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Philadelphians to Buy Palestine Acres for Persecution Victims

January 7, 1934
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The Jewish community of Philadelphia is about to make a definite investment in Palestine. This investment is to be in the form of a tract of land to be known as the Philadelphia Homestead (Nachlath Philadelphia) and to be settled as soon as expedient by immigrants from the various lands of persecution.

Details of the plan will be announced by L. Arthur Greenstein, member of the Pennsylvania State Legislature and recently elected Chairman of the Jewish National Fund Council of Philadelphia and vicinity at the all-day Zionist Conference to be held Sunday. At this conference the various aspects of Palestine develpment will be discussed with special emphasis on the importance of strengthening existing Zionist institutions. The call for the conference was issued jointly by Morris Rothenberg, national president, and Rabbi Max D. Klein, Philadelphia chairman of the Zionist Organization of America.

Mr. Rothenberg and Louis Lipsky, national chairman of the American Palestine Campaign, will address this conference which will be attended by representatives of more than 40 Jewish communities in Eastern Pennsylvania, Southern New Jersey and Delaware.

Mr. Greenstein explained that the project which has already been approved by the Council will be known as “Nachlath Philadelphia.” The colony will be started with an initial purchase of 1,000 dunams to which additional tracts will be added from time to time. “It is expected,” Mr. Greenstein declared, “that the establishment of this Nachlath Philadelphia in Palestine will be not only a mark of honor, in recognition of this city’s contribution to the rebuilding of the ancient homeland, but will also serve as a bond to tie the Jews of Philadelphia closer to their brothers and sisters in the Holy Land.”

At the conference on Sunday, the plan will be formally presented and steps taken to dispose of as many dunams as possible during the month of January. The efforts will close early in February with a banquet, to which all contributors of a dunam or more will be invited, and at which Nachlath Philadelphia will become a fact.

The Philadelphia Council is composed of delegates from all the Zionist groups in the city. In it are represented the general Zionists, Hadassah, Junior Hadassah, United Party Poale Zion-Zeire Zion, Jewish National Workers Alliance, Young Judea, Mizrachi, Gordonia, Young Poale Zion Alliance, Hashomer Hatzoir, and representatives from Zionist organizations in neighboring cities.

Officers of the Council are L. Arthur Greenstein, president; Robert M. Bernstein, Dr. Hayim Fineman, Rabbi Max D. Klein, Louis E. Levnithal and Judge William M. Lewis, honorary vice-presidents; Mrs. Rose Bender, Heinrich Rosenbaum and Isadore Staller, vice-presidents; Isadore Waldman, treasurer; Mary Rothman, recording secretary, and I. E. Bloch, secretary and executive director.

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