The Labor Zionist Assembly will serve as the supreme body of the American Labor Zionist movement until the next World Zionist Congress meets in Jerusalem next year, it was decided here last night at the concluding session of the first such assembly held in this country. The Assembly, which was called to commemorate the 50th anniversary of Labor Zionism in this country, elected Baruch Zuckerman, member of the Jewish Agency in New York, its chairman and named an executive of 29 men and women and a 100-member council.
The 800 delegates created an “immigration to Israel” department of the Assembly to recruit immigrants for Israel from the United States. The immediate objective of the department will be the recruitment of 1,000 American settlers in the next few years, to match the 1,000 Labor Zionists who migrated to Israel between 1948 and now. The department will canvass thousands of organizations and individuals throughout the country to ascertain the immigration potential.
The Assembly also backed a special educational conference called by the Labor Zionist organizations and the Jewish Folk Schools for this summer to consider principles programs and organizational problems involved in Labor Zionist education The delegates stressed their determination to intensify Zionist education of Jewish youth and stressed that a thorough re-examination of Labor Zionist education is needed.
In a resolution hailing the calling of the Assembly, the delegates noted that there were four lines of action indicated for the movement-wide organization conducting the shekel campaign in advance of the next world congress; celebration of the 50th anniversary of the establishment of the Labor Zionist movement; political action in Israel’s behalf, and short-term tasks and the latter two as long-term, major programs.
Louis Lipsky, veteran Zionist and onetime president of the Zionist Organization of America, speaking of the beginnings of the Labor Zionist movement. declared: “Many of us ###not of their party shared their hopes and their vision from the start. They were the intrepid beginners. We rejoiced in their strength and their courage and their loyalty to great Hebraic traditions; and their devotion to the Jewish people. We regarded ourselves the comrades of all who threw themselves into the task of redeeming the s### with their own hands and laying the foundations of the state in harmony with Jewish social ideals and the vision of the prophets of Israel.”
The Assembly was also addressed by Avraham Harman, Israel Consul-General in New York. Messages of greetings were read from Mayor Robert F. Wagner, former President Harry S. Truman; Adlai E Stevenson; Mrs. Eleanor Roosevelt, and CIO president Walter P. Reuther.
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