{span}##{/span} Palestine Publicists Boost Zion Health Resorts

The Sharnapolsky family of Tel Aviv, Palestine, the itinerant Palestine promotion bureau, has just concluded another brief visit to the United States. Father, mother and daughter, they came here once more on their self imposed mission of popularizing Palestine as a tourist center, and a country of cure resorts “superior to anything that Switzerland or Germany or France can offer.” they assured the Jewish Daily Bulletin representative.

In Soviet Russia the tourist trade is a government monopoly. In most other countries, the governments watch the tourist business closely, subsidize it and maintain offices in foreign countries to tell anyone who cares to listen of the beauties of their particular country, but Jewish Palestine has the Sharnapolsky family.

Armed with imposing letters of recommendation from practically everyone of importance in the Jewish world and from government officials in Palestine, including the High Commissioner and many other prominent officers of the administration, they travel about and whisper seductively into the ears of the world at large, and particularly into the ears of the Jewish world, the necessity for seeing the beauties of Palestine at once, and for being cured of all possible ailments in that land of healing cure resorts.

Familiar figures at Zionist meetings and Congresses, they are referred to as “the other Zionist Executive”, and at every World Zionist Congress since the World War they have emphasized over and again the necessity of attracting tourists to Palestine and of building up the country as a land of cure resorts.

AT CHICAGO WORLD’S FAIR

Last year they brought to the Century of Progress Worlds Fair at Chicago an exhibit composed of products of Jewish Palestine, and other exhibits designed to attract tourists and those anxious to be cured. Thousands of visitors to the fair saw the Palestine pavilion under the direction of the Sharnapolskys. Jews and non-Jews alike expressed deep interest in the exhibits. When the fair opens again this year, the Sharnapolskys will be there with a bigger and better exhibit on Palestine.

“And if you think it is ‘carrying coals to Newcastle’ to tell Jews about Palestine,” said Mr. Sharnapolsky, “I wish I could tell you some of the ridiculous questions that were asked us about Palestine. But one question stands out. An elderly gentleman who expressed his admiration for the Palestine exhibit in Chicago told us that he had contributed money to the Keren Kayemeth, the Jewish National Fund, and said that he often wondered why, when so many distinguished Zionist leaders visited the United States, he had never had the pleasure of listening to Mr. Keren Kayemeth himself.”

In addition to arranging for the Palestine exhibit at the Chicago Fair, the Sharnapolskys, during their first concluded visit to the United States, arranged for the showing of the Palestine exhibit in New York this year and secured the support of prominent American Zionists for their show and for their general work in encouraging tourists to visit Palestine. They have also been instrumental in arranging for a large group of tourists to sail there, where the Sharnapolskys will guide the group through the country.

EXILED FROM RUSSIA.

Exiled from Odessa by the Bolshevik revolution, Mr. Sharnapolsky, formerly a merchant, settled in Palestine. He became interested in the possibilities of that country as a tourist and cure center and set about to interest the Jews of Palestine, the government, the Zionist movement and the Jews of the world in his project. Ably assisted by his wife and daughter, they have since traveled about the world and carried on their propaganda for Palestine.

Mr. Sharnapolsky is the author of several guide books to Palestine. One of the guide books, an illustrated volume in English and Hebrew, which contains a dictionary of commonly used phrases and words in Hebrew with parallel columns in French, English, German, Italian, Russian and Spanish, was awarded a gold medal at the French Colonial Exhibit in “recognition of untiring propaganda in the interest of the tourist traffic in Palestine through the “Guide to Palestine.” Mr. Sharnapolsky is also the founder and a member of the board of directors of the Palestine Health and Rest Resorts Company. Ltd.