Illegal crossing of the Polish border into Czechoslovakia by fleeing Jews attempting to reach the American zones of Germany and Austria has practically come to a standstill despite the fact that the Czech frontier has been reopened for these Jews and that the Polish border authorities place no obstacles in the path of Jews leaving the country.
The severe winter weather is one of the reasons for the sharp drop in the emigration of Jews who have to spend days and nights in the woods during their attempt to cross the Polish border without an exit permit. Another reason for the emigration drop is reports reaching here that conditions of life in the camps for displaced Jews in Germany and Austria are very bad.
A conference of Jewish leaders held this week in Cracow was assured by a government is representative that “the Jews have a future in Poland” and that the government is prepared to assist actively in the rehabilitation of Jewish life in the country. “The government,” he declared, “will come to the aid of the Jews in reconstructing their economic position on the basis of complete equality of rights.”
Meanwhile, the Polish Government has assigned raw materials valued at 250,000,000 zlotys to Jewish cooperatives. It also allotted 40,000,000 zlotys to the Central Jewish Economic Council which deals with economic rehabilitation, and 30,000,000 zlotys to the Central Committee of Polish Jews for intensification of its activities in the field of productivization of the Jewish population.
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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.