A demand that the Jewish Agency be given a special status by the Israel Government to enable it to carry out its functions in the Jewish state was voiced by Dr. Nahum Goldmann, chairman of the American section of the Agency, and Berl Locker, chairman of the Agency executive, at the opening session of the Zionist Actions Committee here last night.
Dr. Goldmann disputed the assertion, made by some delegates prior to the opening of the meeting, that granting the Agency a special status would impair Israel’s sovereignty. “Many governments have granted special status to various agencies to carry out specific works and it has not affected the respective governments’ sovereignty,” Dr. Goldmann said. Secondly, he continued, “sovereignty can be affected only when it is forced upon a government, but the Zionist movement does not desire to and never will force the Israel Government to grant any concessions.”
The American Zionist leader insisted that the real goal of the Zionist movement has not yet been achieved since “only ten percent of the Jewish nation is concentrated in Israel, whereas the rest of Jewry faces assimilation if it does not receive inspiration from Israel.” He added: “The Zionist movement’s previous task was to establish a state. Now the task is to mobilize the Jewish nation to assist the state. But the state is unable to do it, and there is a need for a ‘middle story’ between the nation and the state. This middle story is the Zionist movement.”
ZIONIST WORK IN ISRAEL DOES NOT END AT HAIFA, GOLDMANN ARGUES
Dr. Goldmann further asserted that Zionism has two tasks today–one in Israel and the other outside the Jewish state. He pointed out that Zionists should do more to assist the Jews in the countries in which they now live, a program that demands “a certain amount of political work.” As for the Zionists’ work in Israel, he said that he does not believe that it ends at Haifa or at any other Israel port. Finally, he urged either changes in the Jewish National Fund and Keren Hayesod structures or a merger of the two.
Mr. Locker, who called for a special status for the Agency in Israel on the grounds that collective effort is required to carry out the Zionist movement’s function of strengthening Israel and the Jewish communities abroad, briefly reviewed the work of the Agency during the past two years. He reported that the Agency had spent some 15,000,000 pounds–about $42,000,000–in the last fiscal year and that it had already expended 7,000,000 pounds in the first five months of the current Jewish year.
Expressing himself as not satisfied with these figures, Mr. Locker stated that they revealed the tempo at which matters were moving. He pointed out that in the 30 years preceding the establishment of Israel the Zionist movement was able to place some 450,000 Jews in Palestine, but that in the two years since the proclamation of the Jewish state almost 400,000 Jews had enetored the country. He also said that nearly 200 new settlements had been established in the past two years.
U.S. DELEGATES ADVOCATE PARTNERSHIP BETWEEN ISRAEL AND ZIONIST MOVEMENT
During the debate today Judge Morris Rothenberg, chairman of the United Palestine Appeal, declared that he favored the liquidation of the Keren Hayesod, but demanded continuation of the Jewish National Fund, appealing to the body not to “empty the contents of the Zionist movement.”
Mrs. Moses Epstein, Hadassah leader, demanded encouragement from Israel for continuation of Zionist work abroad. Strong ties unite Jewry everywhere, especially with Israel, she said, therefore there must be a close partnership between the Zionist movement and the Jewish state.
Louis Segal, American Zionist Laborite, opposed the granting of a charter by the Israel Government to the Jewish Agency, on the grounds that it would tend to divide the Jewish people. He warned that if the Zionist movement is not permitted to participate in the practical work of upbuilding Israel it will lose its effectiveness as an agency for raising funds for such purposes.
The sole supporter among non-Mapai groups of Premier David Ben Gurion’s view that the Government of Israel should take over responsibility for all immigration and colonization work was Revisionist delegate Baruch Weinstein. Asserting that the state of Israel is the “center of Jewish life throughout the world,” Mr. Weinstein urged that the “periphery must submit its interests and aspirations” to those of the state. Stressing that he does not support the Ben Gurion government, he insisted that any work in Israel not done by that government undermined its authority and sovereignty.
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.
