Gifts amounting to $7, 500,000 were announced here tonight at the inaugural dinner of the United Jewish Appeal of Greater New York launching the 1962 campaign. Governor Nelson A. Rockefeller of New York, former Prime Minister Moshe Shared of Israel and Lord Mayor Robert Briscoe of Dublin were the principal speakers of the evening.
Governor Rockefeller conducted a ceremony in which New York US board members, who were the evening’s guest of honor, received framed citations signed by the heads of the six major Jewish welfare organizations whose world-wide programs are aided by the New York US campaign. The Governor paid tribute to the US board members as leaders in a humanitarian endeavor he described as the “greatest ‘do-it-yourself project in American history.”
Mr. Shared spoke in his present capacity as chairman of the Jewish Agency for Israel, which is responsible for the transportation and resettlement of immigrants to that country and is largely dependent on US funds to finance these operations. His address was heard by the meeting in executive session. However, before the dinner, Mr. Shared authorized issuance of the following statement:
“The refugees bound for Israel realize they are in for a difficult phase of adaptation to new conditions, new ways of life, new social patterns, and that they will have to exert them selves to the utmost to meet them. But they expect help and believe that they are entitled to it. The provision of this help, on a scale commensurate with the rapidly growing need, is a matter of crucial, sharply focussed responsibility, which must be shared by the State of Israel itself and the Jewish communities of the free world–particularly by the Jews of the United States.
“Jews who are secure in the enjoyment of the boons of freedom and material well-being must prove alive to the obligation that is resting upon them, in all its urgency and magnitude. Their reward will be the recognition that thanks to their farsighted generosity, the present chances of rescue were not missed, and a new future of productive and dignified life has been secured for the multitudes so passionately striving for it.”
Presiding over the dinner was Charles Reason, a trustee of the United Jewish Appeal of Greater New York. Other speakers included Jack D. Weiler, a chairman of New York UPAS trustees, and Charles Bassinet, who is serving as a general chairman of the 1962 campaign, along with Samuel Lemberg, State Attorney Louis J. Lefkowitz, and A. Louis Oarsman.
JTA has documented Jewish history in real-time for over a century. Keep our journalism strong by joining us in supporting independent, award-winning reporting.
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.
