With a record attendance of 480 delegates and 1,500 guests from all parts of the world, and with 300 newspapermen present to report its deliberations, the nineteenth beinnial World Zionist Congress opened here tonight in the great hall of the Congress and Arts Palace.
Before the brilliant gathering which included diplomats of many nations and official representatives of the British and Swiss governments, Dr. Nahum Sokolow, 74-year-old president of the World Zionist Organization, delivered two addresses.
In the first, Dr. Sokolow declared the Zionist movement’s adherence to the terms of the Palestine Mandate “in the word and in the spirit.” He voiced a plea for unity among Zionists and an understanding with the Arabs. Reviewing the developments in Palestine within the past two years since the last Congress at Praha, Czechoslovakia, the veteran Zionist leader gave vigorous expression to the demand that the restrictions placed upon immigration to Palestine and expansion within the country be removed.
In his second address, delivered after an interval during which James G. McDonald, League of Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, spoke, Dr. Sokolow reviewed the world situation of Jewry and Zionism.
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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.
