Jewish Domination Caused Boycott, Polish Catholic News Agency Holds

The National Catholic Welfare Conference News service, in a Warsaw dispatch, quotes KAP, the Polish Catholic press agency, as explaining the anti-Jewish boycott in Poland on the ground of Jewish domination of business and professions. The N.C.W.C. dispatch follows:

“KAP, the Catholic Press agency here, emphasizes the Jewish problem in Poland by pointing out that out of Poland’s population of 34,000,000 Jews represent close to 10 percent. A large fraction of the 3,000,000 Jews in Poland, says KAP, arrived from other countries in the World War.

“KAP stresses that the Catholic Hierarchy and clergy in Poland have been most active in efforts to prevent anti-Semitic violence. Thanks to the firm stand of the clergy, the Christian population has entertained no idea of revenge or reprisal, says KAP, so that even though Semitism in this country is a burning problem, there have not been the excesses or pogroms such as have occurred in several European countries, nor strife such as has taken place between Jews and Arabs in Palestine.

“KAP declares that the boycott of the Jews in this country is not really of a political or racial character, but has been brought about almost exclusively by economic conditions. Seventy-five per cent of the commerce in Poland was found to be in the hands of Jewish merchants and the liberal professions, such as law and medicine, were dominated by Jews, it adds.

“The situate on has been aggravated, says KAP, by the clannishness of the Jews, who have confined themselves to their ghettoes and have been separated from the country and civilization about them by a wall of their own customs and ethics, so that there can be no possibility of assimilation.

“KAP says Poland’s economic situation is such that she cannot provide adequate employment for her native population. It is thus that the populace has sought the transfer of commerce and trade from Jewish into Christian hands.”