4.1.101111111
-
Page Two
THE JEWISH.. N:E4/S
Eretz Israel
Is in Danger
"New Strategy in an Old War"
By DR. SOLOMON GRAYZEL.
Editor, Jewish Publications Society; president, Jewish Book Council of
America; editor, Jewish Book Annual; professor of
History at Gratz College, Philadelphia.
The fight against racial and religious prejudice has been going on for
centuries. So long, in fact, as to convince many people that prejudices of
this sort are an ineradicable part of human nature. The past 13 years has
seen anti-Semitism used to disrupt the unity of entire nations and make
them ripe for conquest. Even with this tragic lesson before them, these
very nations, and some men and women in our own nation, have still not
learned that to toletate racial and religious prejudice is to endanger every-
thing they hold dear. How can this simple fact be brought home to people?
How can the common_ run of mankind be made' aware that the only group
.
which dare not be tolerated are the intolerant? .
Dr. Mortimer J. Cohen, chairman of inter-faith activities, and Maurice B.
Fagan, executive director, of the Philadelphia Jewish Community Relations
Council (806 Widener Bldg., Phila. 7) have developed a new and modern
approach in fighting prejudice and intoletance. They have published a little
but very important book in which they set forth their point of view and
explain the strategy to be followed. They call their book "Counterattack:
Scapegoats or Solutions," a • title which indicates their analysis and their
method.
The authors assume that prejudice is a social, not a religious or a psycho-
logical problem. It indicates a community ailment and must be solved on a
community-wide basis. Poverty, unemployment, or any other cause for un-
happiness leads to the search for a scapegoat. Some group in the community,
any group which is defenseless because it is a minority, is shouldered with
the blame for the existing evil. All minorities as well as the democratic-
minded element in the majority, must therefore co-operate, not so much in
the refutation of the charges of the scapegoat-seekers, but in the unceasing
effort to cure the social disease. At the very least, the fighters against preju-
dice must call attention to the real evils, so that society might find intelligent
solutions to its problems rather than blind itself by plunging into the smoky
atmosphere of prejudice. It is counterattack which may not only prevent the
quest for scapegoats, but may also perform a service to society.
The major portion of the book is devoted to outling the methods which
those who enlist in the cause should use. In a series of brief but well illus-
trated chapters the authors offer advice based on theit long experience.
Above all, the book breathes a spirit of faith in out democracy which,
once caught by a public speaker or an audience, will win half the battle for
those who fight for a healthy society. Dr. Cohen and Mr. Fagan have done
an excellent job for which every fighter for democracy should be grateful.
By PIERRE VAN PAASSEN
Friday, "lily 13, 1945
Purely
Commentary
The situation in Palestine is rapidly
By PHILIP SLOMOVITZ
nearing the point of explosion. If the
FEAR AND REALITY
White Paper is not abrogated, or, at least,
if the government of Great Britain does
We repeat an old admonition: the worst
not in the very near future make the ges-
that can happen to any one is that he
ture of sensibly attenuating the harsher
should succumb to fear.
implications of that infamous instrument
Take the latest outburst of anti-
of policy, the Land of Israel will be
Semitism.
plunged into a seething cauldron of un-
The armed forces are compelled to
rest, riots, destruction • of property and
withdraw an anti-Semitic correspondence
bloodshed before the year is over. The
course.
Yishuv is near the • end of its patience.
The foreign Arab princes are encourag•
Senator ("the Man") Bilbo of Missis-
ed to become more presumptuous and ar-
sippi resorted to a tirade against Jews
and "niggers."
rogant every day on the subject of Pales-
tine. The British government, with the
That's bad, isn't it?
passive connivance and the pusillanimity
But when you study the situation and
of the ,Zionist leadership, is allowing
you realize that the reasonable elements
things to come to a pass where a settle-
in America are ashamed of such occur-
ment of the Palestine question will occur •
rences,
you must gain courage and you
automatically—that is to say, by the
are
heartened
in your faith in America.
force of artificially created circumstances.
No, no, friends, we refuse to lose faith
That settlement, conceived in terror and
in our American traditions.
upheaval, will be so detrimental to the
•
• *
Jewish people as to blast their hopes for
a generation to came.
BUT WE REMAIN ON GUARD
Thi s does not mean that we are sitting
What Britain's intentions are with and
back complacently without doing any-
in Palestine may be gauged with sorrow-.
thing about it.
ful accuracy by what occurred recently
in Syria and Lebanon. There, in those
We must remain on guard to avoid
two Levantine states, a great European
trouble.
power, France, was ignominiously booted
It is bad enough that the world has
out by Arab mobs armed, equipped and
become so inured to suffering' that no
brought to a point of anti-French frenzy
one pays any attention to the fact that
by British agents. Behind the Syrian
only 150,000 of the 1,350,000 European
mobs was the new Arab League, which
Jewish -children have survived.
is a Britiih-sponsored and British-con-:
A Free Press reporter sat next to us
trolled organization. That Arab League
at the luncheon for Dr. Stephen S. Wise,
is next turning its attention .to Palestine.
and we saw him cringe in horror when
For that purpose, and no other, it was.
he .heard that only 500,000 Jews -.have
Set up and created by the Colonial Of,
survived the Nazi holocaust out of a
fice: to eliminate the French rival from
total of nearly 7,000,000 Jews. He was
the Near East and to settle -the JeWish
visibly moved and shocked. This means
question in such a Manner that Britain
By BORIS SMOLAR
By ARNOLD LEVIN
that good Americans refuse _ to condone
can afterwards stand before the world
(Copyright, 1945, Jewish Telegraphic
the wholesale murder of a people. It
(Copyright, 1945, Independent Jewish
Agency, Inc.)
and shrug off responsibility.
Press Serviee,• Inc)
means that when the attention of good
POLITICAL NOT4S
* * *
•
ANDRE MAUROIS
Unwarranted attacks by some Amer- men and women is called to tyranny and
If Mr. Churchill is still the friend of
The French biographer Andre Maurois,
bigotry, they will help you fight it.
the Jewish people that he is said to be a Jew, who had many • kind words for ican Zionist laborites on David Dubinsky,
The fight is on! But the fight must be
and if he is sincere in his condemnation Marshall Petain some years ago, while president of the International Ladies Gar-
carried on without fear or cringing.*
ment
Workers'
Union,
may
cost
Palestine
of the White Paper, the time has come Vichy was collaborating with the Gestapo
•
• •
to show it by deeds. His antediluvian in the persecution of Jews, has applied half-a-million dollars . . . It is known
rhetorical pronouncements on the subject, for U. S. citizenship. What's the matter— the union planned to spend $500,000 in IS IT JUST A LITTLE INCIDENT?
Dr. Asher Isaacs, eminent member of
building houses for returning Jewish
to which the Zionist leadership still clings unhappy about De Gaulle?
soldiers in Palestine on land belonging the faculty of Pittsburgh University who
with pathetic insistence, are absolutely SOUVENIR
belongs to one of the most interesting
worthless in the present circumstances.
Among the souvenirs he will bring to the Jewish National Fund . . . This
They are void of substance. Churchill's back from Europe, N. Y. Post columnist project was to have been _a part of a Jewish families in the land, is the edi-
deeds of commission and omission for five Leonard Lyons cherishes most the knob larger project by U. S. organized labor torial writer for the American Jewish
years have to all intents and purposes re- and_ the key of the door to the famous aimed- at alleviating the acute housing Outlook of Pittsburgh and the author of
pudiated his condemnation of the White Munich beer hall where Adolf Hitler be- shortage in Palestine ... The attacks on the Outlook's first page column "Current
Paper. It is not tomorrow or next year gan his career. Lyons feels great satisfac- Dubinsky may affect not only this effort, Comments." The , leading item in one of
that danger to JeWish Palestine may arise. tion that the key to the Nazi shrine is but- the pro-Zionist sympathies in the his recent columns, under the heading
higher rankS of the American Federation "Just a Little Incident," reads:
Jewish Palestine is being destroyed now now in the possession of a Jew.
of Labor.
It happened at the streetcar stop in
by the policy of the White Paper which
President Truman, prior to leaving for ,
front of the Carnegie Library. Three
has been in force for five years—Church-
little girls . . . about 11 years of age
ill being Prime Minister for most of that community and a political organization of his conference with Churchill and Stalin
time—and which is now being implement- vast- potential influence and strength. is expected to receive two' separate dele-
... holding library books and waiting
They
alone
can
tear
that
web
to pieces gations . . . The Zionists hope that he will
for a_ streetcar. Suddenly, one of them
ed by a carefully managed and syste-
who. was facing the library said ex-
matic transfer of authority to the foreign by speaking the truth at last in high see a Zionist delegation, and the Amer-
citedly to her companions, "There goes
Potentates of the Arab .League, which is places, They have never yet, so far, had ican Jewish Committee is certain that
the courage to call a spade by its name the President will receive its-leaders in
a Jew!" The others' turned. I turned,
Mr. Churchill's own creation.
—I.
e.,
let
the
American
people
Imow
the
White
House
shortly.
too. * I thought I had misunderstood.
. Only the policy of haVlaga, of national
Judging from the . excited reaction, I
The petition on Palestine submitted to
Self-control and self-discipline as prac- that it is Britain's imperialist policy which
must hive misunderstood. Surely the
ticed by the Yishuv, is today halding off is diametrically opposed to and the mortal. President Truman by the governors of
of a Jewish Palestine. •
37 states is the result - of long. and hard
little girI must have said, "There goes .
an outbreak of terrorism on an unprece- enemy
.
. *
*
•
work by the American Zionist Emergency - the devil." But I didn't see any devil.
dented scale in the Holy Land. The ten-
As long as the war in Europe lasted Council during Hayim Greenberg's ad-
I saw . a decently dressed individual ...
sion is acute and the acts of Provocatian
no horns, no tail, no three-pronged
On the part of the government and its this attitude on the part of official Zion- ministration* aS chairman of the Council's
ittee . . It was no easy
fork. I sniffed but noticed no trace of
official and secret agents are steadily be- ism may have been commendable •(al- executive comm
brimstone. "My mother used to work
coming more cynically overt and flagrant. though not from a Jewish national point task to- perpade the governors to sign
for him," the girl continued. The other
How long the Palestinian Jews will be of view) in that it sought to spare the the petition . . . Many of them were
two girls contributed, "Stinker!"
able to resist the pressure depends entire- allied British government any sort of hesitant and wanted to- knbw why Amer-
Are these the three little girls for
ly on whether their American brethren embarrassment in the conduct of the war ican Zionist leaders withdrew the Pales-
whom the citizens of Pittsburgh sup-
Will at long last take the matter seriously with Germany. But that considerateness tine Resolution from Congress at a time
is.
no
longer
valid
as
an
excuse
for
in-
when
the
majority
of
the
Senate
was
port the Carnegie Library? Is it for
enough to intervene energetically, un-
them that the Community Fund is kept
afraid, conscious of their rights • as Amer- activity, the more since British gratitude ready to vote for this resolution which
filled? Is it for them that our service-
ican citizens, with the authorities in Lon- for that Zionist policy of non-embarrass- is practically embodied in the governors'
ment now reveals itself in favoring the petition to Truman.
don and Washington.
men and women are dying? Is it for
Arab partners of Adolf Hitler.
* * •
them that the world is being made
The American people will come to look VACATION NOTES
safe? Safe for their hatred? Safe for
There lies the only hope now. The
No
less
than 20 American Zionist lead-
prattle about the Yishuv being able to upon the establishment of a Jewish State
their brand of bigotry? Safe for their
brand of ignorance?
mobilize 60,000 fighting men to resist, in Palestine as an essentially straightfor- ers, the 'majority of them laborites, will
once the signal is given for Arab hooli- ward, genuinely democratic, realistic, just spend their vacation in' Europe this sum-
I don't blame the children entirely,
ganism to break loose; is self-delusion of and necessary solution . of the Jewish mer ... This is the first time since the
although the age of 11 should be an
problem
when
and
if
they
are
told
what
war
that
Zionist
leaders
are
leaving
the
the worst sort. Pompous. declarations by
age of some decency and sense. I blame
United States en masse for Europe . . .
Zionist leaders in this country that is at stake in the Holy Land.
the parents who probably talked
Most
At
of
them
will
go
to
London
to
present
they
are
•
not
being
told.
-
par-
Whereas Hitler might have been able to
about' Jews. I blame the clergymen and
kill Jews with imPUnity the - British gov- They have never been told. They hear ticipate in the 'Zionist conference which
the Stmday schools and the school
will
takes
pla6e
there
lies
from
the
Arab
side
'and
-
the
end
of
this
garbled
ernment cannot do ' sa because a world
teachers of these children. There M
public opinion will oppose its moral non propaganda from British sources. They month . . . But some of them will also
something
very wrong if there is poured
licet—such declarations are childishly never hear the Zionist paint of view ex- proceed to France, Belgium, Switzerland
into these little girls parental love,
plained.
In
the
matter
of,
publicrelations
and
other
countries
to
study
the
general
naive. British imperialism is not any
religious training, civic training, and
More . merciful or amenable to feeble the Zionist _OrganiZation.'s inany, bureaus Jewish situation . Dr. Abba Hillel Sil-
educationsomething wrong, if all that
ver,
who.
is
to
are
worse
than
children,
for
represent
the
ZOA
at
the
childre
n
-
at
democratic protestations than any other
comes of it is the word "stinker."
conference
in
London,
may
also
go
to
least
cry
sometimes
when
they
don't
get
imperialism. It shoots when its designs ,
Our readers will
are contravened, whether in India, Kenya, • what they want. Meeting" one another- is Palestine for a brief visit .. . The mass- that this is a most undoubtedly agree
interesting story—al-
Syria or Palestine. • . • taken for important political work by the exodus of the- princiPal leaders of the
though a : very shocking,--story- and that
% Moreover, its apologists are busy even Zionist leadert. They live as, effectively American • Zionist movement leaves the the author's
comments are. very, valid4
now, for all coming eventualities, with in - a ghetto as if there were a 'Wall around Zionist activities in the .U. S. "frozen"
for the summer . . • But one can expect
We are compelled_ to, ask, however: Is
placing the Jews in an 'unfavorable light. them. •
It is time for .them to come out .of their lively doings as soon as the delegates it just a LITTLE incident? Is it possible
When hell breaks loose not Britain but
the Yishuv will bear the blame, as De- ghetto and forget *abOnt the question of begin to return home . . By that time that this experience reflects a. situation'
Gaulle is made to bear the blame before personal prestige, for the Jewish people's a little more will be known of what the that is current throughout the land?
world public opinion for what hapPened holiest poSsession, 'Eretz • Israel, is in future status of Palestine may be in the
Dr. Isaacs' experience should set all o
in' Syria not long ago. z danger of being stolen. Let them lead the near future, since the ne*,BtitiSh . cabinet us to , thinking. about the ,existing situa-o
The task of rescuing Palestine from the fight. against the foul curse of imperial- will have been forrned, and the Truman- ton in . America with -regard. to Jewish- ,
deadly web of Levantine intrigue and .im- ism, in the open, in the light of - day, and Churchill-Stalin conference will be over. Christian relationships. perhaps , some-
Aerialist chicanery is now up to the millions of unseen brethren in America, . . . At this conference, the Palestine thing can be done -about it through the
American Zionist leaders. They have be- Africa and Asia will acclaim them and question may be touched upon as part schools. Surely, it can't be like the
of the situation concerning the entire weather; about which everybody talks )
hind them a unanimous American Jewish the. Yishuv will bless their names
:(Copyright, 1915, - Seven Arts Feature Syndicate): M 1 ddle'- East and the Dardadelles.
and no one does anything.
Heard in
The LolDbies
Between
You and Me
,
.
.
.
.
,
.