Twenty-four leaders of the left-wing Poale Zion party (radical Zionists), an illegal organization in Soviet Russia because of its Zionist leanings and because of its opposition to the Jewish colonization plan in Bira Bidjan, Far Eastern Republic, today submitted a declaration to the Communist Party and to the Communist International denouncing their own national Zionist idea and saying that the Communist International’s national minority policy is best and asked to be accepted into the general Party.
The declaration says that the Soviet is solving the Jewish problem better than Palestine. The signatories pledge themselves to give up their fight on Bira Bidjan, to renounce their belief in Palestine as the Jewish National Home and to give up their conviction that Jewish migration from Soviet Russia is an economic necessity.
Breaking with these three major principles of the left-wing Poale Zion, the signatories explain that Bira Bidjan is “a success of the national minority policy of the Communist Party and that fighting it means joining Jewish nationalism and Zionism which fear that Bira Bidjan may compete with Palestine and the National Home idea. Palestine as the National Home idea. Palestine as the National Home ideal actually leads to a united front with nationalistic reformism, hence fighting for this ideal means to go hand in hand with Zionists, capitalists and British imperialism.
“Advocating the immigration theory means non-confidence in the Soviet and also encouragement for private economic strivings which is against Soviet interests.” The declaration expresses the hope that the left wing Poale Zion groups abroad will follow the action of their brethren in Russia and join the Communist Party ranks because “the Poale Zion ideology is bankrupt.”
The signatures of internationally known Poale Zion left-wingers are absent from the declaration. However, among the 24 who signed are nine who have been members of the left-wing Poale Zion since 1903, some who have served for many years in the central executive committee of the party and the secretariat. The others joined the party in 1917. L. Sub, J. Kitayebitch, K. Taube, L. Erlichman and Lazar Kohn are among the oldest members who signed the declaration.
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.
