Rumanian Authorities Close Down the Offices of Jewish National Fund and Keren Hayesod

The offices of the Jewish National Fund and the Keren Hayesod of Rumania were closed down last week on charges of participating in large-scale blackmarket operations, it was revealed here today. The action took place after a raid by officials of the Ministry of Finance and National Economy who afterwards held four managers of the offices incommunicado.

Further details of the raid, which was first considered as “routine,” were reported today in the current issue of Unirea, organ of the Democratic Jewish Committee. The publication said that the offices were denounced to the government as “centers for a foreign exchange blackmarket.” Unirea stated that evidence was found during the raid to corroborate the charges. The managers who are being held for trial for “contravening currency regulations’ are: Leon Itzcar, Solomon Rosenhaupt, Enciu Kohn and Michel Leiba.

There are more than 7,000 Jewish war victims in Rumania–widows, orphans and disabled persons–eligible for government pensions, it was announced here today by the Jewish Democratic Committee. The Committee has just completed a country-wide registration of all Jewish widows, orphans and persons disabled as a result of wartime pogroms or deportations.

Under a recently-enacted law, these categories of war victims are entitled to the same pension rights enjoyed by non-Jewish war sufferers. Approximately 75 percent of the 7,000 eligible applicants for pensions are widows, while the remaining 25 percent are divided equally among orphans and disabled persons, the announcement said.

Of the total, 55 percent are former deportees, while about 30 percent survived pogroms in Bucharest, Jassy, Galati and Dorohoi. The Ministry of Labor and Social Welfare will soon decide the size of the pensions to be awarded to them.