Open Hadassah National Parley in Washington

The twentieth annual convention of Hadassah opened this morning at the Wardman Park Hotel with 1,000 registered delegates and guests from all parts of the country, representing the 40,000 members of the organization. Sessions will continue until Tuesday when they will end with a formal banquet.

Mrs. Alexander Lamport, of New York, convention chairman, said this is the largest convention in the history of the organization. She added that the deliberations on Palestinian matters are being closely followed by Zionists all over the world, since Hadassah is the largest single Zionist group anywhere. It conducts a complete non-sectarian system of medical and health work in Palestine.

The meeting opened with an invocation by Rabbi Solomon Metz, of Adas Israel Synagogue. Mrs. Leopold Freudberg, president of the Washington Hadassah chapter, welcomed the delegates. Mrs. Samuel W. Halprin, of New York, national president of Hadassah, formally opened the convention with a review of the past year’s events affecting world Jewry and a summary of developments in Palestine. Greetings were brought from the heads of other national organizations.

MRS. GREENBERG REPORTS

The afternoon session began with a report of Hadassah’s activities in Palestine submitted by Mrs. David Greenberg, of New York, chairman of the Palestine committee. Plans for the first medical center and graduate medical school in Palestine were presented by a number of speakers, including Dr. Nathan Ratnoff, president of the American Jewish Physicians’ Committee; Dr. J. J. Golub, of New York, authority on hospital administration and planning; Mrs. Felix M. Warburg, Mrs. Edward Jacobs, Mrs. Moses P. Epstein, national secretary of Hadassah; Mrs. Lamport, Dr. Emanuel Libman and Dr. Ira I. Kaplan, all of New York.

Rabbi Stephen S. Wise of New York, scheduled to address a mass meeting tonight in connection with the convention, notified Hadassah officials that because of illness he was unable to be present. Upon receipt of the message, Hadassah officials decided to cancel the meeting.

ROUND-TABLE TALKS

Round-table discussions on phases of the Hadassah program in Palestine and its educational and fund-raising activities in this country will be held tomorrow. A Palestinian “thrift” luncheon, such as Hadassah provides for the school children of Palestine, will be served to the delegates. In the afternoon the national chairmen of the various activities will present their reports to the delegates, who will be asked to vote on resolutions embodying plans and budgets for the ensuing year.

The dramatic highlight of the convention will be an international hookup of the National Broadcasting Company, relaying a program from Jerusalem to Washington and throughout the United States. Ceremonies of the cornerstone laying of the Hadassah-University medical center on Mt. Scopus in Palestine’s capital will be broadcast. Election of officers will be held in the afternoon.