Between 15,000 and 20,000 Jews will migrate from Poland to Israel under the recent Polish ruling that Jews may leave if they renounce their Polish citizenship, Eliahu Dobkin, Jewish Agency immigration chief, estimated at a press conference here today. The press conference was held in connection with the European Zionist convention currently taking place in Paris.
During the general debate at the Zionist parley today, Rabbi David Kahane, Polish Jewish leader and former chief Jewish chaplain of the postwar Polish army, stressed the importance of taking pains to adjust the new immigrants from Poland when they arrive in Israel. If these people become dissatisfied, he warned, the story would get back to Poland and would give rise to the most harmful type of propaganda in Poland and other East European countries.
Mr. Dobkin also revealed that the Israel immigration office in Germany is scheduled to be closed by January of next year. At the parley Pesach Piekacz, a delegate from Germany, said that all Jews must leave Germany and must be helped in this aim.
Summing up the accomplishments of the Zionist conference which he said had proved more successful than its organizers had hoped, Mr. Dobkin revealed that it was decided to strengthen the Agency’s North African department. It was also agreed to devote the first six months of each Jewish year to a united campaign for all Israel needs and then to utilize the next six months to carry on separate drives for the Jewish National Fund, Youth Aliyah and Keren Hayesod, he revealed. Israel campaigns and local drives will not be carried on together.
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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.
