Weizmann Assailsland Edict While Reiterating Loyalty to Allied Cause

In his first address in the United States since announcement of the Palestine land ordinance, President Chaim Weizmann of the Jewish Agency tonight reiterated loyalty to the Allied cause despite the measure but denounced it as aiming to create “a pale of settlement” in the Jewish national home which would be “reminiscent of Czarist Russia rather than of the England of Arthur Balfour.”

Before a packed Zionist meeting, which had been scheduled prior to enactment of the ordinance, Dr. Weizmann said in part:

“I had hoped to be spared the embarrassment of criticizing the British Government in a neutral country at a time when Great Britain is at war. But the revival of this unfortunate controversy, which has aroused the deep resentment of hundreds of thousands of Jews as well as non-Jews in this country, is not of my doing. For the sake of Zion I may not remain silent.

“I shall limit myself here to a very few remarks and wish in the first place to endorse the official statement issued by the Jewish Agency on this matter condemning these restrictive land measures as illegal, wholly unjust and as an expedient the effect of which will be to reduce the greater part of Palestine to stagnation. Without discussing the legal and international implications of this action it is not conceivable that we shall admit of the creation in Palestine, in our national home, of a ghetto of a pale of settlement reminiscent of Czarist Russia rather than of the England of Arthur Balfour.

“This constriction of our rights in Palestine comes at a time when Jewry is sorely beset, when millions of our people are ruthlessly hounded and in search of a home. Our bitterness is greater when it is remembered that the blow is launched by those whom we have regarded and still regard as our friends.

“Our adversaries know that the cause for which England is fighting is also our cause; that a Nazi-dominated world would be one in which no Jew could live. We Jews would be deeply reluctant to cause difficulties to the British Government at a time like this. Whatever the provocation, I and those whom I represent will not deviate from the position enunciated in my letter to the Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain at the outbreak of the war. Our loyalty to the Allied cause remains steadfast. But our loyalty does not blind us to the wrong about to be perpetrated.

“Conscious of our rights, we shall, regardless of the obstacles this restrictive legislation seeks to place in the way of our development, continue the struggle for our future in Palestine. The time will come when the conscience of Britain will be aroused, and justice will be done to my people. The present policy of the British Government with regard to Palestine stands condemned and will fall under the weight of its own injustice.

“There is bitter irony in the situation; the hand of him, who nine years ago helped his father frame the letter which reiterated in solemn language our rights in and to Palestine, is today endeavoring to destroy those rights. But the Colonial Secretary is not England. His attempt to tear to shreds the Balfour Declaration and to make a mockery of the Jewish National Home will prove as unavailing as, in the long perspective of history, have all previous attempts of our enemies to destroy us.”