Purely
Commentary
By PHILIP SLOMOVITZ
STEPHEN S. WISE STORIES
Iry Kupcinet, who used to write sport
columns for us as a special JTA corre-
spondent, now authors an interesting col-
umn in the Chicago Times (Kup's
Column).
Recently, Kup told a few interesting
stories about Dr. Stephen S. Wise, and
we record them here as of unusual in-
terest at this time, especially in view
of Dr. Wise's appearance in Detroit for a
lecture on Oct. 23 under auspices of the
Men's Club of Shaarey Zedek. Kupcinet
wrote:
Dr. Stephen Wise, in town on behalf
of the Palestine problem, recalled his
visit to Zurich, Switzerland, in 1936. At
that time Dr. Wise hoped to enter Ger-
many to study at first hand the condi-
tions there. His request for a visa, how- -
ever, was turned down by the U. S.
Consulate, which feared for his life.
Dr. Wise then appealed to Ambassa-
dor Dodd in Berlin. "I wouldn't come
here if I were you," the ambassador
advised him. "Your picture has ap-
peared in every newspaper in Germany
and the S. S. and Gestapo would be
sure to arrest you."
"But surely they wouldn't harm an
American visitor," protested Dr. Wise.
"Of course not," replied the ambassa-
dor. "But shortly after your plane
landed anywhere in Germany, the
newspapers would carry a story to the
effect that there was a Communist
uprising at the airport and, unfortun-
ately, Dr. Wise was killed accidentally."
Dr. Wise didn't go to Germany, but
instead returned home.
In 1903, Dr. Wise visited Theodore
Herzl, the founder of Zionism, in
Vienna. Herzl at that time had a pre-
monition of his death, which followed
a few months later, and told the
youthful Wise:
"I know I won't live to see the estab-
lishment of a Jewish state in Palestine,
but you, Stephen, will."
"I was just 29 years old then," re-
called Dr. Wise. "Now I am '73 and I
cannot die, I must live, until that dream
comes true and a Jewish state is estab-
lished in the Holy, Land."
Dr. Wise remains one of the fascinating
personalities in Jewish life. He has dif-
fered with many world Zionist leaders,
and it is reliably reported that there is
another rift between him and other
American Zionist leaders. We shall know
more about it when the ZOA convention
takes place in Atlantic City. This time Dr.
Wise may be the victor.
He is an optimist, and we have a feel-
ing that both he and Dr. Chaim Weiz-
mann will live to see the realization of
their hopes—for the creation of a free
and democratic Jewish Commonwealth
Israel—especially since it is
also OUR hope.
•
•
•
in ,Eretz
CURFEW HUMOR
George Cassidy, New Yory Post cor-
respondent in Palestine, is among the
Christian newspapermen who has caught
and fully understands the spirit of the
Jewish -builders of Zion.
In a recent column, Cassidy recorded
some of the humor now current in
Palestine.
The stock joke of the week, he writes,
takes this form when two Palestinians
met at the bus station opposite the
pdrked tank:
"Did you hear about the two news-
papers that they're going to start?
"No, what are they?"
"The Daily Curfew and the Sat-
urday Evening Search!"
Mr. Cassidy explains that the Jews in
Palestine are reacting to the British in
the same way as Londoners and other
Englishmen reacted to the German air
attacks upon their communities during
the first years of the war. Perhaps it is
even more so—since England officially
was at war and Jews are just being held
in check by cruel decrees coming from
a democratic power. In a sense, this
makes our people stronger and our case
more powerful.
U. S. Failures
The U. S. has failed to live up to its
professions' of moral righteousness both
in connection with helping Jews in Eu-
rope during the Nazi regime and in the
solution of the Palestine problem . . .
This is the opinion of Sumner Welles ex-
pressed in his "Where Are We Heading,"
published by Harper's . . . He points out
that the lives of many hundreds of thou-
sands of Jews in Europe could have been
saved if President Roosevelt's Evian pol-
icy had really been carried out. Welles
believes Arab - opposition to a fair settle-
ment of the problem is artificially stimu-
lated by the British.
Friday, October. 111„ 1946
THE JEWISH NEWS
Page Two
A Plea for Peace in Palestine
Word From a British. Resident in Zion
Text of a Letter Which Appeared in London New Statesman and Nation July 13, 1946
Sir:—The Government's action seems to be universally taken as action against
the "Jews" or "Jewish terrorists". It is not. I say, with full knowledge of my charge,
that it is, first and foremost, action against socialiSm.
British civil servants in Palestine still believe in the caste system of "rulers"
and "ruled", and often complain that in Palestine there are no "segregation" areas
as in East and West Africa where British officials can live apart. They contrive to
live as far apart as possible. While many of these men are very decent chaps and
are my friends, they are products of an outmoded system. Time after time they
have made such remarks to me as "the Jews would not be so bad if they were not
such d—d Socialists". Only recently I was - told by a senior official that "Jerusalem
wants us to break the Labor Party's hold on the transport system by encouraging
bus companies, which are not Workers' Co-operatives".
In the High Commissioner's proclamation to the people of Palestine on the
morning of June 29, he said that Government was not taking action against the
whole Jewish Community but only a "part". We were intended to think that that
"part" was the "terrorists". The fact is that it was the Labour Party against whom
action was taken. The "terrorists" are concentrated in the towns. It was the villages
which were searched, not the towns. It was the Socialist leaders of the Community
who were arrested in bulk. In Haifa the Conservative chairman, M. G. Levin of the
Jewish Community Council, was left free, while his Socialist deputy was arrested.
David Hacohen, a Socialist Municipal Councillor, was the only one taken from the
Municipality. The only leading manufacturer arrested was U. Friedland. By chance
he happens to be a keen Social/St and member of the Labour Party.
According to the Palestine Broadcasting Service, - the High Commissioner
offered Dr. Weizmann to reinstate the Jewish Agency if Messrs. Rokach, Senator,
and Hirsch were coopted to replace the arrested Labour members. All three are
anti-Socialist. If you look at the New Year's and King's birthday honours list for
local residents in Palestine in the past—even in the last .twelve months—you will
see that all are representatives of the Right. There is not a Labour man amongst
them in spite of what Labour has done for the country.
Is it not possible to send a strong Trade Union delegation to Palestine to work
for peace? Their task would not be nearly so difficult as people imagine. There is
very little animosity between the Arab and Jewish working men. People try to stir
up trouble between them from time to time, but it never lasts long. Throughout the
whole of the "disturbances" of 1936-39 I had on my daily payroll between 1,000 and
1,200 men. There was no time when we did not work with mixed angs of Arabs
and Jews, despite many attempts by British officials to try to split them up into
Arab gangs and Jewish gangs. The strike of Government officials in April this year
showed how the two races can work together.
A BRITISH RESIDENT.
(Our correspondent, whose name we cannot give for obvious reasons, is a well-
known non-Jewish member of the British business community in Palestine. Ed.)
Heard in
The Lobbies
By ARNOLD LEVIN
(Copyright. 19.16. Independent Jewish
Press Service. Inc.)
-
REUTER'S
Reuter's editors must be terribly dis-
illusioned men. For weeks now they have
been drumming up "tension" among Ha-
ganah and the dissident resistance groups
and predicting civil war among Pales-
tine's Jews. Haganah, however, refuses
to take its directives from Reuter's.
•While disapproving of the tactics of the
dissident groups, Haganah knows who
its real enemies are. These enemies. are
not Jews.
•
•
•
ABOUT EDITING
The New York Times has come up in
recent weeks with several graphic il-
lustrations of its motto, "all the news
that is fit to print."
For months on end the New York
Times carried Gene Currivan's Palestine
dispatches confounding Haganah, and the
Sternites and Irgunites, and indiscrim-
inately calling all of them gangsters and
gangmollis. But the same newspaper has
carried the features within a fortnight
about the Mufti. The latest was a
spread of a North American Newspaper
Alliance interview with the Mufti in
which his opinion was sought about the
federation plan and the charges against
him that he was "anti-British." This
gave the Mufti a splendid opportunity.
We shall not discuss the propriety of
seeking an interview with this dubious
political personality, but there can be no
two opinions about the ethics of submit-
ting loaded questions. Confirmed charges
against the Mufti include his role as
the organizer of the murderous Moslem
Legion in Yugoslavia, as the co-plotter
of the extermination of Europe's Jews,
as collaborator in the Iraqi fascist revolt.
But none of these questions were asked
of the Mufti. NANA asked him only
about his being anti-British and about
his "residing" in Germany during the
war. The answer to these was simple
enough and gave the reader a distorted
picture of the Mufti.
Were it not for Dr. Wise's observa-
tions, appended to the tail end of the
interview, none of these facts would have
been-brought out. NANA's questions cer-
tainly made no attempt to bring out all
the facts about the Mufti. That really is
ethical journalism.
The two stories on the Mufti followed
by James Reston's Washington dispatch
accusing the President of failing to take
note of the principle of self-determina-
tion as applied to Palestine's Arabs. This
leaves no doubt as to where the N. Y.
Times stands, nor as to how the news-
paper espouses its stand..
Between
You and Me
By BORIS SMOLAR
(Copyright, 1946, Jewish Telegraphic
Agency. Inc.)
BEHIND THE SCENES
President Truman's statement support-
ing the demand of the Jewish Agency for
the establishment of a "viable Jewish
state" in Palestine was as much of a sur-
prise to Zionist leaders as to the average
Jew .. . That is because the person who
inspired the statement, although a Jew, is
not a Zionist . . . He is. one of the late
President Roosevelt "brain trusters, who
still advises President Truman on impor-
tant political matters . . . The State De-
partment soon- will make public a num-
ber of Nazi foreign office documents
which will reveal the role played by the
ex-Mufti of Jerusalem as Hitler's collabo-
rator .. . Translation of these documents
has just been completed in Washington.
•
•
•
ZIONIST TRENDS
Zionist leaders are gratified at the ap-
pointment of Arthur .Creech-Jones as
British Colonial Secretary . . . He is
known to be strongly pro-Zionist . .
However, the key to the solution of the
Palestine problem remains in the hands
of Bevin and Morrison, the "strong men"
of the Labor' Cabinet . . . The informal
talks which are now being conducted in
London between the British government
and leaders of the Jewish Agency are
being carefully studied by the Zionist
leadership in the U. S. . . . There is dis-
satisfaction over the report that the lead-
ers of the Jewish Agency are asking for
the admission of 5,000 Jews monthly to
Palestine during the period of the nego-
tiations . . . It is argued that this demand
may set a dangerous precedent for the
future . . . Jewish Agency activities in
Latin American countrjes are being care-
fully watched by British diplomatic rep-
resentatives there, who are not at all
happy about the growth of pro-Palestine
committees in that part of the world. •
•
•
•
ANTI-SEMITIC FRONT
Will the Mutual Network renew the
contract for Upton Close's broadcasts
which are resented by Jews and all lib-
eral elements in the U. S.? ... This ques-
tion is of great interest to Jewish organi-
zations engaged in combatting anti-Semi-
tism in this country • . . The contract
expires this month . . . Radio station
WOR, the network's outlet in New York,
has been receiving an average of 200
telephone calls after each of Close's
broadcast . . . Each of the callers pro-
Have
tested against the broadcasts . .
you ever heard of an organization . called
"Youth Society to Preserve Christian
Palestine?" ... Well, this is one of Gerald
K. Smith's latest creations . . . The anti-
Semitic front in the U. S. was "strength-
ened" this month with the establishment
of an organization which styles itself
"The American Gentile Army."
Strictly
Confidential
By PHINEAS J. BIRON
Copyright, 1946, Seven Arts
Feature Syndicate, Inc.
A TRUE THRILLER
Tel Aviv was under a curfew. .. .
All inhabitants had to be indoors at
6 P.M. . .. British soldiers came parad-
ing through the streets on the lookout
for Stern gang members.. . . Suddenly
a detachment of 50 British MP's
stopped in front of a group of houses,
ilook 10 young men into, custody, and
marched them off under the protection
of the English soldiers.. . . These 10
prisoners were members of the Stern
group and so were their captors, who
had donned British uniforms to save
them.
• • •
ATTENTION: GOODWILL
ORGANIZATIONS
The elders of Oberamergau village in
Germany are making plans to resume
their famous passion play. . . They
must, however, get permission from the
American military government. . . . We
hope that the permission will not be
granted. . . . The 2600 members of the
cast were—almost to a man—notorious
Nazis and among the most vociferous
anti-Semites. . . . Passion plans, wher-
ever given, are not conduCive to inter-
religious goodwill. . . . Germany is the
last place for such a spectacle. . . . Here
is a job for our goodwill organizations.
. . . They should urge our zone commands
to look into the records of the Oberam-
ergau cast.
• •
QUESTIONS
To Rabbi Philip Bernstein. just back
from Europe: Is it true that American
soldiers in Germany are falling in love
with the Aryan theory and behaving ar-
roc*antly toward Jewish DP's?
To Ben Hecht: Are you collaborating
with Quentin Reynolds on a movie about
British policy in Palestine?
To Actors Equity: Is the theatrical
producer interested in bringing Emma
Goering to this country a well known
Jewish impressario who should know
better?
To Warner Brothers, Hollywood: We
are told that you tried to convince Frank
Sinatra to play "The Jazz Singer" with
the proviso that the Jewish hero be
changed into an Irish lad. . . . It is only
when Frank insisted on playing the orig-
inal Jewish character that you reluc-
tantly consented.
• •
POT POUR!
David Lax, a combat-veteran whose
paintings are in the National War Mu-
seum, is offering three courses in Art
under the City College Adult Education
Program. . . . Dave, incidentally, is do-
ing an important series on the war, which
will arouse hot controversy. . . . Watch
for it in about a year.
Frances Adler's book on Jacob P. Ad-
ler, her father, is ready for publication
•after • 10 years of writing and rewriting.
Publishers should grab it. It's an epic.
Peter Bergson, chairman of the. He-
brew Committee for National Libera-
tion, until recently in danger of being
deported to Palestine, has squared his
case with Washington.
Upon the Height
Of Pisgah
A Simhat Torah Poem
By DR. NOAH E. ARONSTAM
Upon the height of Pisgah Moses stood
•
And viewed the Promised Land.
A tremulous and radiant haze
Declared the birth of dawn
As the first rays of the sun kissed the
earth.
Moses deeply fascinated by the sight
Let his glance wander down the Plain.
There his eyes beheld the Land of Gilead
Unto Dan; even unto the Hindersea.
To the South he dimly glimpsed
The City of the Palms
As it- spread its splendor unto Zoar.
A tear trembled in his .eyes.
"Lo, this is the Promised Land," he
mused.
"Thine eyes drink in its beauty—
The fulfillment of a Pledge—
That my people shall. inherit
In Peace and Concord for all times.
But-as to myself: .I may only view it
From afar; not vouchsafed is to me
The happiness to dwell- therein."
His countenance was bathed by the glow
Of sunbeams through a mist.
•
•
•
Down the Height of Pisgah
His path led back to Israel's encampment,
And a smile divine suffused his /ace
As he breathed: "Lord, Thy , Will be
done."