NAZIS AND JEWS

Evening Post, Volume CXVI, Issue 83, 5 October 1933, Page 11

NAZIS AND JEWS

GERMANS AT GENEVA

DEFENCE OF POLICY

REPLY BY MR. ORMSBY-GORE

THE BRITISH VIEWPOINT

United Press Association—By Electric Telegraph—Copyright. (Received October 5, 1 p.m.) GENEVA, October 4. With remarkable suddenness the most dramatic scene in the present League Assembly arose this morning when Mr. Orni9by-Gore, in the Political Committee, delivered a slashing reply lo the Germans' attempt yesterday to gloss over the persecution of the Jews.; Mr. Ormsby-Gore, challenging the German treatment of, minorities, rejected the conception of a State based upon racial homogeneity. Such a principle once admitted would enable every American claiming Mayflower descent to claim British citizenship. Government on a purely racial basis involved grave dangers. . It was a cardinal British concept that nobody should be debarred even from the highest office, by race, colour, or creed. Equality of status alone held together the Empire. If fairly treated and given equal rights Jews were loyal citizens to the country in which they resided. Their treatment by Germany was causing most serious concern, and therefore it -was necessary to reaffirm solemnly the resolution of the 1922 League Assembly. The 1922 resolution declared that all citizens, regardless of distinction of race, language, or origin, had''the right to equal treatment. The Committee sat late to allow the German, Heir yon Keller, to reply. He declared that most of Mr. Gore's criticisms were irrelevant showing that Britain failed to realise that the Jewish problem in Germany was quite different from any similar problem in the world. He reiterated that the League was not quali- j fied to deal with a nation's internal laws. Mr. x Gore's speech caused a great stir.in the lobbies, and was warmly applauded. This totally unexpected extempore attack on the Hitlerite persecution of the Jews', which is the most courageous presentation of the British viewpoint yet made at Geneva- has had an electrical effect everywhere outside the German circles. Applause greeted his statement that Britain would, never abandon Parliamentary Government.