Jews of Austria Call for United Front to Meet Growing Antisemitism

A call to the Jews of Austria to organise a united Jewish Federation which will concentrate all Jewish efforts in Austria, has been issued here over the signatures of Dr. Desider Friedmann, Dr. Oscar Gruenbaum, Chairman of the Austrian Zionist Committee, and Dr. Joseph Loewenherz.

The new organisation, it is stated, will make it its duty to conduct a vigorous campaign against antisemitic agression and to carry on an active Jewish policy.

Day by day, the appeal says, Jewish distress is growing. The systematic economic pogrom carried on b# the Austrian parties is making it impossible for Jews to secure any State employment. Thousands of Jewish employees are out of work. Thousands of Jewish employers are closing down under the pressure of the economic crisis and the burden of taxation. Distress is making rapid strides among the Jewish masses. The militant antisemitism of the Hackenkreuzler is menacing our honour, our life, our citizen rights and our economic existence.

The feeling is growing among the Jewish masses that the call of the hour is to unite, to put a stop to all conflicts inside the Jewish camp and to create a closed Jewish front.

The Jewish People’s Party which was founded recently in Austria under the leadership of ex-Deputy Robert Stricker, the Revisionist leader, has also issued an appeal, which says:

The need of creating an instrument for the Jews of Austria which will be entitled to fight against the ### and political dangers that threaten us, and to deal with all things which fall into the orbit of Jewish interests, has become more acute than ever. Only a self-conscious Jewish policy, neither of the Right nor of the Left, can in these days of acute danger, in view of the increasing aggressive antisemitism, conduct a successful ###.