Palestine Provides Only Solution for Problem of Jewish Dp’s, Rifkind Says

Without Palestine, there is no solution to the problem of the displaced Jews in Europe, Judge Simon H. Rifkind, former civilian advisor to the Commanding General of the U.S. Forces in the European Theatre, declared tonight, in his first public address since his return to the U.S. He spoke at a reception given in his honor by the Interim Committee of the American Jewish Conference at the Hotel Biltmore.

Calling for the immediate evacuation of DP centers in Germany, Judge Rifkind said that mass migration of European Jews to Palestine was the only answer that humanity could give to the Jewish people. “Should the Anglo-American Committee fail to respond to their human cry the results will be catastrophic,” he stressed.

He praised the courage and devotion of the American Army, from generals to enlisted men, for their efforts in behalf of the surviving European Jews. Were it not for the American Army, there would be no Jews in Central Europe today, he said. He reported that “after doubt and hesitation the Army is making plans to make farm areas available for those of the Jewish young man who desire to prepare themselves for agricultural life in Palestine.”

Judge Rifkind expressed his personal sorrow at the incident in a Jewish DP camp at Stuttgart last Friday, in which a Jew, Samual Danziger, was killed by German police, disclosing that he had met and spoken with the victim while in Germany. He welcomed the order by Gen. McKarney suspending the authority of German police to enter Jewish DP centers, and voiced the hope that it would be abolished altogether.

“I shall never forget,” Judge Rifkind said, “that one of the first requests of the so-called denazified civil governments of Germany to the Allied Control Council was that the rations of the displaced persons be reduced.”