An appeal to President Eisenhower to bring up, at the forthcoming “summit” meeting in Geneva, the problem of Jewish emigration from Soviet Russia and the satellite countries, was voiced here today by Dr. Bernard Bergman, newly-elected president of Hapoel Hamizrachi, the Religious Labor Zionist Organization of America, at the concluding session of the four-day annual convention of the organization.
“With the Big Four meeting in Geneva, on July 18th, President Eisenhower must not be unmindful of the minds and hearts of millions beyond the Iron Curtain,” Dr. Bergman declared in his acceptance address. “Among them will be some three million Jews, whose one mighty prayer-when will the time come for us as it did for our forbearers in Egypt, to come forth to the Promised Land#-is still unanswered.”
The over 500 delegates attending the convention called for a defense agreement between Israel and the United States as a logical expression of American-Israel friendship and as the most effective means of achieving stability and peace in the Near East. The delegates also asked for suspension of military grants to the Arab states, pending progress toward a settlement, and for efforts by the U.S. Government to encourage direct negotiations between Israel and the Arab states to end tension and to promote a peace settlement.
The convention also resolved to urge its members to make plans for eventual settlement in Israel. It assailed the anti-Zionist American Council for Judaism as “vindictive and petty-minded.” At the same time it called upon the Jewish Agency and the Israel government to give the right to religious immigrants to live in religious settlements.
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.
