Histadrut Campaign Convention Votes $5, 000, 000 Goal for 1963

A resolution voting a $5, 000, 000 goal for the 1963 Israel Histadrut Campaign was adopted here today at the closing session of the 39th annual convention of the National Committee for Labor Israel which was attended by 2, 000 delegates from all parts of the country. The 1963 goal, according to Dr. Sol Stein, national director of the organization, compares with $3, 293, 000 raised in 1962, an increase of $105, 000 over the preceding year.

Dr. Stein also announced that next year’s plans envisage the establishment of a series of cultural and medical institutions in Israel, honoring the memories of American labor leaders and organizations that “have made major contributions to Histadrut’s welfare program.” These will include, he said, the Sidney Hillman Medical Center in Tel Aviv; the Max Zaritsky Youth Center, at Beth She An, honoring the late president of the United Hatters, Cap and Millinery Workers Union; and the Isidore Nagler Youth Center, near Haifa, commemorating the name of the late vice-president of the International Ladies Garment Workers Union.

The concluding session re-elected Rabbi Jacob J. Weinstein of Chicago, as national chairman, and installed William H. Sylk of Philadelphia, as national president of the American Histadrut Development Foundation; with Louis Segal and Ralph Wechsler as associate chairmen; Charles Gutwirth as treasurer; and Maurice Guinsberg as associate treasurer. The installations were conducted by Judge Victor H. Blau, of Philadelphia. The two-year-old Foundation, an arm of the national organization charged with securing long-range commitments, has already received such commitments to aid Histadrut’s welfare agencies in Israel, exceeding $2, 500, 000, the 2, 000 delegates at the four day convention were told.

Announcements were made also that Isaac H. Taylor, of Baltimore, has contributed personally the sum of $250, 000 for a youth center in Jerusalem to bear his name. Mr. Taylor and a group of Baltimore friends had previously given $100, 000 for this project. Dr. Stein reported that more than $100, 000 has been raised for the establishment of the Sholem Aleichem Museum and Library at Tel Aviv.

Speakers at the convention included Mrs.Golda Meir, Israel’s Foreign Minister and that country’s first Minister of Labor; U. S. Undersecretary of Labor John F. Henning, who brought to the gathering the personal greetings of President Kennedy; Israeli-Consul-General Katriel Katz, who read personal greetings from Israel’s President Izhak Ben-Zvi; Meir Argov, chairman of the foreign affairs committee of Israel’s Parliament; Zev Haring, a member of the executive committee of Histadrut, the Israel Federation of Labor; Dr. Eli Ginzberg, professor of economics at Columbia University, Louis Segal, member of the Jewish Agency executive, and others.

In her address, Mrs. Meir charged that the “brothers and sisters” of the Soviet bombers supplied to Cuba are now “on the doorstep of Israel, among the Arab nations.”