The Council of the Anglo-Jewish Association, by a substantial majority, today defeated a proposal that the AJA rejoin the Board of Deputies of British Jews.
The opposition to rejoining the board was led by AJA president Montague Ewen and Neville Laski, former president of the Board. Mr. Laski said that the Board had shown no evidence of a desire to have the AJA rejoin, while Mr. Ewen insisted that since many of the AJA’s members were already on the Board there would be an unnecessary duplication for the AJA itself to be represented on the Board.
Meanwhile, considerable comment has been aroused by a statement by Mr. Ewen, on behalf of the AJA, on the Kibya incident. The statement attempted to present the background of the raid and, according to Mr. Ewen, to make the public aware of the fact that this was not “one outrage but an explosive situation.” The division over the propriety of the statement exists even on the AJA Council, where some members feel that the statement should have opened with a flat condemnation of the “outrage,” while others want it pointed out that the Arabs are chiefly responsible for the situation which brought about the Kibya raid.
Mr. Montagu also rebuked the Archbishop of York for stating last week that the “Jews” and “Jewish soldiers” had carried out attacks on the Jordan village of Kibya when the attack was carried out by Israelis. Mr. Montagu declared that “no Jew who is really a Jew and influenced by his religion could ever bring himself to commit such an action.”
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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.
