DISTRESS AMONG JEWS.

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXV, Issue 20115, 28 November 1928, Page 14

DISTRESS AMONG JEWS.

POSITION IN EAST EUROPE. ORGANISATION OF RELIEF. "Tile position of tlic Jews in Eastern Europe," was tho subject of an address given by Mr. Jacob! to tho Jewish community last evening in the Auckland Jewish Social Club. Mr. N. Alfred Nathan, president of tho Auckland Hebrew Congregation, presided. The Rev. S. A. Goldstein said tho condition of the Jews in Eastern Europe was one of the greatest tragedies of centuries. Mrs. David L. Nathan, president of the Women's Zionist Society, and also of the Jewish loaches' Benevolent Society, conVtiycd to tho speaks ttfcii 1 sin com good wishes for the success of tho objects of his mission. Mr. Jacobi said (hero had been 896 pogroms or organised massacres of Jews since (lie war, during which over 100,000 had been killed. There were 200,000 orphans. Famine had wiped out whole communities and tliero had been a succession of epidemics. Tho Russian Government had appropriated to itself all the com'morco and had destroyed tho economic lifo of tho Jews in Russia. Half the Jewish population of tho world lived in Eastern Europe, in Russia, Poland, Latvia and Rumania. Tlio Jewish World Relief Organisation had set itself tho task of repairing tho ravages of war, famine, and disease, and of securing tho economic reconstruction of Jewish lifo in Eastern Europe. Tho Jewish population had to turn 11 sol t to agriculture and artisanship. Tho society for the promotion of trades and agriculturo among Jews was concentrating on vocational training and agricultural development, and tho society for preserving tho health of tho Jews was rebuilding the efficiency of East European Jewry. There was a time, only a few years ago, when tlio number of deaths of Jews in somo places was ten times that of births. Clinics, hospitals and dispensaries were established and thero had been an immense volumo of medical relief. Seven hundred thousand patients had attended these institutions. The work of agricultural development which had commenced in 1921, was at first in tho nature of rclief, but It had become systematic throughout tho Jewish centres of population in Eastern Europe. A very profound impression was created by Mr, Jacobi's graphic description of the conditions existing in Eastern Europe. These were illustrated by lantern slides, which also showed the efforts being made by tho relief organisation to relieve them. At the conclusion of tho address, tho meeting pledged itself to give generous support to Mr. Jacobi's appeal rind a substantial sum was raised for this purpose.