Not less than 11,000 Jewish families in Warsaw alone, totaling 50,000 persons, will receive aid from the Jewish Community for Passover, it was announced today by the community.
In addition thousands of families will receive Passover food from private relief organizations. The number of Jews who depend upon charity for their Passover food is estimated at over a million throughout the whole of Poland.
The miserable situation of Polish Jewry is pictured in the tens of thousands of applications filed with the Jewish communities asking for matzoh in connection with the approaching Passover. Most of the applicants are asking for nothing more than matzoh and potatoes. All of them will celebrate the Passover with hardly anything but chese bare necessities.
In view of the withdrawals of government subsidies from the Jewish communities, Jewish leaders are totally at a loss as to how to accommodate the tens of thousands of applicants. The poverty in the provincial cities is even greater than in Warsaw.
Fear was expressed today that many Jewish communities will actually be stormed this week, the last before Passover, by those applicants who will be informed that their applications cannot be accommodated. Appeals were made Saturday in all synagogues throughout the country asking the more affluent Jews to share their Passover meals with the needy by contributing voluntarily to the special funds created for the purpose of providing the needy Jews with food throughout the Passover.
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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.
