Bnai Zion Convention Hears Plea for Greater Jewish Unity in U.S.

The need for greater Jewish unity in the United States was emphasized here today at the 54th annual national convention of Bnai Zion, fraternal Zionist organization, which is being attended by more than 400 delegates.

Addressing the convention, Rabbi William Berkowitz, national vice-president of Bnai Zion, said there is “a definite need” for such unity, as well as for improvement in the area of Jewish education and for a deeper devotion to religion. “We have become a people minus a religious way of life. True there is much talk about a religious revival. However, it lacks depth and it lacks commitment,” he stressed. The answer to the religious revival is not to be discovered in more buildings but what goes on in these buildings and who frequents them and how often. It is high time for us to bring an end to a Jewish religious life of emptiness–poor in content, lacking commitment and one only of convenience,” he stated.

Max M. Varon, counselor to the Israel Embassy in Canada, predicted Israel will reach the three-million mark in population during the next decade and achieve a balanced industrial and agricultural economy with an organic link to all world markets. Mr. Varon also declared that “the Arab boycott, already in retreat, will have become a myth of the past within that decade.”

Col. Jacob Laske, of the Israel Army, addressing a luncheon session dedicated to the Jewish National Fund, told the delegates that “a great danger lurks for the whole Jewish minority in the Galilee area unless the land there is speedily redeemed, reclaimed and settled by Jews in the near future.”

He pointed out that the Arab population of Galilee is the largest in Israel and that now an estimated 140, 000 Arabs live in Central Galilee, whereas within that Arab area there are only 2,000 Jewish inhabitants. He charged that Arab citizens hold many strips of land not used by them and not needed by them. They would sell their land but are afraid to do so because of Arab nationalism which grows stronger every day,” he reported.

“The area is close to the borders and thus open to infiltration, which cannot be stopped,” he said. “Espionage is the daily business of outside enemies and Arab citizens of Israel, who are becoming a daily threat. Some Arab land-owners are interested in leaving Israel to join relatives in neighboring states. But again, they are afraid of being killed. Others wish to sell their land at speculative prices, payable in foreign currency, even for the land they and their ancestors could not cultivate because it was unirrigated, barren and rocky. The Jewish National Fund wishes to redeem and reclaim this for security reasons.

Irving Mann, West Coast director of Bnai Zion, reported a record development of the organization of the West Coast through the establishment of nine chapters in the Los Angeles–San Francisco area, with a total membership of four thousand. These chapters will now start a $50,000 project for a new youth center in Jerusalem. The center will bear the name of Fred Kahan, president of the Los Angeles Council of Bnai Zion and also a national vice-president of the organization.