450,000 Hungarian Jews Already Deported; Federal Council of Churches Issues Appeal

An appeal to the Christian world to prevent further deportations of Jews from Hungary was issued today by the Federal Council of Churches of Christ of America, following receipt of information from the World Council of Churches in Geneva that 12,000 Hungarian Jews are being deported daily to Poland and that the number already deported is about 450,000.

The appeal, made public by Samuel McCrea Cavert, general secretary of the Federal Council of Churches, reads: “According to radiograms received at the office of the Federal Council of the Churches of Christ in America from the headquarters of the World Council of Churches in Geneva, nearly 450,000 Jews have already been deported from Hungary to Auschitz in Upper Silesia and deportations are continuing at the rate of 12,000 each day. The information which comes to us indicates that the evacuation of Jews in the eastern provinces is virtually completed and that the evacuation is now proceeding in the western districts. We are told that travel conditions are such that many deportees die en route and that others are killed and cremated on arrival in Auschwitz.

“In the face of such conditions I earnestly appeal to American Christians to pray for the Hungarian Jews subjected to such inhuman treatment. Even if we see no practicable way of going to their assistance, we must at least cry out in protest and identify ourselves in sympathy with the victims of an un-Christian racial policy. I also appeal to our Christian brethren in Hungary to refuse to be silent in the presence of this crime and to do everything possible to aid and comfort the Jewish victims. To accept the present inhumanity against the Jews without protest would be to leave a black stain on the record of any country which wants to be regarded as Christian.”