilities for the exit and transport of all Jews in European countries who may wish to emigrate to Palestine.
Appealing to the Arabs to sympathetically realize the tragedy of the Jewish people, the conference expressed the hope that the peoples of the Middle East would appreciate the spirit of Jewish work in Palestine and emphasized that “a Jewish Palestine will be happy to cooperate with the Arabs for the good of all.”
A resolution offered by leaders of the Hashomer Hatzair that Palestine be established as an Arab-Jewish State with a Jewish majority was rejected by the conference. Another resolution, effered by the Jewish State Party stating that the whole world condemnes the Arab opposition to the establishment of a Jewish State and urging an exchange of Jews in the Middle East for Arabs in Palestine, was similarly rejected.
The Zionist Actions Committee today appointed a special commission of five to go into the legal details of proposed changes in the composition of the world Zionist executive with a view to having Dr. Abba Hillel Silver and Dr. Stephen S. Wise included in the executive as full-fledged members.
At the closing session of the World Zionist Conference Dr. Silver in a stirring speech struck the note that the next twelve months would be crucial in Jewish history. “We are fortunate in having friendly governments,” he said. “America and England must make an all-out effort to achieve a just solution of the Jewish problem.” He expressed pride in the fact that more than a million Jews fought in the Allied armies and that tens of thousands of Palestine Jews joined the Jewish units in the British Armed Forces and the Jewish Brigade.
JEWISH NATIONAL FUND RAISED $26,000,000 DURING WAR
A report on the activities of the Jewish National Fund was given today by Dr. Granovsky, director of the J.N.F. office in Palestine, at a reception tendered him at Derchester Hotel. He revealed that the Jewish National Fund had raised $26,000,000 since the outbreak of the war and that it expects to raise $8,000,000 this year.
Dr. Granovsky said that the execution of the practical program of the J.N.F. is hampered by the land regulations new in effect in Palestine and by the attitude of the Palestine administration. He charged that Palestine officials “from the highest to the lowest” consider it their sacrd duty to prevent further Jewish land acquisition. Another obstacle is the rise in prices on land. Nevertheless 330,000 dunams of land were bought by the Jewish National Fund during the years of the war, bringing the total possessions to over 300,000 dunams, he stated.
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.
