Sixteenth Zionist Congress Adjourns Sessions; Coalition Executive Elected

The Sixteenth Zionist Biennial Congress which was in session here for two weeks, with the participation of 322 delegates from all parts of the world, adjourned its sessions at nine o’clock this morning, following an all-night meeting which had lasted twelve hours.

A coalition Executive, including two Laborite and two Orthodox Mizrachi members, headed by Dr. Chaim Weizmann, was elected in the last hour of the Congress session.

The Executive as constituted after a prolonged deadlock, is composed of the following members:

Dr. Chaim Weizmann, London, president; Louis Lipsky, New York; Dr. Selig Brodetsky, Professor at the University of Leeds; Harry Sacher, Jerusalem; Col. Frederick H. Kisch, Jerusalem; Miss Henrietta Szold, formerly of New York, now of Jerusalem; Dr. Arthur Ruppin, Jerusalem; Felix Rosenblueth, London, all General Zionists; Laborites: Joseph Sprinzak, Jerusalem and S. Kaplansky, Jerusalem; Mizrachi, Orthodox Zionists, Lazarus Barth, Germany, and Rabbi Meyer Berlin, president of the Mizrachi Zionist Organization, formerly of New York and now of Jerusalem.

PROTESTS AGAINST SOVIET RUSSIA AND YEMEN ADOPTED

Resolutions of protest against anti-Jewish persecutions in Soviet Russia and in Yemen, Central Arabia, were a feature of the final session. The delegates, exhausted from the all-night session, rose to concur in the expressions of protest against these countries for their mistreatment of the Jewish religion and Hebrew cultural activities, which were read by Senator Ringel of Cracow, member of the Polish Senate.

Other resolutions adopted expressed the views of the Zionist Congress on the policies of the British administration in Palestine.

REVISIONISTS DECLARE UNALTERABLE OPPOSITION TO WEIZMANN

Before the vote on the new Zionist Executive was taken, M. Rosoff of Tel Aviv, Palestine, read a declaration on behalf of the Zionist Revisionists, opposition party, in which the party’s unalterable opposition to Dr. Chaim Weizmann was voiced. “Since Dr. Weizmann is identified with the policy and tactics which we combat as pernicious, we shall vote against any Executive headed by Dr. Weizmann,” the declaration stated.

Dr. Weizmann, who was forced to leave the sessions at two o’clock in the morning, was absent when the crisis over the composition of the Executive reached its climax in the early morning hours, to be resolved into the final solution reached in the last hour. He was not informed of the solution until the morning. Nahum Sokolow, chairman of the Zionist Executive, was present throughout the night. He delivered the closing address, in which he said that many Zionists had feared that this would be the last Zionist Congress. “I remember that the same was said when the first Zionist Congress concluded its sessions thirty years ago. The contrary is true. This is the first Congress of a new epoch in the rebuilding of Palestine,” he said.

One of the most touching moments of the closing session occurred when the chairman, Dr. Motzkin, paid tribute to the memory of Dr. Henry Sokolow, son of the veteran Zionist lead (Continued on Page 3)

er, who died recently in Berlin. The Congress honored his memory by rising, but when Mr. Sokolow came to the platform to make the concluding address, he made no reference to his own grief but made extended remarks concerning the obligation of the Zionist Organization to transfer to Palestine the remains of Dr. Theodor Herzl, founder of the Zionist Organization, in accordance with the terms of the late Zionist leader’s will. A resolution to this effect was passed by the Congress.

SESSIONS END IN AMITY AS PALESTINE SONGS FILL THE HALL

Notwithstanding the acrimony which characterized the party quarrels over the composition of the new Executive, resulting in the prolonged deadlock, the sessions ended in an atmosphere of amity and fellowship. Palestine songs of the Zionist pioneers filled the hall when a fifteen-minute pause, announced by the chairman at dawn, brought a feeling of relief into the assembly which knew that a solution to the Executive crisis was found. The singing was started by the Laborites of the Palestine delegation, who held out until the last hour in their attempt to oust Harry Sacher from the Executive for his alleged anti-labor views and his stringent policy of economy. Their “friendly enemies,” the Mizrachists, and the center groups joined in the songs.

PRINCIPLE OF NON-PARTISAN EXECUTIVE ABANDONED IN COMPROMISE

The solution of the Executive crisis came when the majority of the Congress had already despaired of the possibility of an agreement being reached. Some expected that the Laborites will have their way and that an Executive would be composed without Harry Sacher, who was the storm center because of his ruthless consolidation policy, which he inaugurated when he took office two years ago. But compromises were made by all parties, the Laborites agreeing to have Mr. Sacher included on the new Executive and the Mizrachists agreeing to include Miss Henrietta Szold, to whose education policy they objected, Mr. Sacher agreeing to serve on a coalition body which he feared would be unwieldy, Miss Szold agreeing to share the responsibility for the education department with a Mizrachi representative as a co-director. Another concession was that which resulted in the appointment of Dr. Arthur Ruppin, colonization expert, as the head of the Zionist colonization department. The result of the election was generally considered satisfactory.

When it became known that an agreement had been reached, all delegates and visitors crowded around the labor benches and the singing of the Palestine songs was again resumed. The action of the Zionist Congress in composing the present Executive was a return to a principle practiced before the Fifteenth Zionist Congress in Basle two years ago. It was then, under the pressure of the American Zionist delegation, that the coalition principle was banned in favor of a non-partisan administrative body with efficiency and economy as its policy.

The abandonment of the non-partisan Executive principle became necessary, it was declared, since the Left and Right wings of the Zionist movement gained numerical strength and the Laborite and the Mizrachi parties could combine to defeat any Executive chosen by the numerically weakened center groups.