Iraq’s Entry into War May Affect Jewish Position in Palestine

Zionist leaders here today refrained from commenting on assertions that Iraq’s belated entry into the war on the side of the United Nations may affect Jewish post-war demands in Palestine, but Moshe Shertok head of the political department of the Jewish Agency, in a public address last night stated sarcastically:

“We, Jews, did not wait for Rommel’s retreat, for the spectacular victories of the Russian Army and for the Axis reverses in the Mediterranean to declare war against the Axis. We never sat on the fence. We were at war with Hitler long before Britain and the United States.”

Speaking to the annual conference of the Zionist Federation of Great Britain and Ireland, Shertok emphasized that it is of great importance that the Zionist movement “reach an understanding with Russia” and that it “see to it that America does not shirk its responsibilities” in order that the rights due the Jews in Palestine be secured at the peace negotiations. He warned that the Jews in Palestine will make unworkable any policy directed against Jewish interests and pointed out that Palestine Jewry’s contribution to the Allied war effort corresponds proportionately to the British volunteer army of 2,400,000.

(Mrs. Anne O’Hare McCormick, noted political commentator, stated in her column in the New York Times today that the Palestine problem takes on new aspects with Iraq’s entrance into the war. “Iraq,” she writes, “as one of the United Nations, potential representative of the Arab peoples in the post-war settlements, is likely to increase the misgivings of the Zionists that their claims, like the demand for a Jewish army, will be subordinated to those of the Arabs. Whether or not it gives substance to the vague idea of Arab federation, it must strengthen the insistence of the advocates of a Jewish state to have a voice in the peace plans.”)

“It is important to impress upon the world that Palestine must become a Jewish Commonwealth in order to make it impossible for the present tragedy of the Jews to reoccur,” Shertok said. He reaffirmed the Zionist policy of mutual non-domination by neither Jews nor Arabs in Palestine, but denounced the suggestion that Palestine be proclaimed a bi-national state. He clearly stated that the Zionists will insist on Jewish control of immigration into Palestine instead of the present control by the Palestine Government. “God is with us!” he concluded.

The conference, attended by 439 delegates, re-elected Dr. Chain Weizmann, who is now on a visit to the United States, as president. It also heard addresses by Prof. Selig Brodetsky, Berl Locker and others, all of whom stressed the necessity for Jews to be prepared for post-war international decisions which will shape the future of the Jews. Brodetsky insisted that the Jewish leaders approach the Allied Nations with a demand that negotiations be started with Hitler to remove from Nazi occupied countries those Jews who still remain alive.