Mizrachi, orthodox Zionist organization, today bolted the national Zionist conference when the praesidium ruled one of its leaders out of order for attacking Dr. Kurt Blumenfeld, former president of the German Zionist Federation, on religious problems.
The orthodox delegates walked out of the hall when the praesidium refused to permit Rabbi Hoffman of Frankfurt-am-Main to continue with an address criticizing Dr. Blumenfeld.
Earlier, the conference heard S. Tschertok and Hans Gaertner, Zionist leaders, demand complete control by the Zionists of the cultural life of the Jews in Germany. Today’s session was devoted chiefly to cultural problems.
With agents of the secret State police looking on, Mr. Tschertok declared, “We can never agree even to a fifty-fifty combination with the non-Zionists as far as Jewish cultural life in Germany is concerned.”
Mr. Gaertner emphasized the Zionists’ demand for complete control of the Jewish school system, which is to be set up under a decree of the Ministry of Justice expelling Jews from the German school system by April 1.
A message was received from Dr. Chaim Weizmann, president of the World Zionist Organization, stating that the problem of German Jewry would remain the main focus of Zionist activities.
The first National Zionist Conference since Hitler came into power, opened yesterday with all Zionist leaders attending and agents of the secret State police taking notes on the proceedings.
The conference was prepared to make certain requests of the Nazis in the belief that it is now possible to obtain concession for the Jews because the Government is anxious to give the impression to guests coming here for the Olympics that the Jewish situation is better than has been described abroad.
Dr. Siegfried Moses, president of the Federation, voiced the hope that the delegation of British Jewish leaders in the United States would succeed in obtaining opportunities for emigration. He declared that the delegation’s plan did not aim at the transfer of large amounts of capital but at the expatriation of middle class youths without capital.
He demanded that “Palestine should be given the first place in the project” and that the Zionist Organization be incorporated into the machinery which will be established under the emigration scheme.
Dr. Moses stressed that emigration to Palestine must be the back bone of all emigration activities, adding that all German Jewish communities should center their work on emigration.
He appealed to the non-Zionists to aid the Zionist Organization in obtaining additional Palestine immigration certificates. “I hope that the German Government will help the Zionist and non-Zionists in their united efforts for well-planned emigration from the Reich,” he stated.
Asserting that Zionist favor emigration to other countries besides Palestine, he urged that the experience of the Zionists be applied, under the Zionist influence, to settlement of Jews in other countries.
The convention, the twenty-fifth in the history of the German Zionist movement, was opened by Dr. Franz Meyer, Zionist leader. He stressed the difficulties of holding a convention “under the present conditions.”
Among the other speakers was Dr. Blumenfeld, head of the organization department of the Hebrew University in Jerusalem. Otto Warburg, banker, was given an ovation when he appeared as a guest.
Interest of the delegates centered on a plan for Zionist domination of the Jewish communities and the central Jewish organizations.
The conference was faced with the problem of forcing the People’s Party, a Zionist group headed by Georg Kareski, Nazi-appointed director for Jewish Cultural Affairs, and Dr. Alfred Klee, Zionist leader, to submit to the control of the Zionist Organization.
Strong sentiment was expressed against assimilationist policies and an extensive campaign was planned to win the German Jews to Zionism.
The Zionist plan for dominating Jewish life in Germany was crystallized in a five-point program drawn up by the federation’s executive for submission to the convention. The program calls for national autonomy for the German Jews with Zionist control over Jewish communities and central organizations.
Demanding the recognition of the Zionist federation as “the only instrument for the exclusive conduct of the work of nationalizing German Jewry,” the program provides:
(1) To make all efforts to change the structure of German Jewry within the framework of existing laws.
(2) To create economic, cultural and social conditions which would give the Jews the possibility of existence.
(3) To convert German Jewry into an organized, nationally-conscious, solid unit of the Jewish nation.
(4) To provide for Jewish education of children and adults on a large scale.
(5) To develop larger activities by adapting the Jews to new professions, artisanship and emigration.
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