Taking issue with Senator Robinson, who declared that anti-Semitism is decreasing in Germany, Dr. Henry S. Leiper, Presbyterian minister and secretary of the Department on Relations with Churches Abroad of the Federal Council of Churches of Christ in America, describes in a special article in the New York Post the militant anti-Semitic activities which the Nazis are still fomenting in Germany. Dr. Leiper has just returned from Germany, where he made a special study of the Jewish situation. Dr. Leiper writes:
Senator Robinson, who was on the same ship I took to Hamburg this Summer, has returned and is reported to have said that there is a distinct lessening of pressure where Jews are concerned. I do not wish to dispute the honesty of such witness. But I do wonder how widely he has investigated and how much evidence he has amassed to support his estimate of the situation.
When I read his words I hear ringing in my ears the incisive and explosive words of an American, internationally known and intimately acquainted with Germany, who said to me a few weeks ago in Berlin: “If anybody tells you that they are letting up on the Jews in this country, don’t you believe it. I live here and I know. A few weeks ago I was at — (naming a famous resort in the south of Germany) and there I met some friends of mine who have been in intimate contact with Jews who are mutual acquaintances. What they told me was so harrowing that even though I am pretty hardboiled I found it hard to go to sleep after that conversation. “
In Switzerland, Denmark, France and England I interviewed refugees from Germany. What I got was a series of impressions which, put together, make me very hesitant to agree with the optimistic assumption of Senator Robinson.
On the other hand, it must be said that the situation is “spotty,” and in my mind there is not the least doubt that in some places, particularly in cities like Berlin and Hamburg, conditions have improved. Jewish business enterprises carry on. People trade with Jews and even Storm Troopers sometimes remove their swastika sleevebauds for the purpose of entering Jewish shops unobserved.
The fate of the Jew, however, is still sealed in Germany.
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.
