British Papers Urge Eden to Press Washington for Swift Action on Saving Jews

Hope that Anthony Eden, British Foreign Secretary, will utilize his stay in the United States to bring about more concrete action by the Allied Nations to save the Jews in Nazi Europe, was expressed in the press here today following a meeting last night arranged by the British Commonwealth movement at which England was urged to admit more Jewish refugees.

“It is of the utmost urgency that Secretary Eden should discuss in Washington all matters concerning the forthcoming British-American conference on refugee problems which is to take place in Ottawa,” the News Chronicle, a leading London newspaper, writes in an editorial today. “There are many difficulties to overcome, such as the difficulties in securing transportation, food supplies and passports for the victims who may be saved from Nazi hands. There is the initial difficulty of getting these victims across the frontier. But whatever the inconveniences may be, the plight of those suffering from Nazi savagery lays obligations upon us which our conscience does not dare to reject. We hope that Eden will utilize his stay in the United States to press for swift action on the part of the United Nations to rescue those who can still be rescued.”

Presiding at the meeting of the British Commonwealth movement, Rev. James Parkes declared that it is not enough to wait for the outcome of the Ottawa conference. “There are things which we can do ourselves,” he said. He urged the removal of the existing restrictions on the entry of refugees into British territories. Other speakers demanded that the British Government take action to feed the starving Jewish as well as non-Jewish people in Nazi-occupied countries.

Replying to the contention of the British Government that no more refugees can be admitted into England because of the shortage of dwellings and food, the British Pacifist Organization announced today that it received more than 100 offers of homes for refugee children almost immediately after issuing an appeal for shelter for such children. The argument that the housing conditions and shortage of food make it impossible to admit more refugees was advanced by the British Government in its correspondence with the Government of the United States which resulted in the calling of the Ottawa conference.