Hungarian Jews Will Accept Anti-semites’ Challenge, Sandor Declares

(J.T.A. Mail Service

The reactionary tendencies shown by the Government for a long time past are fully in accord with its action in including so pronounced a reactionary politician as Julius Goemboes in the Government, Deputy Paul Sandor writes in the Hungarian Jewish organ “Egyenloeseg.”

“To me, it was therefore not so overwhelming a surprise when he was given the appointment,” he continues, ” as it was to Liberal public opinion, especially abroad, because they knew that Julius Goemboes, together with the Roumanian Cuza and the Bavarian Hitler, is one of the most notorious anti-Semites in Europe.

“Mr. State-Secretary Goemboes, since he has been in the Ministry of War. has in fact been more active than ever before. His first act was to invite all the Awakening Magyars to the banquet of the Government Party. The other day, at a banquet of the Federation of Social Organizations ‘Tesz,’ he delivered a speech which showed no sign of any change in his mentality from the period 1918-1920. His speech opened with the old story about the Hungarian race and the alien race, and the fight for the supremacy of Hungarianism in the country. Such a speech is designed to rouse anew the slumbering, hidden, revolutionary elements of the Right which have been at rest for years.

“But we Hungarian Jews,” Deputy Sandor goes on, ‘ will not allow ourselves to be excluded from the community of the nation. If you, Mr. State-Secretary Goemboes, regard the Jews here as guests and aliens, perhaps you will be good enough to recall what these Jews have done for the welfare of the Hungarian nation. The Jew Sigmund Simonyi laid the foundation-stone of the Hungarian language. The Jew Heinrich Marczali did incalculable service to the writing of Hungarian history. The Jew Bernat Alexander created Hungarian philosophic literature. The Jew Josef Kiss created the new Hungarian lyric. The Jews Ladislaus Fayer and Gustav Schwartz were the pioneers of Hungarian law literature. The Jew Leopold Feher was Hungary’s most representative mathematician. The Jews Franz Mezo and Attila Petschauer were responsible for the hoisting only a few weeks ago of the Hungarian flag to the mast-head of the Amsterdam Olympiad.

“This is only a small fraction of what the Jews have done for their Hungarian nation. We will not allow ourselves to be barred out of our homeland, to which we have just as much right as you. And I know that you would never have become State-Secretary of Szegedin, were it not for the Jewish officers who in 1919 cleared Szegedin of the Bolsheviks. If Mr. Goemboes is looking for a fight,” Deputy Sandor concludes, “he may take note of this fact, that we Hungarian Jews will fight to the alst man for our Hungarian honor and our citizenship rights.”