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Number of Murdered Jews in Poland Exceeds Reported 2,000,000 Figure

January 27, 1944
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Two members of the Polish underground movement who have just reached Palestine told a Jewish labor conference today that the report that 2,000,000 Jews have been annihilated by the Germans in Poland underestimates the extent of the massacres.

“When we, in the underground, learned of the announcement made in New York that 2,000,000 Jews have perished in occupied Poland, we decided to make a reliable investigation,” one of the arrivals reported. “Our survey established that the number of exterminated Jews is much larger than 2,000,000, since hundreds of thousands of Jews from other countries were brought by the Germans to Poland and annihilated there.”

Many of those present at the meeting wept loudly as they listened to the eye-witness reports of the underground representatives. It was announced at the meeting that the Jewish National Council of Palestine today sent a cable to U. S. Secretary of State Cordell Hull emphasizing that there are still possibilities of rescuing Jews from occupied territories. Similar cables were sent to Winston Churchill and to the Soviet Foreign Commissar Vyacheslav Molotov. The latter two were despatched through the Palestine Government.

The entire Jewish press here lauds President Roosevelt’s establishment of the War Refugee Board, expressing the hope that the new body will act immediately to rescue the Jews of Europe.

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