The scheduled appearance of Palestine Arab refugee spokesmen before the Senate Immigration Subcommittee tomorrow was postponed today for a week following severe criticism voiced by Rep. Emanuel Celler, chairman of the House Immigration subcommittee.
Sen. Forrest C. Donnell, acting chairman of the Senate subcommittee, told Rep. Celler that the Senate body would call whomever it pleases to testify. Rep. Celler’s protest and Sen. Donnell’s reply occurred during testimony by the former at a hearing of the Senate subcommittee.
Rep. Celler assailed the scheduled appearance of the Arabs as “unmitigated audacity” because the “Arabs have been the aggressors” and said the refugee situation in Palestine resulted from a war which they started. He warned that the Arab spokesmen’s testimony would “inflame and arouse the Arab masses” in the Middle East and might “gum up the works” of the United Nations agencies attempting to achieve a solution of the Palestine problem.
JTA has documented Jewish history in real-time for over a century. Keep our journalism strong by joining us in supporting independent, award-winning reporting.
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.
