Golda Meir, addressing an overflow audience at an Israel Bond dinner in her honor last night, declared that history has consistently recorded that whenever and wherever anti-Semitism began, the regimes that started it have disappeared but the Jewish people have survived.
Opening her address with “Fellow racists.” the former Premier was strongly applauded when she said that the recent resolution by the UN General Assembly equating Zionism with racism had rendered the UN less important and that it represented a step in the downfall of the UN and not in the downfall of Israel.
Referring to the Jewish people as “one family,” she drew a parallel between the tremendous impact of American Jewish support during Israel’s critical struggle for independence in 1948 and the urgent need for American Jewry’s support of Israel and its economic strength particularly at this time.
More than $2 million in Israel Bonds were purchased at the dinner attended by more than 1200 persons, with major purchases by several banks and a $100,000 purchase by the Jewish Welfare Federation. The leading participants at the tribute dinner, which was held at the Fairmont Hotel, included Karl Bach, who served as dinner chairman; Mayor Joseph Alioto, who welcomed Mrs. Meir with the key to the city; Benjamin H. Swig, permanent Honorary Bond chairman for Northern California, who presented the Eleanor Roosevelt Humanities Award to Mrs. Meir; and Kenneth Colvin, San Francisco Bond chairman, who conducted the sale of Bonds.
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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.