Bulgarian Jewish Leader Denies Greek Anti-semites’ Charges Against Salonican Maccabees

The charges by Greek nationalists that a member of the Saloniki Maccabee Club had manifested disloyalty to Greece when he visited the Bulgarian Maccabees last summer, allegations which led to a violent outburst of anti-Semitism in Saloniki a fortnight ago, were today branded “mean slanders” by Col. A. D. Tagger, chairman of the Bulgarian Jewish Consistory.

In reply to numerous inquiries in connection with the attacks on the Jews of Saloniki, Colonel Tagger today issued the following statement:

“The chairman of the Jewish Central Consistory wishes to state that the representative of the Saloniki Maccabee organization who was in Sofia at the time of the Maccabee sport celebration in the summer of 1930, came here, as did representatives of Maccabee organizations in other countries, to greet the Bulgarian Maccabee Federation on the occasion of its thirtieth anniversary.

“The behavior of the Salonican delegate, Mr. Cohen, during his entire stay in Sofia, was wholly proper and did not give the least occasion for doubting his loyalty. Anything else that has been said in his name or in the name of the Maccabee organization of Saloniki, is nothing more than mean slanders.”

Greek anti-Semites had spread a report that when Mr. Cohen was in Bulgaria last year he had listened unprotestingly to addresses by Bulgarian Maccabees in which they advocated Macedonian independence. By his silence, the anti-Semites charged, he was a tacit party to the agitation

Although this charge was repeatedly denied by the Maccabee organization in Saloniki and after it had been disproved by an investigation sponsored by the governor of the city, Greek nationalists attacked and burned the Jewish quarter of Saloniki.