(Jewish Telegraphic Agency Mail Service)
A series of demands urging immediate measures to cope with the unemployment situation in Palestine were formulated at the three days sessions of an extraordinary conference of the General Jewish Labor Federation held here, called for the purpose of discussing means of combatting the existing unemployment in Palestine.
Ben Gurion, who reported on the situation, said that it was necessary to submit a demand to the Zionist Executive that it start carrying out public works on a large scale in order to case the situation. He also suggested that a cable message describing the situation and demanding immediate help should be sent to Dr. Weizmann and the Zionist Organization in America.
Reports were submitted to the Conference by Mr. Hartzfeld and Messrs. Sprinzak and Kaplanscky, members of the Zionist Executive, showing that public works are now under way which will give employment in Tel Aviv to 400 workers, in Petach Tikvah to 400 and Haifa and Jerusalem to between 400 to 500 workers.
In May another 500 workers will be needed at Jidra and in the agricultural labor settlements. The Palestine Zionist Executive, they stated, is doing its utmost to combat unemployment. The labor budget has been increased from £E. 35,000 to £E. 110,000, and the Executive is making further endeavors to obtain money by means of a loan for public works. During February about 1.400 workers will be engaged and 1,500 more workers will be engaged after the £E. 50,000 loan will have been concluded. It was urged that the Government must share the burden of combating unemployment in the country.
Among the resolutions adopted at the conference were the following:
“The Council of the Workers’ Federation declares that the unemployment situation endangers the Zionist work in the country and emphasizes the inactivity and lack of sufficient provision on the part of the Zionist Organization to save the situation.”
” The Council declares that in case a sufficient number of the unemployed workers will not be provided with work within a month, the entire responsibility for the danger which threatens Jewish work, the reconstruction of the country and the Zionist movement will fall entirely on the Zionist Organization.”
“The Council urges the Zionist Executive to mobilize the mount of £200,000 which is necessary for the realization of the plans submitted by the Executive Committee of the Workers’ Federation. This sum should be realized by a general redaction of twenty per cent of all the salaries of the officials in the Zionist institutions in Palestine and abroad, as well as through obtaining an additional loan abroad.”
“The Council urges that employment be provided during the month of February for at least 1,500 unemployed workers in addition to those who will be occupied at the Jaffa-Petach Tikvah road and the public works in Tel Aviv.”
“The Workers’ Federation is urged to organize a wide public activity for the purpose of combatting the unemployment and presenting its demands to the Zionist Executive, the Palestine government and the Yishub at public meetings of the workers in the country.”
“The Council urges the Executive to appoint a special commission which is to engage in the immediate collection of the monthly sums due from all the members who have permanent employment.”
The question of whether or not the Workers’ Federation is to withdraw its representatives at the Zionist Executive in Jerusalem, which was heatedly debated, will be decided by a special referendum among the members of the Council.
Among the fifteen men in the United States who carry life insurance of $4,000,000 or more as disclosed in an analysis of American and Canadian life insurance, based on statistics of 1925, in the current issue of “The National Underwriter,” are William Fox, motion picture producer, who carries $6,000,000 insurance; J. L. Latsky, Adolph Zukor and Marcus Loew, $5,000,000 each: Joseph Schencic, $4,250,000, and Ralph Jonas, president of the Brooklyn Chamber of Commerce, $4,000,000.
Payments of more than $1,000,000 each were made in 1925 on three men under 60 whose deaths came almost without warning. They were Solomon Rosenbloom of Pittsburgh, Horace A. Saks of New York, and Julies Fleischmann, of Cincinnati.
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.
