More than 1,000 delegates to the 69th annual meeting of the National Conference of Jewish Communal Service concluded their four-day conclave at the Deauville Hotel here. Climax of the meetings was passage of a resolution supporting United States policy to preserve Israel’s national sovereignty and territorial integrity aid to preserve peace in the Middle East.
Prior to the passage of the resolution. Mrs. Avram Harman, wife of Israel’s Ambassador to the United States, addressed the delegates and told them that “it is essential to Israel’s survival that the lifeline of the Gulf of Akaba and the Strait of Tiran be kept open,” She also warned that “long drawn out negotiations could be very damaging to Israel’s economic life” because continuance of Nasser’s blockade of the gulf and the strait would interfere with Israel’s considerable trade with Asia and Africa.
Dr. Gary T. Marx, assistant professor of sociology at the University of California, who has been studying the attitudes of the American people towards the civil right movement since 1964, reported that “Civil rights concerns tend not to breed anti-white feelings among Negroes. The more militant Negroes, on the average, are more tolerant of whites and tend to be less anti-Semitic.”
Rabbi Jay Kaufman, executive vice-president of B’nai B’rith, said that in helping the younger generation to find its Jewish identity, the Jewish professional working in the various fields of Jewish communal service could serve as a model of Jewish identity. “It is the Jewish professional who spends his working hours on Jewish concerns and destiny, who progressively directs his life to a maximum and all pervading Jewishness,” Rabbi Kaufman declared.
Sidney Z. Vincent, executive director of the Jewish Community Federation of Cleveland, was elected president of the National Conference, at the annual business meeting, succeeding William Avrunin, executive director of the Jewish Welfare Federation of Detroit. Other officers elected were: Martha K. Selig of New York, first vice-president; Sanford Solender of New York, second vice-president; Dr. Benjamin B. Rosenberg of Boston, secretary, and Irving Greenberg of Newark, N.J., treasurer.
During the more than 100 workshops held while the conference was in session, Jewish communal workers from all parts of the country heard papers on both professional and general interest. Progress of the preparations for the International Conference of Jewish Communal Service, to be held in Jerusalem from August 19 to 24 were reported on. It was announced that the 1968 National Conference annual meeting would be held in Detroit next May.
The National Conference is composed of five organizations made up of professionals working in the field of Jewish health and welfare. They are: the Association of Jewish Community Relations Workers; the National Association of Jewish Center Workers; the National Association of Jewish Family, Children’s and Health Services; the National Association of Jewish Homes for the Aged: and the National Council of Jewish Education.
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.
