The 967 Jewish refugees from Egypt who arrived here yesterday aboard an Egyptian vessel under the auspices of the international Committee of the Red Cross were provided today with shelter and other necessities by the Union of Italian Jewish Communities with funds provided by the Joint Distribution Committee. The immigrants will be housed in Naples until plans for their migration to other countries is completed.
A JDC official told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency that the party of 967 is the largest single shipload of refugees ever handled by the JDC, not excepting the immediate postwar years. Among the American and Italian Jewish leaders present to greet the Jews and to care for them were Rabbi Herbert Friedman, executive vice president of the United Jewish Appeal, and Moses A. Leavitt, executive vice chairman of the JDC. The entire JDC staff in Italy was mobilized in Naples to receive the exiles.
The Jewish Agency is making arrangements to take over care of the 855 men, women and children who are leaving for Israel Wednesday aboard a ship which is already on the high seas headed for this port. Among the 967 Jews were 113 children under the age of five. All but 17 of the group were officially stateless Jews, although most of them had been born in Egypt.
The health of the refugees appears good, despite the mistreatment of them suffered at the hands of Egyptian police and jailers. Only three were ambulance cases a woman over the age of 90; a man with a paralyzed leg and a man suffering from shock as a result of his expulsion experiences.
Among the refugees were 78 men, heads of families, who were taken directly from prison or concentration camp to the steamer without knowing what had happened to their families. Most of them found their families already aboard.
A number of the exiles spoke of the miserable conditions under which they had been imprisoned and reported instances of brutalization and violence to which they had been subjected or which had been suffered by people they knew. Many were pessimistic about the possibility of future violence against Jews still in the country.
A good many reported that all their goods except a few personal possessions and small sums of money had been confiscated or stolen by Egyptian officials. Police and other authorities were quite open in their creation of an atmosphere of terror aimed at forcing a mass exodus of Jews from Egypt, they reported.
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.
