changes have been only in small details. The general line has remained the same. Nothing was done for the Jews previously and nothing is done for the Jews now.
“There was a time when it was contemplated to set up a committee to enquire into the position of the Jews in Poland and to formulate a series of proposals—a mixed Jewish-Polish Committee. After long investigations, the representatives of the Committee came with a memorandum to one of the Ministries. They were given a hearing and a reply. And the reply was that instead of coming with a big plan of altering the occupational strata of the Jewish population, they had come with demands for subsidies for various purposes, and since those subsidies would not solve the entire Jewish problem nothing at all was done, and not a groschen was allocated. The Committee ceased to work. It is foolish to go on wasting time, one of the non-Jewish members of the Committee said, if even the slightest demands are ignored.
“Polish Jewry, however, cannot resign itself to its fate and withdraw its just demands,” Dr. Rothenstreich said. “The Club of Jewish Deputies, as the Jewish representative body in the Polish Parliament, demands fulfilment of our main postulates in the economic field, the abolition of the economic blockade against Jews, and the extension of the Government salvage work to include the Jewish victims of the crisis.
“You can deal with our proposals with regard to the Lvov occurrences when you like, but you must not postpone our economic demands. I leave it to the Government to estimate the results if they postpone consideration of the Lvov occurrences, and to decide whether that is a sound and just policy from the point of view of the State. I am convinced that if the Government reflects upon it at all, it will come to the conclusion that the policy of constantly putting off and not giving effect to our most important and our most just demands is wrong.
“Time is limited, so that it is impossible to enumerate all our grievances. For years we have been repeating that the taxation policy is utterly ruining us. It is not right nor natural that the trading class should have to pay the largest part of the taxation.
“Someone has dared to assert here in the Sejm that the trading class is economically well-placed, and will have to bear the burden of the internal loan. The only result if that is done will be that those merchants who still manage to keep their heads above water, will be submerged unless they are given assistance, and their interests are taken into account in the Government’s salvage program.
“The three million Jews in Poland constitute a great economic force which is deliberately being ignored, weakened and neglected; instead of uniting all the forces of the country you are breaking them up. That is the wrong road. The crisis is growing.
“There are some among us who doubt very much indeed whether it is worth while ever again depicting in this House the bare truth with regard to the terrible facts of Jewish life, if we are not listened to, if you refuse to listen to us. We still cling to the hope that in spite of everything, reason will win in the end, and that the method of ignoring our needs will cease.
“For two years now we are in this sad position, that instead of demanding our just political, cultural and economic needs we are compelled to fight for the elementary right to live.
“But we shall not allow ourselves to be diverted from our fight for full political, cultural and economic rights.
“The crisis has upset the balance of political and economic relations. The situation in which we Jews have been placed is a clear proof of this lack of balance.
“But we must realize that the declassation process among Polish Jewry is now on the verge of becoming an annihilation process.
“I have considered it my duty,” Deputy Rothenstreich concluded, “to depict our real position. I declare here openly, frankly, that the position of the Jews in Poland is catastrophic. It depends on the policy of the Government, on the steps that the Government will take immediately to change the situation, to satisfy our postulates, whether this position will not grow to be still more catastrophic and menacing.”
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.
