Henry Morgenthau Jr., general chairman of the United Jewish Appeal, last night cabled an appeal chairman of the United Jewish Appeal, last night cabled an appeal to British Prime Minister Clement Attlee and former Prime Minister Winston Churchill requesting the release of 11,000 Jews interned by the British Government on the island of Cyprus.
Declaring that “their only crime is that they are Jews who escaped death at the hands of Hitler and sought to find life among their own people in Israel, ” Mr. Morgenthau charged that “these men, women and some 600 babies have been subjected to the most inhuman forms of degradation.” He added that “if the British people could see the intolerable conditions under which the Cyprus refugees live, they would demand that the refugees be freed to leave for Israel at once.”
Mr. Morgenthau stressed in his messages that the people and government of Israel were eager and anxious to receive the Cyprus “prisoners,” and give them an opportunity to build new lives. Of the 11,000 Jews held in prison camps on Cyprus, at least fifty percent have been there for two years, another twenty-five percent for more than 18 months and the remainder for at least six months, he stated.
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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.
