Asserting that the Jewish displaced persons problem in Germany “can be licked in less than a year,” Harold Glasser, director of the Council of Jewish Federations and Welfare Funds’ Institute on Overseas Studies today called upon Congress to provide an additional $50,000,000 to the International Refugee organization to finance the mass resettlement of 100,000 Jewish DP’s to Israel.
Glasser, who just returned from a seven-week study of European DP camps, declared at a press conference that such action would result in the speedy closing of Jewish DP camps. While in Europe he visited camps in Germany, Austria and Italy. He also spoke with numerous DP’s, representatives of Jewish communities in Western Europe, top leaders of the American military occupation, and representatives of international and private relief agencies.
Glasser declared that the I.R.O. must carry out its assigned responsibilities for the Jewish DP’s. He said that the present appropriation of $71,000,000 would “not solve the problem” but would merely keep the DP’s alive. “With an additional $50,000,000,” he added, “the Jewish DP problem can be solved once and for all.”
Glasser declared that the recent statement issued by the I.R.O. that it must await U.N. approval before sponsoring immigration to Israel, is “questionable from a legal point of view.” The fact that Israel has been recognized by the United States, the chief financial support of the I.R.O., and a growing list of countries, should convince the I.R.O. of the responsibility of the new state and of the necessity for immediate direct negotiations to resettle DP’s, he said.
“The I.R.O. and the Government of Israel should get together immediately to agree on a program which will move the Jewish DP’s out of Germany in an orderly and humane manner and as fast as the operation can proceed,” he asserted. Discussing other emigration possibilities for Jewish DP’s, Glasser said that the bulk of the group, about 100,000 of the DP’s in camps, will want to go to Israel immediately. A minority would prefer to settle temporarily or permanently in Western Europe, he added. Some 25,000 would be eligible to enter the United States in the next 12 months if Congress passes current proposals to admit 200,000 DP’s, he pointed out.
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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.
