Large Potential Immigrant Influx from N. America, Britain Seen in Israel

Urging concentration on efforts to promote immigration into Israel from the free countries, S. Z. Shragai, a member of the Jewish Agency executive, said today that there is a potential Jewish immigration to this country from North America and Britain alone, reaching about 15,000 to 20, 000 a year.

However, he said, to activate this potential, it would be necessary to improve absorption conditions here, “Realistic steps,” he said, must include plans for small capitalists and middle class settlers, easier housing and mortgage loans, and subsidies for construction of rental housing. He declared that the large number of Israelis in the United States and Canada, totaling 40, 000, are “eager to return if granted some sort of aid. ” Students, he said, should be granted “some of the privileges” extended to immigrants.

Mr. Shragai, who heads the Agency’s immigration department, made his statement about potential immigration from North America and England in the course of a press conference at which he denied reports that the current immigration has “swamped” the country with social welfare cases.

Referring to a breakdown of last year’s immigration, he said that 53 per cent of the newcomers were aged 16 or less; about 20 per cent between 17 and 30; and 18 per cent between the ages of 31 and 50. The “hard core” social welfare cases, he said, did not exceed 5 per cent, while “borderline” cases, such as widows with children, constituted some 10 per cent. This was unavoidable, he stated, in a “complex” immigration which, in many cases, cannot be controlled by the Agency either as to source or rate. Replying to criticism about many immigrants having large families or many ill and aged, he said “discrimination would amount to tyranny. “