Dr. Stephen S. Wise, president of the World Jewish Congress, revealed last night that the W.J.C. had appealed to the four-power conference in Paris considering the fate of the former Italian colonies to make certain that the rights, liberties and status of the Jewish population in Libya and other areas would be fully protected under any final settlement. Dr. Wise’s announcement was made to over 1,500 members of the American Jewish Congress at a meeting which heard reports on the plenary session of the Congress held in Switzerland last summer.
Dr. Nahum Goldmann, chairman of the W.J.C. executive committee, declared that at its plenary session the Congress had wisely avoided involvement in any of the disputes between the Big Powers now threatening to split the world. “No person in the world,” he said, “is so vitally concerned about the hope of one united world as the Jewish people who are the predestined victims of every conflict.”
The dangers of rising anti-Semitism in Germany and the recrudescence of Nazi thinking were emphasized by Dr. Joachim Prinz of Newark, chairman of the administrative committee of the American Jewish Congress. He asserted that his observations in Germany had convinced him that progress toward democratization was “lamentably slow and dangerously inadequate.” Dr. A. Leon Kubowitzki, secretary-general of the Congress, stated that the session in Switzerland, representing the Jewish communities of 65 countries, reflected the victory of the Congress idea over the philosophy of Jewish isolationism and of anonymity in dealing with specifically Jewish matters.
JTA has documented Jewish history in real-time for over a century. Keep our journalism strong by joining us in supporting independent, award-winning reporting.
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.
