Jewish Agency Presents Impressive Progress Report to Zionist Congress

A picture of steady progress in the absorption of immigrants and unparalleled settlement of the Israeli land was presented here today in a report prepared by the Jewish Agency executive for presentation to the 24th World Zionist Congress which opens in this city next Tuesday. The report covers the 57-month period between the last Congress in April, 1951 and the end of 1955.

The number of immigrants in maabarot immigrant transit centers–was reduced from 213,000 at the beginning of the period to 70,000 at the end of last year. One hundred and twenty five new agricultural settlements were founded in that period and 440 already established settlements were given aid for expansion and consolidation purposes.

Large and vital sections of the country’s water system were completed in that period, the report said. Israel’s agricultural supplies more than one-half of the local food requirements and in some categories has already produced an exportable surplus. The trade balance has narrowed appreciably, with Israel now exporting 40 percent of its import total, as compared with 12 percent in 1951.

In an analysis of immigration into Israel, the report revealed that after a hiatus between May, 1951 and August, 1954, the Jewish Agency resumed mass immigration from North Africa. Only five percent of the immigrants since then have been social welfare cases. Last year, thanks to a new “ship to village” plan, 70 percent of the immigrants were taken directly to prepared settlements in new and border development areas. This program, the report asserted, helped reduce the number of people in transit camps and facilitated the absorption of all immigrants.

GIVES DETAILS ON IMMIGRATION; 1,482 JEWS FROM U. S. SETTLED IN ISRAEL

The needs of North African Jewry, endangered by nationalist upheavals and general political uncertainty, were met at the expense of a program, approved at the last Zionist Congress, aimed at obtaining middle class immigrants from Western countries. But this effort continues and a plan to attract youth to Israel has “entered the stage of implementation, “the report said. It gave the following figures for immigration from various countries during the four and three-quarter year period:

Iraq, 108,000; Iran, 14,000; Turkey, 1,800; Yemen, 1,216; Aden, 389; India, 2,877 and China, 492. Also, Rumania, 33,800; Bulgaria, 2,200; Hungary, 1,271, Poland, 143 and USSR 118. Mass emigration from Czechoslovakia ended completely in 1950. United States, 908 plus 574 tourists who settled permanently; Canada, 188; Argentina, 1,666; Brazil, 491, all other South American countries together, 792; South Africa, 189, plus 133 tourists who remained as settlers, and Australia, 100.

Youth Aliyah institutions and farm and training centers absorbed about 25,000 youths during this period, about one-third of the total the movement has cared for in its entire history. Some $40,000,000 was spent on Youth Aliyah activities and there are still 11,000 children in the movement’s various centers. Seventy percent of the children absorbed during this period were boys and about half of all the children it cared for have gone into agriculture, with the remainder choosing the army or various other occupations.