Six major Jewish organizations, meeting in an emergency session here today, adopted a resolution protesting the “Nazi-like” persecution of Jews by the Government of Iraq. The meeting also voted to present to the State Department a joint memorandum calling on the U.S. Government to use its “good offices to halt the persecution of the Iraqi Jews which now threatens the very existence of 130,000 Jews in Iraq.”
Representatives of the following national groups participated in the meeting: American Jewish Committee, American Jewish Congress, American Zionist Council, B’nai B’rith, Jewish Labor Committee and Jewish War Veterans.
The emergency session said that “news of mass arrests, torture and confiscation of property in gross violation of human rights, perpetrated by the Government of Iraq on a defenseless community, came as an overwhelming shock to American Jews.” It was noted that the reports of the Iraqi pogroms arrived in the U.S. at the “very moment President Truman, officiating at the cornerstone laying of the new U.N. headquarters, was dedicating the U.N. and the U.S. to freedom and preservation of human rights.”
The meeting added that the “six organizations gathered for collective action on this tragic issue are planning appropriate action designed to make the facts known to the American public. The organizations represented are convinced that once these facts are known, the United States Government, backed by popular support, can and will move effectively to halt this resurgence of terror in a land long known for persecution of minorities.”
JTA has documented Jewish history in real-time for over a century. Keep our journalism strong by joining us in supporting independent, award-winning reporting.
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.
