How the progress of reconstruction in Palestine made it possible for the Jewish homeland to absorb more Jews in one year than all the other countries of the world combined, is told in a report just issued by Morris Rothenberg, president of the Zionist Organization of America. The report offers population statistics showing that there were 250,000 Jews in Palestine on March 1 of this year, while the figure for 1921 was 85,000.
A supplement to the report states that since April 1, 1933, 11,000 German Jews have come to Palestine. About 1,500 of those have come to Jerusalem and 1,800 to Haifa. The villages and small townships have absorbed approximately 2,000.
Tel Aviv has accounted for the other half. The large influx of German Jews in effecting a considerable change in the numerical structure of the Yishuv. Including earlier immigrants, the number of German Jews now approximates 13,000 or about eight percent of the total immigration since 1919.
Of 38,000 Jews who entered Palestine during 1933, 11,174 were from Germany, who had come to Palestine since April 1, 1933, Mr. Rothenberg revealed. Of this number 3,055 entered under category “A,” meaning that they possessed from 250 pound to 1,000 pound. 3,129 came in under Category “C,” which comprises labor immigrants without means. The German immigrants under Category “A” constituted fifty-five per cent of the total of such Jewish immigration into Palestine during 1933.
There is no unemployment in Palestine, Mr. Rothenberg declares. German Jews are showing greater interest than other immigrants in learning Hebrew rapidly in order to adjust themselves to the life of the country. The Central Bureau for the Settlement of German Jews in Palestine has spent $330,000 between October, 1933, and March, 1934, for various activities related to the settlement of German Jews.
His report is based on statistics just received from the London and Jerusalem branches of the Central Bureau, which is headed by Dr. Chaim Weizmann. Mr. Rothenberg is co-chairman of the United Jewish Appeal, representing the Jewish Agency for Palestine and the Joint Distribution Committee, which is seeking $3,000,000 for the relief and rehabilitation of Jews in Germany and for the settlement of Jews in Palestine.
The funds of the committee have been spent on the construction of huts and barracks for housing immigrants from Germany, at Tel Aviv and Haifa. Money was allocated for various technical and educational institutions for the placement of German Jewish scholars. Individuals and middle class families were placed in agricultural colonies. Hundreds of German Jewish children were settled in girls’ farms and agricultural training colonies.
Housing facilities have been provided in various colonies. Occupational training classes and schools were also established and loans were granted to individuals and small firms trying to set up in business in Palestine.
Mr. Rothenberg’s report provides details on specific activities undertaken by the Central Bureau. His comment is as follows:
“The extent to which Palestine, on the threshhold of economic development, already is capable of offering a refuge to German Jews whose life has been made unbearable by the Hitler regime is revealed in a comparison of immigration figures for 1933 and for previous years. As against 11,174 who entered Palestine from April to December, 1933, there were only 1,948 German Jews who came into Palestine in all the years between 1920 and 1932.”
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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.
