The eighteenth World Zionist Congress formally opened here tonight with a moving address by Dr. Nahum Sokolow, president of the World Zionist Organization, in which he urged that Zionism be made the concern of the entire Jewish people and that Palestine be made “a land of fulfillment instead of a land of promise.”
Addressing the 332 delegates and several thousand spectators who filled Lucerno Hall, Dr. Sokolow offered greetings in German, French and English to the representatives of foreign governments present.
“Our work of peace and of civilization has but one need, the need of sympathy and a sense of attentive curiosity and a bit of patience on the part of the world. I hope that you will accord us your good will,” he declared.
“We are assembling now in a time of need and suffering,” the venerable Zionist leader told the delegates. “All the tragedy of the 2,000-year Diaspora has been unveiled before our shocked eyes. Anti-Semitism has lately struck at the heart of that part of our nation now in the Diaspora. The foundations of emancipation have been shaken and uprooted as by an earthquake. The whole facade of our civilization is crashing. Dangerous, inflammable matter has been stored up. It is dangerous to speak, but it is much more so to keep silent.”
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