“manchester Guardian” Writer Finds Almost Unbelievable Poverty Among Polish Jews

“The great mass of Polish Jews live in poverty that to the Western European who sees it for the first time is almost unbelievable; he rubs his eyes, wondering whether he is not in a bad dream,” writes a special correspondent of the “Manchester Guardian,” regarded as perhaps the most reliable and responsible newspaper published in Europe.

Discussing the “almost unbelievable poverty” which he has discovered, the writer, whose article appears in a recent issue, says that it is terribly aggravated by anti-Semitism:

“What makes this poverty doubly terrible is the anti-Semitism that keeps the Jews imprisoned in their dark ghettoes of disease and want,” he writes. “The Jewish poor of Poland— in Warsaw, a million city, they are about one-third of the population— cannot even become workmen. They are shut off even from those limited opportunities that, insignificant as they may seem to the rich, mean everything to the poor because they make just that small difference—amounting perhaps to no more than a few pence a day—between destitution and regular even if ill-paid employment.

“Polish Jews cannot get employment in any Government factory, in gas or electrical works, in the post office and telegraph services or, of course, in munition or armament factories, or in the bureaucracy. After a long and obstinate struggle a few—not more than ten or twelve—are now employed on the Warsaw tramways, and they have proved to be excellent workmen. When the Germans occupied Warsaw in the Great War they employed hundreds of Jews on the railways, but these were dismissed as soon as the Germans left. Many private firms, including some of the big textile factories at Lodz, refuse to employ Jews. Only here and there, as in Bialystok, is the anti-Semitic boycott broken,” the writer says.

ANTI-JEWISH BIAS EVERYWHERE

“Many a young Jew of high intelligence and with first-rate testimonials will appear to have the best chances until his prospective employers realize that he is a Jew, and his chances will go to a Christian who may be far less qualified.

“The bias against the Jews is everywhere. They feel it in the law courts and in the presence of the magistrates, they feel it in school, in politics, in business, and at the universities. But the peculiar characteristic of Polish anti-Semitism, making it one of the most dreadful instruments of oppression in the world, is that its main weight falls on the poor, darkening lives that would be dark enough in any case.”

BOYCOTT HURTS JEWS

Pointing out that there is Christian poverty as well, in Warsaw, and also slums, the writer says:

“For the Christians there are many chances of which the boycott deprives the Jews. Many an able-bodied and intelligent young Jew sits in semi-darkness sorting rags, patching old clothes, or darning socks, or sewing for twelve hours a day or more and earning hardly enough to keep hunger away when but for the boycott he might be earning several times as much in some office or factory.

“Of all the Polish minorities these Jews have the hardest struggle. But they rely upon their own effort. They are deeply appreciative of any sympathy or help from outside, but they feel that ultimately there is nothing worth their having save what they have achieved themselves. They have little if any faith in the League, although the most practical proposals for reforming the procedure by which the League deals with the complaints of the minorities were the Jewish draft proposals. Their struggle is there where they are, and it is for nothing save the rights of Polish citizenship, especially for what they call ‘the right to be workmen, a right enjoyed by the poorest Pole’.”