Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion and Dr. Nahum Goldmann, president of the World Zionist Organization, today addressed the opening session of a pre-Conference of Jewish Journalists attended by 60 delegates from the Jewish press in all languages published in22 countries, including Israel. The people decided to help world conference of Jewish journalists in Jerusalem in 1962.
The Prime Minister said that up to 30 years ago, Yiddish had been a major unifying factor but that now three-quarters of all Jews no longer use it. Lack of a common language, he said, is an obstacle to the unity of the Jewish people. He added that the existence of Israel depends on the unity of world Jewry and that a world union of Jewish journalists could strengthen the ties between the various parts of world Jewry.
Dr. Nahum Goldmann said that no other people had been influenced politically as much as the Jews by journalists. He cited Theodor Herzl, Nahum Sokolov, A. D. Gordon. Vlahmir Jabotinsky and others, Dr. Nathan Swerdlin, president of the Yiddish Writers Union in New York, deplored the lack of space given by the press in Israel to Jewish news from other countries.
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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.
