Elie Eliashar, president of the Jerusalem Sephardic Community, will leave for the United States within the next few days to arouse, through the United Nations, world public opinion to the danger of the massacre of hundreds of thousands of Jews living in various Oriental countries. Eliashar, who is now in London in connection with the same mission, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency today that large-scale pogroms can be expected during the weeks immediately following British surrender of the Palestine Mandate on May 15.
He urged that all attempts be made to divorce the Palestine question from the fate of the Jews in Arab countries who are treated as hostages and prisoners at the mercy of mobs and irresponsible rulers. He pointed out most of the atrocities committed against Jews during the past few months have occurred in territories under the complete control of Britain.
The leader of the Sephardic Jews stressed that administrative, if not legal, discrimination through racial boycott and impeding the right of free movement is practiced against the Jews in all Arab countries, in opposition to the principles of the U.N. Charter. Reviewing the recent situation in a number of Arab lands where Jews have been the victims of mobs, he stated that the number of Jews killed in Aden was about twice the official figure of 78; that in the British protectorate of Bah-rein, where only 55 Jewish families dwell, 67 Jews were injured in a riot; that 12 synagogues were destroyed in the Syrian city of Aleppo and that an anti-Zionist law in Egypt threatens the entire Jewish community with ruin.
Eliashar pointed out that he has appealed to the United States, Britain and France on humanitarian grounds to protect the isolated and endangered Jews. He reported that the French authorities are cooperating to a great extent-offering relief to pogrom victims and adopting precautionary measures in Arab territories and also admitting to French schools Jewish students expelled from Beirut colleges.
In Britain, leading Jewish organizations and leaders are hopeful that the government will agree to some form of concerted international action to protect the Jews. Meanwhile, the government is expected momentarily to announce an inquiry into the Aden pogrom which Jewish circles have been urging for the past month.
Eliashar, who intends to make a formal plea at Lake Success for international protection for the Jews in Oriental countries, expressed the hope that all Jewish organizations will act in concert on this matter and will avoid making separate approaches to the world tribunal.
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