Col. Frederick Kish retired today as a member of the Zionist Executive and the Jewish Agency Executive after nine years of service. His retirement was marked by a reception tendered him by the Jewish National Council over which Miss Henrietta Szold, American member of the Council’s administration, presided.
In his farewell address, Colonel Kisch said that in his nine years in Palestine he had seen “the Jewish community double, shared with it grief and danger, had witnessed the large immigration of 1926, the rise of the Emek settlements and the opening of the Hebrew University.”
Pointing out that while he had not always fully agreed with the Jewish community, he declared he had always found its instincts sound. He thanked Miss Szold and Isaac Ben Zwi, secretary of the Jewish Federation of Labor, for their cooperation. Speakers at the reception included Meyer Dizengoff, mayor of Tel Aviv, M. Levin of the Haifa Jewish community, M. Golum of the Jewish Federation of Labor, M. Meltzer of the Mizrachi and M. Schtempfer of Petach Tikvah, one of the pioneer colonies.
Shortly after the opening of the recent Zionist Congress, Colonel Kisch informed the Congress’ steering committee that he did not want to be a candidate, although he hoped it would be possible for him to serve the Zionist cause in a private capacity. Colonel Kisch, who has had a distinguished career in the British military and diplomatic service beginning in 1907, resigned from the British army in 1922 in order to devote himself to Zionist work in Palestine where he has made his permanent home.
Elected to the Zionist Executive by the 13th Congress in 1923, he has been reelected at each biennial Congress except the last. When the enlarged Jewish Agency was created in August, 1929, he was elected a member of the Agency’s Executive. In his nine years of service he has been in charge of the Executive’s relations with the Palestine government.
Colonel Kisch, who is 43, is a nephew by marriage of Sir Herbert Samuel, the first High Commissioner of Palestine.
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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.
