Jewish Labor Delegates Clash in Offering Views to Migration Congress

(Jewish Telegraphic Agency)

The plight of the Jewish working masses in Eastern Europe, unable to find employment in their native countries and prevented from finding new homes by the existing bar on immigration in overseas countries, was presented to the World Migration Congress in session here.

In making these presentations a clash between the views of the Jewish Socialist Labor Party, Bund, and the Poale Zion, the Zionist Socialist party occurred.

In arguing his amendment which asks the world Migration Congress to urge the principle of free migration upon the respective governments, Mr.Victor Alter, a delegate representing the Jewish labor party, Bund, in Poland, declared:

“I am speaking in the name of the majority of Jewish workers in the Republic of Poland, one of the chief countries of emigration. We are unable to understand the opposition of organized labor to immigration because of its desire to safeguard its own position. Why should we be left in our state of misery, because you desire to be prosperous? Where is your workers’ solidarity if those who are in the most tragic position are to be sacrificed. If migration presents no solution to the problem then it is the duty of international labor to remove the causes which compel the workers to emigrate. The Polish government, for instance, is the largest employer in the state, but this government is boycotting the Jewish worker,” he declared.

Referring to the situation in Palestine, the representative of the Bund, which is opposed to Zionism, declared that Palestine immigration does not cover the immigration problem of the Jewish workers. Immigration should be unrestricted into Palestine as well as other countries, he stated.

B. Locker, representing the Poale Zion, contradicted the assertion of Mr. Alter with regard to Palestine, pointing out that during the year 1925, only 10,000 Jews entered the United States of American, while 34,000 Jewish workers entered Palestine during the same period. He stated that over 250,000 in Eastern Europe are without any alternative besides emigration. He criticised the labor parties of Geneva and Australia who were unwilling to cooperate with the Congress.

Mr. Ben Zvi, representing the Palestine Labor Federation, in outlining the work of his organization, took the stand for the open door policy for immigration. He stressed as particularly important that Palestine be open for Jewish immigration.

The Zionist World Organization is represented at the Congress by Messrs. Israel Cohen and Dennis Cohen.