Hias Reports Activities for First Quarter of ’78

HIAS, the world-wide Jewish immigrant aid agency, assisted 3182 Jewish refugees in finding new homes in the United States and other Western countries during the first quarter of this year, Gaynor I. Jacobson, executive vice-president of HIAS reported today. He said the figure represented a nine percent increase over the same period in 1977.

According to Jacobson, 2823 refugees came to the United States, 98 percent of them–comprising 2764 persons–from the Soviet Union, a 13 percent increase over 1977. He reported that as of the end of the first quarter some 3500 Soviet Jewish emigres were in Rome undergoing processing by HIAS for migration, mainly to the U.S. An additional 10, 266 Soviet Jews were registered with HIAS by their relatives for migration aid, the vast majority for the U.S., Jacobson said.

He reported that the new arrivals from the Soviet Union consisted of 1024 family units with on average of 2.7 persons per family. Of that number, 47 percent were males and 53 percent females. Twenty-five percent were 20 years of age or under, 48 percent between 21-50 and the remainder 50 or over.

With respect to occupations, 47 percent of the adult Jewish refugees from the USSR were highly trained or university educated. Out of 784 persons, 251 were engineers, III technicians and 422 in various other professional categories. Jacobson reported that three percent of the refugees assisted by HIAS in the first quarter of the year went to Canada, six percent to Australia and New Zealand and two percent to Western Europe.