The Jewish Agency Assembly declared in a resolution today that more rental housing in Israel was vital for absorbing immigrants and to relieve the indigenous housing shortage. Adopting a draft resolution of its housing committee–which included some of America’s top Jewish builders–the Agency Assembly called on its permanent technical committee on housing to “consider ways of reducing both financing costs and building costs with the purpose of creating the framework for a new mortgage program in Israel essential to reduce the price of apartments and to encourage investments in rental housing.”
The resolution reflected a detailed plan for overhauling Israel’s mortgage system proposed to the housing committee by Max Karl of Milwaukee, president of Mortgage Guarantee Insurance Corp., the giant mortgage guarantee firm. The plan called for 90 percent mortgage loans for low-price flats and no mortgages at all for expensive ones. Karl’s plan has attracted a good deal of attention in Israel, and Jewish Agency Chairman Louis Pincus promised it would be thoroughly studied.
A resolution from the aliya committee urged that officials of the Agency’s immigration department receive on-the-job training to raise their professional standards. The Assembly urged the department to recruit professional workers from among the new immigrants themselves. The Assembly also called for special housing facilities for elderly immigrants and young single immigrants.
A resolution submitted by the agricultural settlement committee called for the formation of a joint body of Jewish Agency officials and representatives of diaspora Jewry to introduce new industries into rural settlements. The Assembly noted with satisfaction the progress of many settlements under the Agency’s aegis towards full economic independence.
UNPRECEDENTED MOBILIZATION OF RESOURCES
Another note of satisfaction came from the fund-raising committee which praised the Agency for the “unprecedented mobilization of Jewish resources” last year. Nevertheless, the committee’s resolution noted that needs far exceeded resources and called on world Jewry to recognize that its efforts were not yet adequate. The Assembly called on all other Israel-based fund-raising bodies to coordinate their efforts with the United Jewish Appeal or the Keren Hayesod in each country.
The Assembly, adopting the resolutions of the higher education committee, called on the Agency to set up a permanent committee to define criteria for the allocation of Agency funds to Israeli universities each year and for supervising the universities’ long-range planning. Most of the universities’ funds come from the Jewish Agency. The Assembly, noting this fact, urged more careful planning to avoid duplication of programs, and facilities and to determine the necessity of new institutions before they are established.
APPROVE $470 M FOR 1973/74
The budget committee approved the $470 million budget for 1973/74 but stressed that it was not really enough for all of the Agency’s programs. The committee urged that all Assembly members receive periodic reports on the implementation of the budget items and that the standing budget committee include people who are not members of the Board of Governors.
In the general resolution, the Assembly assailed the Soviet education tax and the persecution of Jews in Arab lands. While congratulating Israel on its 25th anniversary, the resolution noted that even after 25 years of Statehood there are still “considerable numbers of citizens suffering from deprivation in housing, education and social and economic standards.” The Assembly pledged itself to help these people as well as to help the State continue to absorb new arrivals.
The general resolution concluded: “This Assembly, on the eve of the 25th anniversary of the establishment of the State of Israel, places on record its earnest thanksgiving for the greater dignity enjoyed by the entire Jewish people in our generation as a result of the existence and character of the State of Israel, for the new courage and hope which Israel has inspired in communities living under duress and for the solidarity and unity of purpose that now pervade the whole of the Jewish people.”
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The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
