Impartial Report of Roumanian Excesses, Presented Before International Congress of League of Nations

(Jewish Telegraphic Agency)

An impartial view of the Jewish situation in Roumania was presented in a report to the Committee on Minorities of the Congress of the International Federation of League of Nations Unions, which was made public today. The report was presented by the Secretary, M. H. Ruyssen, at the federatoon’s session held here the end of May.

The attention of the Committee on Minorities was drawn to the situation of Jews in Roumania by a telegram dated December 23, 1926 sent to the Secretariat in Brussels by the Jewish Association of Palestine. The telegram was immediately communicated to the Roumanian League of Nations Union with the request that they should go into the matter. A copy was sent to the Secretary-General of the League of Nations, who acknowledged its receipt. The Committee on Minorities was summoned and the President, Sir Willoughby Dickinson, asked the General Secretary to collect evidence and to give a resume of the facts in a memorandum to be placed before the Committee.

The memorandum, which is dated January 20, read:

“Roumania has been the theatre during the last three or four months of anti-Semitic troubles of incontestable gravity. As far as one can judge from the newspapers the facts most worthy of attention are the following:

“At the beginning of the autumn term of the University Czernowitz, Bukovina, examinations were held as usual and a large number of Jewish students were failed. These young men had the impression of having been the object, on the part of certain examiners, of unjust treatment and systematic elimination. There was as a result amongst them a certain effervescence which produced immediately a countermanifestation by the non-Jewish students.

“In the course of this agitation a Jewish student, David Falik, was shot by a non-Jewish student named Totu. This unhappy event threw the Jewish population of Czernowitz, which is considerable, into consternation.

“On the day of the victim’s funeral all the Jewish shops were closed as a sign of grief and a large cortege followed the coffin of the murdered student. This new demonstration was at once denounced by certain nationalist elements as an intolerable provocation and the trouble spread, notably to Jassy, Kishinev, Ploesti, Foeshani and Ungheni. These troubles had a repercussion all though the country and led the Chief Rabbi Zirelson. Senator of Bessarabia, to intervene in the Senate on November 26, on the occasion of the Speech from the Throne. M. Zirelson urged the Senate to take energetic measures to combat the wave of anti-Semitism which threatened to spread dangerously throughout the country, following the occurrence of new incidents. The Jewish Senator’s speech was met with a tempest of protestation and such cries as “Go to Palestine,” and the Bureau of the Senate decided that the speech should not be inserted in the official journal. In view of the scene, Senator Zirelson tendered his resignation, which was accepted by the enormous majority of 80 votes to 7, on December 1.

“Now at the same moment there was held at Jassy a congress of students which attracted no less than 5,000 members. This congress had in itself no political aim; it was simply academic. But Professor Cuza, whose militant anti-Semitism is well known and has more than once been the source of anti-Semitic troubles in the Roumanian universities, presided. The congress adopted, among other resolutions, one demanding the transformation of the Numerus Clausus into Numerus Nullus, that is to say, the total and definite exclusion of Jews from the Roumanian universities.

“Excited, it would seem, by the heated feelings shown at the Jassy re-union. the students, upon their return, committed grave excesses; in the train Jewish travellers were molested, even thrown out of the windows or through the doors of the carriage. Other violent incidents took place in the stations of Focshani. Buceu and Ploesti. But it was at Kishinev in Bessarabia, above all, that the troubles reached their greatest height. It was, according to certain newspapers, a veritable pogrom; the Jewish quarters were devastated; three synagogues were wrecked and innumerable people were injured.

“The troubles spread to other town notably to Bucharest. On December 10, with the authorization of the Government, the students celebrated in that town in their own quarter the fourth anniversary of the inauguration of the anti-Semitic movement amongst the university youth. After the celebration a crowd of students forced the police cordons, rushed through the streets, broke the windows of the offices of the newspapers “Adeverul” and “Stampa,” and wrecked a large number of Jewish tradesmen’s shops in the streets of Bacan, Spinzi, Moschilor, etc. Thirty students were arrested and then released. Similar outbreaks occurred at Bucharest on December 17 and 20, and at Clausenburg on December 23, where a Jewish charity ball was invaded by students who committed all sorts of violence upon those present, injuring twenty people.

“Again, in the University of Bucharest, the students organized among themselves a police, with the object of securing the exclusion of Jewish students, as demanded by the congress at Jassy. The Jewish students were expelled by force from the College of Medicine. The effect of these excesses has been to intimidate the Jewish students so that they no longer appear at the University. On December 18, the ‘Adeverul’ of Bucharest wrote:

“At last all is calm at the College of Medicine; the students have formed their own police, order has been re-established; it is the order of the Numerus Nullus.’

“The Government has certainly prescribed energetic measures for the re-establishment of order. Moreover, the Minister of Public Instruction, M. Petrovici, received delegates from the students on December 17 and 21, and promised to give them ample satisfaction as to their professional demands on condition that the disorders at the universities were stopped absolutely.

“Nevertheless, there are certain indications which permit one to doubt that unanimity is complete, even on the part of the Government, in matters concerning the anti-Semitic movement. The Minister of the Interior, M. Goga, would seem to be more indulgent than his colleagues toward the movement. So much so, that the ‘Vittorul’ of December 22 accuses the Minister of ‘tolerating and encouraging the students’ agitation.’

“In any case, M. Goga’s speech in Parliament on December 4 in reply to the interpellation of the Jewish deputies as to the disorders at Kishinev produced a lively surprise. Recalling the murder of the student Falik, the Minister said: ‘I do not approve of excesses from whatever quarter they may come, but the wrong is not only on the side of the students, who in a legal way accomplished an organic action of our nation, and I wish that these students would continue to preserve in their soul the fire of the national ideal.’

“These seem to be the chief elements of the agitation which has troubled Roumania, and to which the attention of the Committee has been drawn.” When writing to advertisers please mention the “Jewish Daily Bulletin.”