“Without greatly increased aliya there can be no security for Israel, no future, no Israel.” This warning was issued by acting World Zionist Organization chairman Leon Dulzin in remarks prepared for tonight’s opening session of the World Jewish “summit,” attended by 170 Jewish leaders from overseas joined by scores of prominent Israelis–ministers, Jewish Agency Executive members. Knesseters, trade unionists and industrialists–in the Knesset’s Chagal Hall. The two-and-a-half-day conference was called on short notice to plan world Jewish action following the anti-Zionist resolution adopted by the United Nations General Assembly.
Dulzin said “two issues stand out above all others–immigration and identification.” Today there were some three million Jews in Israel, he said: “Our goal must be to ensure, by the end of the century, a population of seven to eight million….It is a task which is not a concern only of Israel, It demands total responsibility by the entire Jewish people.”
“The second issue is identification.” Dulzin declared.” By identification I mean an understanding of what you are identified with, Let me remind you that only 20 percent of Jewish children get Jewish education, and that only eight percent get a full Jewish education. This situation is evidence of a most dangerous threat to Jewish survival….What is at stake is the Jewish spirit, the will to survive as Jews….”
Israel, said Dulzin, was not founded by the UN at Lake Success. It was the culmination of “an inevitable and persistent logic in Jewish thinking over “the millennia of dispersion….” he stressed.”The Mideast is full of archaeological reminders of the countries and empires that controlled the minds and hearts of ancient peoples….One people and only one people in this region continues to practice the same religion, to recite the same prayers, to speak the same language, to till the same soil….We, we are that people. This is the victory of the human spirit. This is Zionist fulfillment.”
URGES AGONIZING REAPPRAISAL
Dulzin urged a “heshbon hunefesh” by Jewry, “an agonizing reappraisal of all structures, strategies and approaches. We in Israel need the advice and help of our colleagues from the diaspora in adapting our instruments of work to the new situation with which we are confronted. At the same time we want to be of help to you in developing new approaches and programs that will reflect the realities and potentials of your home communities.”
The 170 Jewish leader were urged by Dulzin to utilize their “magnificent talents” to work “in a great cooperative effort” to combat the effects of the General Assembly anti-Zionist resolution. The basic answer to this resolution, he asserted, “is in what we are and what we do as Jews in Israel and in our Jewish communities in the diaspora. The basic answer is the kind of society we build in Israel….” Dulzin added that the summit would not be just another meeting with very little “tachliss,” but would “map out concrete methods of strengthening Jewish identity.”
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