Some 700 high school students, most of them members of synagogues in New Jersey, held a demonstration yesterday near the United Nations in protest against Soviet treatment of the Jews in Russia. They included 40 Negro youth.
The students assembled in the Sutton Place Jewish Center to hear Sen. Clifford Case, New Jersey Republican, folk singer Theodore Bikel and others who denounced Soviet authorities. Sen. Case declared that “We learned from Hitler’s time that silence will not help the Soviet Jews.” He called for a Congressional resolution condemong religious persecution in Russia and urged a United Nations resolution on the issue. The speakers told the students that their protest was an important means of halting Soviet government suppression of Jewish religious and cultural life.
The students then marched to Hammarskjold Plaza at the UN, singing as they carried signs in Hebrew and English. The protest was organized by the New Jersey Youth Conference on Soviet Jewry.
JTA has documented Jewish history in real-time for over a century. Keep our journalism strong by joining us in supporting independent, award-winning reporting.
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.
