United Jewish Appeal Adopts $105,000,000 Goal for 1964 Campaign

The 26th annual national conference of the United Jewish Appeal concluded here today with the adoption of a 1964 goal of $105,000,000 and the election of Joseph Meyerhoff of Baltimore to his fourth successive term as General Chairman.

The $105,000,000 campaign goal–$9,000,000 higher than the 1963 goal–is made up in two parts: $69,000,000 to finance the ongoing programs of the UJA constituent and beneficiary agencies, which are the United Israel Appeal-Jewish Agency for Israel, Inc.; the Joint Distribution Committee; and the New York Association for New Americans. Also included as a beneficiary agency is the United Hias Service.

The other part of the goal provides for the raising of a Special Fund of $36,000,000 to meet the extraordinary costs rising out of the high rate of the immigration to Israel, the movement of Jews to other lands, and other emergencies.

In adopting the goal, the 2,000 delegates representing hundreds of Jewish communities throughout the country, took particular cognizance of reports that “in the forthcoming year, immigration to Israel may exceed even the large migration of the past 12 months.” The reports also emphasized the needs of the Jews uprooted by political upheavals in North Africa. In all, 751,500 distressed Jews in 31 countries, the largest number in more than a decade, will require aid from the UJA-supported agencies in 1964.

Mr. Meyerhoff, in commenting on adoption of the 1964 goal, said that American Jews “must treat these increased obligations not as increased burdens, but as increased opportunities to advance the great mission of the redemption of our people.”

The conference also elected today Max M. Fisher of Detroit as Associate General Chairman of the national UJA. Mr. Fisher has been a ranking leader of the UJA for more than a decade and served as national chairman. Rabbi Herbert A. Friedman was named to a 10th consecutive term as the UJA’s executive vice-chairman. Mrs. Jack Karp of Beverly Hills, Cal., was elected national chairman of the UJA Women’s Division. Joseph Kanter of Cincinnati was elected chairman of the UJA’s national Young Leadership Cabinet.

SHARETT APPEALS TO U.S. JEWRY FOR $75,276,000 THROUGH U.J.A.

Moshe Sharett, speaking in his capacity as the chairman of the Jewish Agency for Israel, told the delegates that a total of $75,276,000 will be required as American Jewry’s share in 1964 to cover the cost of bringing in and resettling another record wave of immigrants, and of absorbing the thousands of immigrants who have poured into Israel in the last three years, alone.

In addition, Mr. Sharett said, the Jewish Agency will have to find more millions of dollars for these purposes in fund-raising campaigns to be conducted by Jews in other countries. In a plea to American Jewry to mobilize their utmost support on behalf of the UJA in 1964, Mr. Sharett stressed the inability of the people of Israel to meet the needs of Israel’s newcomers “alone and unassisted.”

“We are only a people of some two million. One-half of this number are immigrants who came to Israel over the last 15 years. Many of them are not yet fully absorbed and productive, many are still steeped in poverty. We in Israel must depend on you to help us give these people and their children the chance for a decent life they so eminently deserve,” Mr. Sharett said.

He stressed that the funds allocated by the American Jewish community through the UJA for overseas needs–comprising the financing of immigration to Israel and the administration of relief work in other countries–signify more than mere material assistance. “They bear testimony to American Jewry’s consciousness of its crucial responsibility–by virtue of its numerical strength, financial capacity and public maturity–for the present well-being and future survival of the Jewish people as a whole,” he said.

“While relief work is concerned with urgent aid to individuals and groups desperately in need of it, the activity of the UJA in Israel is organically connected with the development of a country and the creation of a new civilization and is, therefore, invested with a historic significance of a most far-reaching import,” he emphasized.

J.D.C. TO SEEK A MINIMUM OF $25,000,000 FROM U.J.A. SOURCES

Charles H. Jordan, JDC director-general for overseas operations, reported that the Joint Distribution Committee will need a minimum of $25,000,000 from UJA sources to finance its major relief, welfare and rehabilitation programs in behalf of 485,000 persons in a total of 30 countries, including 85,000 in Israel. He told the delegates that, “as we stand on the threshold of 1964 Jewish relief and resettlement needs are greater than at any time since the post-war period.”

The Joint Distribution Committee, Mr. Jordan declared, is faced with “the responsibility of carrying a backlog of thousands of recent migrants who are not yet firmly resettled in France, as well as maintaining ongoing medical assistance and rehabilitation programs in Israel.” He particularly stressed the problems that were created for the JDC in the summer of 1962 by the sudden influx into France of 100,000 Jews from Algeria.

The other UJA-aided agencies also presented their 1964 needs. These were the New York Association for New Americans which aids Jewish immigrants arriving in the port of New York, and the United Hias Service, the world-wide Jewish migration agency.

RABBI FRIEDMAN OUTLINES THREE BASIC AIMS OF U.J.A.

Rabbi Herbert A. Friedman, executive vice-chairman of the United Jewish Appeal, told the delegates that, “freedom for Jews in many parts of the world today can only be achieved by helping them to migrate from places where they are physically or spiritually oppressed to places where they can live under complete liberty.” He set forth a three-point program, as the “heart and philosophy” of the UJA’s 25 years of relief and resettlement work.

“The UJA,” he said, “has three basic aims: First, to assure the physical survival of any Jew in the world threatened by oppression or need. Second, to assure spiritual liberty and freedom for Jews who do not possess it, primarily through migration. Third, to support the growth of free Jewish communities, particularly in the State of Israel, and thereby insure that Jews may continue to remain free.

Rabbi Friedman also stressed the importance of migration in the UJA’a program in 1964. “There is every reason to believe,” he declared, “that we will see another year of peak movement of Jews overseas to Israel and other havens.”

“We are gratified by the fact that we are able to help rescue Jews through migration,” he said. “But let us remember that real rescue does not end with their arrival in their country of haven. Real rescue implies full absorption. We have the obligation to stand by the side of those we helped to bring into Israel or any free country.”

AMBASSADOR HARMAN ASKS U.S. JEWRY FOR INCREASED EFFORTS

Israel Ambassador to the United States, Avraham Harman, addressing the delegates at a dinner last night, called upon the Jews in this country to increase their efforts to speed the process of Jewish rehabilitation throughout the world.

“The 18 years since the end of World War II have seen striking progress towards Jewish rehabilitation following the Nazi period,” he declared. “The UJA has been a primary source of this rehabilitation. Its member agencies–the United Israel Appeal and the Joint Distribution Committee–have helped in the migration of 1,500,000 Jews to lands of freedom. Of this number, more than 1,100,000 are today resettled in Israel.

“However,” he continued, “this process of rehabilitation is by no means over. He stressed that the 2,200,000 people of Israel, “half of them immigrants since 1948,” were already doing more than their full share of meeting the burden of taking in and absorbing the newcomers. “Israel is already meeting, through the taxation of its own citizens, two-thirds of the cost of this refugee rehabilitation program,” the Ambassador declared.

Michael S. Comay, Israel’s Ambassador to the United Nations, called for a continuation and strengthening of the partnership between the Jews of America and Israel’s people in the work of rescue, resettlement and absorption. “The Jews of Israel will continue to do their part as I know the Jews of America will continue with their part of our joint, historic responsibility. Knowing that, I feel certain together we can meet any crisis and any emergency in the future,” he said.

DELEGATES PAY SPECIAL TRIBUTE TO MEMORY OF PRESIDENT KENNEDY

Dr. Abram L. Sachar, president of Brandeis University, appealed to the delegates for continued help to Israel’s people in receiving and resettling oppressed and impoverished Jewish immigrants. He underscored the importance of “timing and timeliness” in helping Israel’s people. “A few precious opportunities remain, for salvage and rescue,” he said. “The tandem of American generosity and Israeli courage, rightly timed, can work miracles. Next year or the year after, ten times the effort may be fruitless because the historic moment may have been missed and lost forever.”

The delegates at the dinner last night, at which Edward M. M. Warburg, UJA honorary chairman, presided, paid special tribute to the memory of the late President John F. Kennedy. They heard a special re-play on tape, of the eulogy to the late President which was delivered by Chief Justice Earl Warren in the Great Rotunda in the Capitol in Washington, November 24. The Chief Justice, who was to have spoken at tonight’s session, canceled his appearance to observe the 30-day governmental period of national mourning.

During the sessions, Mr. Meyerhoff led the delegates in memorial tributes to the late Senator Herbert H. Lehman, a UJA founder and honorary chairman; Rabbi Abba Hillel Silver, also a founder of the UJA; Fred Forman of Rochester, N.Y., an honorary national chairman; Abe S. Kay of Washington, D.C., a ranking member of the UJA’s national campaign cabinet; and Herman M. Pekarsky of Newark, N.J.