An organized effort to raise funds for the Jewish Agency for Palestine to enable that body to facilitate the immigration to Palestine of Jews from Germany and other Central and Eastern European countries was launched last night at the Hotel Astor at the dinner given in honor of Nathan Straus, Jr. by the Jewish Agency.
All the speakers referred to the situation in Germany, and declared that Palestine offered a refuge for those Jews in Europe who are fleeing from persecution or whose livelihood is jeopardized by economic discrimination.
Among the speakers were Morris Rothenberg, who presided, Mayor John P. O’Brien, Joseph V. McKee, George Gordon Battle, Louis Lipsky, James Marshall, Rabbi Stephen S. Wise, Mrs. Rose Halprin, and Nathan Straus, Jr., the guest of the evening.
Mr. Rothenberg said: “While Jews will never yield their inalienable right to live on a basis of equality with and to enjoy the same privileges as all other citizens in the lands of their birth or adoption, the task of finding a solution for hundreds of thousands who must flee from persecution or whose existence has been made impossible by economic discrimination, is inescapable.”
Mr. McKee, who touched on the events in Germany, said there could be no justification for what the German Government was doing. It could only be the result of stupidity. A stupid lack of appreciation of the real work of the Jewish people. He cited the services of the Straus family as an illustration of the worth of Jews to the countries in which they dwelt. “Multiply the Straus family by the hundreds of thousands of Jewish families in the United States,” he said, “and we have an appreciation of the real meaning of the phrase ‘the contribution of the Jews to the building of America’.”
Mayor John P. O’Brien castigated the anti-Jewish policy of the Nazis. He expressed the hope that the Jewish National Home would be able to provide a place of refuge for Jews wherever they were persecuted, and declared that he hoped in the near future to pay a visit to Palestine in order to see what the Jews had done. He hoped by the time he went there, the Jews in Palestine would have increased from 200,000 to 2,000,000. Of the Straus family he recalled the public spirited work of the late Nathan Straus and the similar activities of the guest of the evening, Nathan Straus, Jr., who had devoted so much time to providing play grounds and open spaces for the children of New York.
Rabbi Stephen S. Wise drew a parallel between the results of Jewish contributions towards German culture and economic development and Jewish contributions towards the upbuilding of Palestine. The latter, he declared, were permanent and meant permanent enrichment for the Jew, body and spirit, as well as being a contribution to the world as a whole.
James Marshall said that the events in Germany had proved, even to those who had hitherto been dubious, the wisdom behind the Jewish effort in Palestine. He traced the development of Jewish persecution through the ages, showing that such persecution coincided with periods of decline and cultural decay of the persecutors.
Nathan Straus, Jr., in his response to the tributes paid to him, said in part:
“Events of the last few weeks have proven again how well founded is the deep-seated feeling that the Jewish Homeland must live and grow. I know and I love Germany. I was educated at a German university, and I believe I can claim to have an appreciative love of all that Germany and German thought has done for the world. Yet I am on my guard against believing too easily what it is easy and convenient to believe. It is so easy to accept palatable lies and to reject bitter truths. It is so pleasant to warm ourselves with sunny fictions, instead of facing cold facts.
“It is heartening at this time to have evidence of the unity of Americans of all faiths, creeds and shades of opinion, in behalf of social justice, and in protection of humanity. The spirit of Oglethorpe of Georgia, Roger Williams of Rhode Island, and Abraham Lincoln, lives in the American people.”
Of the work in Palestine for which the campaign was being opened, and its relation to the German emergency, he said:
“We are not building Zion merely because of this emergency. Hitler’s men will come and go as other tyrants have. Governments rise and fall, nations climb to dizzy heights and then crumble to the dust — but the Jewish people goes on.”
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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.
