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Hias Asks Congress to Repeal Mccarran Act, Protests Soviet Drive

March 16, 1953
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Resolutions calling upon Congress to repeal or amend the McCarran-Walter Immigration Law and urging the United States to take steps in the United Nations to protest the growth of anti-Semitism in the Iron Curtain countries, were adopted today the 68th annual meeting of the Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society. The meeting also approved a budget of $1,930,000 for 1953. Fifteen hundred delegates attended the session.

In his presidential report to the session, Ben Touster revealed that the agency had helped 3,503 refugees leave Europe last year and that its active case load of 25,000 was being increased daily by the influx of escapees from the Communist countries. The HIAS president added that several of the organization’s offices in Europe which had been closed were being reopened to cope with this new emergency.

Arthur Lourie, Israel consul general in New York, told the meeting that Communist hostility towards the Jews was a Soviet reprisal against Israel “for its association with the West.” He also urged the U.S. to reject Egyptian requests for arms until the Arabs ended their war against the Jewish State.

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