Lauding the “monumental and historic” work of the Joint Distribution Committee in aiding displaced Jews, former Governor Herbort H. Lehmen who was the first director-general of Unrea emphasized yesterday that the coming dissolution of Unrra places demands on private organizations “far greater than ever before, and the means to satisfy even the most elemental demands will be totally inadequate.”
Speaking to 750 volunteers in JDC’s Supplies for Overseas Survivors campaign, which has started a special drive to collect 10,000,000 cans of food by the end of next month, Mr. Lehman referred to the “practically indescribable” plight of “the pitifully few survivors” of the Jews in Europe. “Try as I may,” he declared, “I can’t picture the degree of suffering, both physical and spiritual, that peoples cverseas are undergoing, particularly the Jews.”
“The war is over,” he stressed, “but the need for relief abroad is as great as it has ever been.” Explaining why this new campaign is necessary in addition to the millions of dollars already raised, he asserted, “the answer is, that as much as we haveg given, it is not enough.”
Mr. Lehman, paid tribute to the JDC as the organization that has stood between 1,400,000 European Jews and starvation. “Seventy-five percent of these Jews ressided in areas where Unrra did not operate,” he pointed out, “and it was only the JDC that was able to bring them assistance.”
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