Jews in the Honours List, Knighthoods for Lion Simon and Montague Burton: Distinctions for Albert Hy

The names of several well-known Jews appear in the Honours List issued to-night for the occasion of His Majesty’s Birthday to-morrow.

Mr. Montague Burton, the prominent Leeds Jewish social worker, who is also active in the Zionist movement, where he is a Provincial Vice President of the English Zionist Federation, and has been a delegate to several Zionist Congresses, receives a Knighthood. Mr. Burton receives the award as “a generous benefactor to Leeds and other universities, and for public services in the cause of industrial relationships”. Mr. Burton established in 1929 the Weismann Chair of International Peace at the Hebrew University in Jerusalem.

Mr. Leon Simon, who was recently appointed Director of pests and Telegraphs to the General Post Office, receives a Knighthood in the Order of the Bath. Mr. Simon is the outstanding authority on Achad Ha’am, whose works he has translated into English, and the leading exponent of his ideas. He was a member of the Zionist Commission which went out to Palestine after the promulgation of the Balfour Declaration.

Mr. Albert Montefiore Hyamson, the Chief Immigration Officer to the Palestine Government, becomes an Officer of the Order of the British Empire.

Mr. Hyamson who was at first in the British Post Office Service and was transferred to Palestine in 1921, was at one time the Joint Editor of the “Zionist Review” which was published in London. He was the first Honorary Secretary and afterwards Vice President of the Jewish Literary Societies in England and was editor of the Jewish Literary Annual. He has published a number of books, among them” A History of the Jews in England”, 1908, a revised edition appearing in 1928; “The Jubilee of Jewish Emancipation in England” ,in 1908; “Palestine, the Rebirth of an Ancient People”, in 1917; and “Palestine, Old and New”, in 1928. A question about Mr. Hyamson’s one-time Zionist views was put during the sessions of the Shaw Enquiry Commission in December 1929, the Counsel for the Arab side, Mr. Stoker, asking Mr. Harry Sacher whether Mr. Hyamson was a Zionist. No, Mr. Sacher replied, but he was. You had better ask him for his views.

Mr. Siegried Hoofien, the President of the Jaffa and District Chamber of Commerce, is made Honorary Member of the Order of the British Empire. Mr. Hoofien is the Manager of the Anglo-Palestine Company, and was a member of the temporary Zionist Executive in Palestine at the time of the outbreak in August 1929, when the members of the Executive were absent at the Zionist Congress in Zurich, and in that capacity he was one of the Jewish witnesses called before the Shaw Commission, whom he told in his evidence that the Jews had brought 45 million pounds into Palestine, and the Jewish immigration had brought great benefits also to the Arab population, the country having entered as a result on a new stage of development, despite some inevitable dislocation consequent on cultivation replacing grazing.

Mr. Mark Aitchison Young, the new Chief Secretary to the Palestine Government, who was Acting High Commissioner during Sir John Chancellor’s leave of absence till yesterday, also becomes a Knight Companion of the Order of the Bath. An Honorary Commandership of the Order of the British Empire is conferred on the former Prime Minister of Transjordan, Hassan Khalid Pasha, an Officership of the Order of the British Empire on Captain Buller of the Palestine Transjordan Frontier Force, and Honorary Membership of the Order of the British Empire on Zahi Haddad, the Medical Officer of Health in Haifa.