The urgent need for laying the foundation for a Jewish Commonwealth in Palestine after the war will be one of the major topics of discussion at the 45th annual convention of the Zionist Organization of America and the 28th annual convention of the Hadassah, both of which open here tomorrow.
More than 1,000 delegates from all parts of the country will attend each of the conventions, which will run concurrently for four days. Some of the sessions dealing with important resolutions on political problems will be closed to the public.
Leaders of the Zionist movement today indicated that the ZOA convention will adopt the attitude that no plan for the future of Palestine can be acceptable unless is enables Palestine, to serve as the national home of the Jewish people. No matter what measures are taken to protect the economic political and cultural rights of the Arabs, no obstacle must be placed in the way of the Jews becoming a majority in Palestine, they said.
A cabled plea from the Jews in Palestine asking for continued American support was received today by the Hadassah headquarters. Signed by Isaac Ben-Zvi, president of the Jewish National Council of Palestine, the message pleads for means “to prevent the sufferings of large sections of the population which might be brought about by the increased cost of living.” The hope that the joint deliberations of America’s two largest Zionist organizations might “bring comfort to our suffering brethren and clarification of Israel’s problem in the diaspora and Palestine eventuating in a free Israel with independence founded on justice in the world of the four freedoms,” was expressed in a cable received by the Hadassah from Miss Henrietta Szold in Jerusalem.
Mrs. Roosevelt, in a message today to Mrs. David de Sola Pool, national president of Hadassah, stated; “My greetings to all those attending the joint conventions of Hadassah and the Zionist Organization of America. The task before you is greater than ever and I know that your contribution will be greater too. You have my good will in your present efforts and my hops for the future. May the meeting be an inspiration to all of you and may it bring forth many practical ways in which you, in your great combined strength, can work for the war effort, lend aid to the people of Palestine, and build toward lasting peace.”
A special session of the Hadassah convention will be devoted to a resume of health conditions in Palestine where, “because of a thirty-year old program of public health, much of it supported by American funds, epidemic diseases which laid the country waste after the last world war, are now being kept in cheek,” it was announced here today.
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