American Jews Sail to Attend Zurich Parley

Prominent Jews will sail from many ports today to attend meetings of the board of governors of Hebrew University which are to be held in Zurich from August 13 to 15. Dr. Chaim Weizmann, president of the University, will preside.

According to the New York office of the American Friends of the Hebrew University, Inc., Dr. Judah L. Magnes, chancellor of the university, will sail from Haifa today. Yesterday he attended a memorial service on Mt. Scopus for the late Chaim Nachman Bialik, the celebrated Hebrew poet and founder of the Palestine Friends of the Hebrew University.

Among the American members of the board of governors expected to attend the meetings are: Dr. Cyrus Adler, president of the Dropsie College in Philadelphia and of the Jewish Theological Seminary in New York; Dr. Emanuel Libman, member of the board of directors of the American Jewish Physicians’ Committee of the University; Dr. Nathan Ratnoff, chairman of the American Jewish Physicians’ Committee; Charles Rosenbloom of Pittsburgh and New York; and Dr. Stephen S. Wise.

Dr. Libman and Rosenbloom will sail on the Berengaria from New York tonight.

Other Americans who will attend the meetings, holding proxies for absent governor, include Maurice Hexter, member of the executive board of the Jewish Agency; Edward M. Warburg of the executive committee of the American Friends of the Hebrew University; and Dr. Jacob J. Golub, Director of the Hospital of Joint Diseases, who will sail with Dr. Ratnoff from Palestine.

Prior to sailing, Dr. Magnes issued a statement which has been released by Dr. A. S. W. Rosenbach, President of the American Friends of the Hebrew University.

“If ever there was a time for a Hebrew University, that time is now,” Dr. Magnes declared. “The Great War brought with it what might have been expected—a questioning of every presupposition of man’s thinking. But there have also come attempts, most violent and savage, to tighten up the loosened world. It is a time of deep despair, also a time of the glimmering of some hopes, a more honest time than usual, a bolder, more courageous time for better and for worse, a time seeking great answers to great questions.”

It is expected that Dr. Magnes will present the board with a five year plan embracing the addition to the university staff of twenty former German professors with whom negotiations have been under way during the past year. Fourteen have already been appointed.