Toronto police today prohibited a reception arranged in honor of Sholom Schwartzbard, killer of the Ukrainian pogrom leader, Simon Petlura, scheduled to be held tonight. The reception was forbidden after Ukrainian nationalists threatened violence unless the reception was cancelled. Police warned the management of the Labor Lyceum, where the reception was to have been held, to close the assembly hall.
A deputation of Ukrainian nationalist leaders appeared before the Toronto police board, stating that the Schwartzoard reception would provoke riots. The Jewish community was unaware of the deputation until the police order was issued. In all likelihood Schwartzbard will not make any public appearance in Toronto.
Sholom Schwartzbard, Ukrainian Jew. who served in the French army during the World War, returned to the Ukraine after the revolution broke out and organized Jewish self-defense corps to combat the pogrom bands, called armies and who were ravaging and destroying Ukrainian Jewish settlements. When the revolution was over, Schwartzbard trailed the pogrom leader Petlura across Europe until he found him in Paris in 1926. He shot and killed him, but was tried and acquitted by a French court. The case became a cause celebre, attracting the attention of world Jewry.
Following his acquittal, Schwartzbard settled in Paris and devoted himself to the organization of Jewish self-defense groups all over the world. Recently he came to the United States with a delegation of French war veterans. Schwartzbard was warmly greeted by the American Jewish War Veterans, who gave a dinner in his honor, and embarked on a tour of the United States.
During an interview with the Jewish Daily Bulletin Schwartzbard was asked whether the Ukrainians in Paris ever bothered him. The blond little man took fire and exrecently they complained to the-they are afraid of me. Why only recently they complained to the French government that I was ploting against them, and that they were not safe as long as I was free.”
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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.
