Play-Act Propaganda

Northern Advocate, 8 September 1947, Page 5

Play-Act Propaganda

A Daily Mail correspondent, who quotes a passenger aboard one of the exodus ships as the source of his information, says the scenes of-patriotic fervour, heart-rending despair, do or die determination played aboard these ships were carefully rehearsed, coldly contrived and calculatingly portrayed. They were known by the cynical name "Ben Hecht Follies.

The actors are cynical off stage. For example, one man left the ship at Port de Bouc, screaming in incoherent agony against the treatment received from the British troops. It was convincing until he came aboard later and shouted, not in the broken English of a refugee, but m good Brooklynese: “How did you like my broadcast from Palestine?” Later it became known that he was acting on behalf of the Jewish Agency, putting over propaganda for the Palestine radio.

The Jews complained of hunger, but there was plenty of food in all three ships. One young girl, with hair dishevelled and a bloody bandage on a leg, ran screaming ashore in France. She returned and removed the bandage, which did not cover a wound. Instructions in English, smuggled on board unwittingly by the Red Cross, told the Jews how to behave before an audience. Before their arrival in France passengers on the President Warfield and other ships behaved quietly, but when anyone was present they rent their garments. The correspondent adds that there was enough real tragedy aboard the ships to make play-acting unnecessary. He gives the example of two young girls from Warsaw ghetto who were thrown into a communal grave and rescued by a Jewish burial party. Jewish displaced persons today hanged the effigy of the British Foreign Secretary (Mr Ernest Bevin) and beat the dangling dummy with sticks, during a mass meeting at Belsen displaced persons' camp. The meeting protested against the return to Germany of illegal migrants. A 72-hour general alert for Army and police in Palestine began at dawn today as a precaution against thieatened demonstrations against the landing of the Jews at Hamburg. Jews have called a general strike between 3 p.m. and 5 p.m. local time tomorrow. Zionist commentators have described the Foreign Office statement that among the exodus Jews were children taken from their parents as part of a “smirch” campaign. They say the story is incredible to anyone knowing the peace-loving ways

of the Hashomer Hatzair youth organisation, which is alleged to have organised the departure of the Jews from Eastern Europe.