New England Parley Backs Program to Bring 3,000,000 Jews to Palestine in 20 Years

A program to bring to Palestine at least three million Jewish refugees in the next 20 years, proposed by Israel Moses Sieff of London, was endorsed by 800 persons attending an Emergency Conference for Palestine held at the Hotel Statler to launch the regional campaign of the United Palestine Appeal.

New England Jews were asked to provide to the United Palestine Appeal at least fifty per cent of all funds raised locally for overseas and refugee needs. The conference urged Great Britain and Prime Minister Winston Churchill to remove the White Paper policy with its restriction on Jewish immigration and land purchase still being adhered to by the Palestine administration.

“The speedy development of Palestine to absorb the vast post-war migration which would take place regardless of who won the war” was urged by James G. McDonald, chairman of the President’s Advisory Committee on Political Refugees.

“Some optimists believe that when the war is over, the Jews of Poland will carry on life as before,” stated McDonald. “It will be worse after the war, even if Hitler is defeated. Irrespective of the peace settlement to come, the problem of mass migration on a vast scale will have to be solved. It is now two years since President Roosevelt spoke of the necessity of resettling from fifteen to twenty million people at the and of the War. Some of us felt two years ago that this was an exaggeration, but we know now that his estimate is no exaggeration, even if the Allies win the War.”

Sieff, another speaker, declared that the “Jewish future is not in Europe today, but must be based upon the Jewish national home in Palestine. We have to place in Palestine right after this War at least three million Jews. We must create instruments with which to achieve this and must think in terms of hundreds of millions of dollars in order to achieve this program.”