The Wandering Jew

Dr. Bernhard Eahn, the European director of the Joint Distribution Committee, is concededly one of the greatest Jewish social service workers in the world. In the following article he tells of the changes which must be made in the methods of aid for German Jewry.

The time has come to consider a radical change in our activities for the Jewish refugees from Germany. The period of giving mere relief must end. We must attempt in all countries a final settlement for those for whom this has not yet been achieved. If it is not possible to find a final settlement for all the refugees in the countries where they find themselves today, migration possibilities must be opened. Reconstructive measures must be applied to absorb as many as possible into the economic life of the countries in which the refugees have now been idle for so many months.

Credit institutions must be set up. Such loan funds are available through the American Joint Reconstruction Foundation, which is composed of the Joint Distribution Committee and the ICA. Loan funds have been created by this Foundation in Palestine, in England, and in some overseas countries. The establishment of such loan funds is contemplated in France, Spain and in other parts of the world.

HOPE TO MAKE SETTLERS OUT OF REFUGEES

With the united efforts of all Jewish organizations and the support of the High Commissioner we hope to succeed in changing the refugees into settlers who can be absorbed into the economic life of the country in which they are or into that to which they may be directed.

We have every hope that we will succeed in all the refugee countries. Some doubt only exists about France, where the refugee problem has lately become most acute. The hope that France will now absorb most of the refugees is very slim.

The refugees in France present a problem that the Jewish organizations are almost unable to overcome, even with very large means, because in the near future there will be but limited openings for the emigration of such a mass of refugees.

MUST PROVIDE FOR THOSE WHO STAY

The ever-increasing difficulties with which refugees from Germany are confronted in all lands and the impossibility of a continued larger emigration from Germany to the neighboring countries make it urgently necessary to help the Jews within Germany, where the majority of the Jews will have to remain.

We must, therefore, provide for those who cannot leave. If we want to avoid a further irregular flight from Germany, if we want to avoid increased misery in the refugee countries, and complications dangerous to Jews throughout the world, we must help the Jews within Germany and their organizations to enable them to carry out the tremendous task they had to undertake.

FACE DIFFICULTIES IN AIDING YOUTH

Not only the refugees have difficulties in all countries. It is increasingly impossible to send young people to other countries. Even Holland has, for instance, stipulated a period of three years during which the training of young refugees must come to an end. Other countries, especially Eastern European countries like Latvia, Lithuania and Poland, do not wish to allow young German Jews to come in for training, and even when that is allowed, no money can be provided for these young people, on the basis of restrictions covering the export of money from Germany.

Therefore, we have to try to keep the younger generation at least so long in Germany until they are trained or retrained there and to wait for an orderly emigation. German Jews have withstood with courage and bravery all the humiliation and oppression; German Jews have so far succeeded in retraining many of their economic positions, They have been able to keep up their morale, to keep up the standard of education and in this way to frustrate all efforts to bring German Jews down to a state of helotry. Social and welfare institutions have been maintained. Community work and cultural undertakings have been enlarged to meet the needs of those who can no longer go to non-Jewish institutions.

RAISE $5,000,000 YEARLY BY SELF TAXATION

While German Jews still raise about $5,000,000 a year in self-imposed taxes for the work of the Jewish communities, they have had now to carry the burdens of the new undertakings that the emergency has developed in the field of training and retraining, the extension and maintenance of schools, the preparation of emigration to Palestine as well as to other countries.

They are also faced with the need of increasing social and welfare work in excess of the former, regular philanthropic programs of the Jewish communities. For these needs, they must count on a substantial measure of aid from the outside, although they themselves with tremendous effort are trying to raise a substantial part of the sum required for these new and emergency requirements.

UP TO WORLD JEWRY TO CHANGE THEIR FATE

It is up to the Jews of the world and especially to American Jews, by supporting the Jewish organizations, who work hard and efficiently to change the sad fate of the German Jews, and the pathetic existence of the refugees. It is up to them to continue to give their moral and financial support so that in the not too distant future we may present a European picture painted again in the bright colors of a happier European Jewish life.

During the twenty-two months which have elapsed since the new regime in Germany, about 65,000 Jews had to leave Germany. Over 20,000 went to Palestine, of whom 14,800 went there as immigrants, and 6,000 as tourists—most of the latter have probably remained in the country.

MANY RETURNED TO NATIVE LANDS

Another large mass of 16,000 to 18,000 non-German citizens who had lived in Germany for many years, many of whom had been born in Germany without becoming citizens, have gone back to the countries of their origin or to that of their parents in Eastern European lands. Their homecoming is, in fact, a return to misery that is far greater today than at the time, when years and decades ago, they or their parents were forced to leave these same homes because they could no longer endure the want and gloom in their native countries.

Thus, 8,000 to 10,000 Jews from Germany went back to Poland, over 2,500 to Czecho-Slovakia, about 1,200 to Hungary, 1,400 to Austria, more than 1,000 to Rumania and smaller numbers to Latvia, Lithuania and other homelands. These masses, who left Germany to return to their countries of origin, represent only a part of the non-German Jews who were forced out. Of the total number of refugees, the non-German citizens and the stateless form about forty per cent or about 28,000. Those who did not go back to the country from which they formerly came and the stateless, who have no country to which they can go increased the flow of German Jewish refugees to the various European countries or overseas or to Palestine.

12,000 REFUGEES LEFT IN FRANCE

Next to Palestine, France is the country to which most of the German Jewish refugees went. Today, however, there are not more than 10,000 to 12,000 in France, the number being reduced by emigration and by repatriation to Germany itself. For months the borders of France have been almost hermetically closed as far as further immigration is concerned.

Of the 5,069 refugees in Holland, two-thirds have left that country nearly 1,000 going back to Germany.

In England there are about 3,000 refugees, most of whom are likely to be absorbed into the country in some way or another.

Nearly 3,000 sought and found their way to Czecho-Slovakia, where most of them have been absorbed.

There are about 800 refugees in Austria, and 300 in the Scandinavian countries, and 1,800 in the Saar District. Of the 750,000 inhabitants of the Saar, there are only 4,500 to 5,000 Jews. Their future is very uncertain. The refugees will have to leave.

There are hardly more than 150 to 200 refugees in Madrid, 600 to 700 in Barcelona, another 300 to 400 in Mallorca, and a few in Valencia.