JEWISH WESTERN BULLETIONf
Thursday, September 28, 1939
The Jewish Western Bulletin
Official Organ of the Vancouver Jewish Administrative Council
j^. rtie??5 _-__—- Ghairman Administrative CouncU
Samuel Gillies ——_______... L_--------—Editor
Harry Musikansky.
Published every other week by Musikansky Publications,
JBusiness Manager and Publisher
2675 Oak St., BAy. 4210. Business Hours: 9 a-m. to 5 pju., except Saturday and Jewish Holy Days. Entered as Second Class ^£ail Matter at Ottawa
VANGOUVEB, B.C., THURSDAY, SEPTEMBER 28, 1939
GERMAN CULTURE A MYTH
We hear so much about German culture especially in peace time, that it is hard to understand how this culture mysteriously disappears dujjmg war-time, being replaced with-the barbarism of the most unnatural ferocity unequaled by the savage tribes in the wild unexplored jimgles in various parts of the world. V Looking back in the files of the newspapers of 1914, we read authentic accounts of the German soldiers while passing through Belgium picking up innocent little children with the bayonet poin just as they would stick an animal.
In the recent invasion of Poland news is now filtering through of the atrocities of the German troops. The worst carnage came from the air. From Wilno comes the report of terible devastation and destruction by German air raids. Warplanes came swooping down from the skies, flew low over the thickly populated Jewish district droppiag their bombs on innocent women and children, maiming and killing thousands.^ Refugees lon the roads, agec people, women and babies were repeatedly machine-gunned by war planes. There can be no excuse for such inhuman acts, as at the comparative lowness of the German warplanes it would be quite easy to distinguish civilians from soldiers! It would take volumes to describe the horrible massacre of innocent people perpetrated by the German army in Poland. One thing nobody can understand is why can beasts develop so rapidly from so highly would-be cultured humans. We are inclined to think that German culture is a myth. The German Jews provide the culture which was sadly curtailed when Hitler forced numbers of Jews out of Germany. What culture was left was eradicated by the ruthless suppression of Jewish natural life in Germany.
A PAINFUL DUTY
A dispatch from London reports that the Association of Jewish ex-Servicemen appealed to the Government to make use of the sei^ces of its German-Jewish members, fii a letter to the Daily Telegiraph, the association declared:
"Since the crisis last Septei)iber we have received numerous offers by German Jewish-ex-servicemen to serve the country in the event of war. On August 26, a letter embodying this desire was sent to the Undersecretary of State by the ex-servicemen in the 'hope that an opportunity might !be given them td express loudUy ; theii* latitude to Great Britain |n these days. They do not want i a^heltered, easy life while the manhood of the country sacrifices their blood in the trenches for th^ ideals of humanity. Their earnest desire is to be placed in a position where they can setve the "country and do their duty as grateful guests. ■ f Meanwhile, mG^ a report from £atvia states, there are
increasing indications of attempts by the German Government to ivin this wartime support of the! Crerman Jews.
It is interesting to note that during the World War 17 per ^ent'of the total German population was mobilized, while 17.7 per cent of the Jewish population of 100,000 was mobilized; and 15 per cent of the Jews mobilized, approximately 12,000, were killed. A sad commentary of sacrifice for a fatherland which not many years later rewarded that patriotism with humiliation, disgrace and deliberate annihilation.
• Those were her children. Germany once was rich in the "Strength of a united ipeople ready and eager to dedicate themselves to the glojiy of protecting their country. There were great minds and strong bodies. She has forsaken them. She has driven them from her soil and forced them to seek new lands where they might spend their energies protecting humanitarian ideals. It is no longer the'restricted" Jewish problem" for which they gladly give their 'Uvea: it is for the greater struggle between a free humanity and a -downtrodden one.
" Jews from the Reich have been crowding French and British registration offices. They are not a violent people given to mani--festations of physical force. They are essentially a peace-loving people who under normal conditions lived at peace with their rneighbors. It must hurt to have to spill blood on the land they loved, the blood of the people who not many years ago shared that love for their native land. Yet with all the horor that has been perpetrated against the Jewish people in Germany it is doubtful whether theirs is a spirit of revenge. Rather it is the deep realization that the pain which they must infiict upon the people of that country—just as the pain inflicted by the surgeon's knife-is but a forerunner to a better life.
StricUy Ctinfidential -
TISHRI 5700
Throughout the world last week Jews celebrated the birth of a new year. The traditional blowing of the Shofar, characteristic of the Rosh Hoshonah services, is a solemn call to meditation and moral inventory. It began the ten-day period known as the Ten Days of Penitance, ^hich are culminated with Yom Kippur, the Pay of A.tonement, the most solemn day of the Jewish year.
The war in Europe, with its catastrophic possibilities was the theme most widely used by rabbis in their High Holiday services. As they surveyed the year which has ended and looked into the new year, their plea was for peace and understanding among all peoples. Frightful as the past year has been for civilization, and .in the face of the year's calamities, Jewish spiritual leaders nevertheless expressed a deep faith that Jewry and civilization would emerge, as it has always before, revitalized and strong, and that but of all tins woe would come a rebirth of the human spirit.
The blast of the Shofar was compared, by Rabbi Segal of Mount Neboh Congregation, New Yorl^ to the sound of a reveille "which calls all Israel to a spiritual mobilization." "Israel," he said, "chooses to banish the sword and to raise aloft as a shield the Book of Peace. In that book tears reveal a quest for life—a life of unending tranquility.
In his sermon at the Free Synagogue in Carnegie Hall, New York, Dr. Stephen S. Wise said that the "tale that is old"—persecution, wandering and war—will "forever renew itself" until men jmderstand that not only H patriotism insufficient, but even that world citizenship is not enough.
"Even more is needed," he added, "and must be claimed by men—a sense of kinship with all; humans under the only kingship that is secure and irrefragable: the Divine Sovereignty."
.LONDON (WNS.)—Dispatches received by the Daily Mail from its correspondents in war zones bn, the eastern front revealed the Polish Jews were suffering every form of. depriva-
tion and hardship from the Nazi invasion of Poland. In Lemberg (Lwow)
the advices said, two hundred Jews were killed when Nazi warplanes bombed the Jewish quarter of the city.
WAR DAZE
Those restless ^trplogysra. who are forever making* predictions about Hit-l^l' claim that his chart shows that just as he was made by an old man —Hindenburg, who made his chan|-cellor—he will bs defeated by oile-|-Chamberlain, who now is waging wal* against him ... Now you see what foresight - Secretary . Ickes showed when he refused to sell helium to thje German Zeppelin makers ... He most probably saved thousands of, Polisji lives . . . Those in the know insiist that Prance will give the Germans a^i awful shellacking on the Western front by means of the new French .Anks, which can ride roughshod over the pillboxes that are supposed to 3top them . . . A Canadian Jewish Legion was almost formed, but then some of the Jewish leaders in the Dominion decided that Jews should enlist in the regular expeditionary force . . . British and Canadian officials, however, were ready to accept a distinct Jewish unit in the British forces ... Just to prove once more that there is no limit to Nazi stupidity thje Furore recently approached the Bey. Martin Niemoeller, Protestant rebel against • the Nazi regime, with the suggestion that the pastor resume his naval career and become a U-boat commander again, as in the 1914-18 war . . . Neimoeller, however, preferred to stay in the concentration camp that has been his home for seyr eral years . . . Incidentally, if Hitler retains any doubts as to where the sympathies of most" Americans lie in the present conflict it isn't the fault of Hans Dieckhoff, former Nazi ambassador to the U.S. ... Reporting to Badolf on American feelings toward Germany Deickhoff is reported to have said that the United States will join the Allies within thr6e months of the beginning of hostilities". . .
GAGGING ON WAR '
This is fimny even if it isn't true . . . The story is going: around th4t the great Russian dancer Nijinslcy, who for years has been confined in | a Swiss insane asylmn, was Rowing definite signs of recovery until his wife tried to explain the new w situation to him Aftel^ to her exposition 6f the pifeserit lineup, Nijinsky is said to have suffered a violent jrelapse. . . Then tiiere's the tale o?'1thi&-A&iericah tourist who, in Berlin; ask^d a government official how far Rumania was .. . "Abolit two incidents away" was the Nazi's reply . . . WIricheil feels peeved bie-cause Chamberliaih ignored his suggestion on how the official text of Great Britain's dsclaratioh of a state of war should read ./. .The phrase; "war against Germany" is all wrohfe, says Walter; insisting that "war agahist Adolf • Hitler" would have been much more accurate^ - • The German reaction to the annoimce-inent that Goeiing will step into Hit-er's shoes if and when Adolf gets what's coming to him is that Goer-mg will have a hard time climbing into Hitler's pants . . . All of which reminds us that a former European correspondent, very well informed, lecently whispered in our ear that Goering is the only high Nazi official who is opposed to Hitler's anti-Jewish policy ...
THE LOW-DOWN '
That stunt which brought international publicity to a London newspaper really was originated by our own Non-Sectarian Anti-Nazi League . The London paper used its front pag^e for a "Wanted Dead or Alive" circular on Hitler ... The columnists have it all wrong when they imply that Professor Haushofer is a sort of anonymous brain trust for Hitler . . . The professor is none other than the General Haushofer \yhose works qn military strategy throw more illiunl-uation on the details of Hitler's future moves than even the Nazi chief's 'Mein Kampf" . . .We have it from a pretty reliable isource that within Ihe near future, there will be an open
breach between the King of Italy and Mussolini^. . ; EmU Jannings, the grerat German screen actor, has com-' pletely siurendered to the Nazi ideology ... He Is now: in charge of all theatre and cinema activities in th^ Reich, and part and parcel of the great propaganda machine that is supposed to keep up the German morale during the war . . . LISTEN TO THIS
Appalling is the information supplied by Drew Pearson and Robert S. Allen, Washington's most reliable snoopsters . . . They insist that ah American firm is largely responsible for the tremendous Nazi air fleet ... That firm, they say, has been shipt-: ping plane engines to the Nazis far the last five or six years, in total disregard of Secretary Hull's private request that American firms refrain from selling such products to Germany . . . Don't think for a moment that the incident of. the sinking of the Athenia belongs to the dead and buried past . . . The State Department will yet be heard from in a sharp protest to Germany * .. Attorney-General Prank Murphy's declari-ation that foreign agents engaged in espionage will no longer find this country a happy hunting groimd seems rather strange to us, in view of the circumstance that Fritz Kuhn's activities are entirely unhampered ... Danton Walker, New York columnist, claims that Litzonoff and Kag-anovich, two Soviet big shots, are now on Stalin's death list . ; . We doub it, Mr. Walker.
ABOUT PEOPLE
Charlie Chaplin's film "The Dictator" is going to be out soon, we're promised ... Its three principal characters are called Adenoid Hinkly Herring (that's for Goering) an Gasolini . . . Claire Booth's next play will be about the Bund, and she in tends calling it "Blockhead" . . . It is true that Bert Lahr, the screen comedian, was bom in Yorkville of German stock—but Bert is very much against the Nazis,) and during the World war served in the U.S. Navy . . . Luise Rainer is now a refugee In Switzerland, preferring staying there to making bad pictures in Hollywood . ..Oiu: best wishes for a speedy re covery to Mrs. Felix Frankfurter wife of the Supreme Court Justice: ^vho is reported to be suffering from a rare malady that she contractec abroad . . . Bemiard Baruch, new recuperating in Saratoga Springs, will be in tiptop shape again before the winter is too far advanced . . . Rabb Albert G. Baum of Congregation Gemiliuth Chassodim of Alexandria La., wants his people to take an Interest in the affairs of their Catholic fellow citizens, and with that end in view recently had a copy of "Catholic Action of the South," official organ of the New Orleans Archdiocese, sen to every member of his temple . if you want to hear Heifetz free o; charge see whether you have a friend who lives near his Greenwich VUiage hideaway . .. His neighbors, it% said, always invite their friends when Jas-cha is due to practice his music . What happened to the Sons and Daughters of the Jewish War Veterans, an organization which a year ago claimed a membership of ten to fifteen thousand? . . . One of the reasons why Hank Greenberg, Detroit slugger, did so poorly in the last series in New York is that instead of adhering to strict training rules, he spent all his spare time watehing the electric news sign that runs around the Time Building . .. Paul Muni has pledged himself to stay away from Hollywood this winter . . .He hopes to be in a Broadway play ... Our sin-
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cerest sympathy to Rabbi Roses J. S. Abels of the American Jewish Committee, whose daughter, the gifted painter Judith Harriet Fishbach, died recently . . . Mrs. Fishbach was instructor in Arts and Crafts at Temple Beth Elohim, Brooklyn . . .One of her paintings hangs in the Carnegie Institute in Pittsburgh.
JEWISH SECTIONS, POLISH TOWNS, NAZI WARPUNE OBJEOTIVE;
"PARIS (WNS.)—According to re)-ports reaching newspapers here from correspondents in war zones on the eastern front siost of the thousands of non-combatants killed as a result of air raids by Nazi warplanes over Warsaw, Wilno, Bialystok, Lwow, and other cities, were Jews. During the past week continuous bombardments over these towns took a toll of nb fewer than 3,500 non-combatants, most of them women and children, 2,00 of whom were Jews. |
Newspapers in the Netherlands reported that approxlihately 40,000 Poles were killed and 100,000 wounded during the past wieek of warfare. In
Himgary radio • bulletins said that hundreds of Polish Jews were resorting to suicide rather than be taken prisoners by the German military forces. Those taken prisoners are being put on forced labor projects.
: Swiss newspapers reported that Polish Jews taken prisoners are being subjected to brutal treatment and that in some places Nazi officials suggested to Polish soldiers that they shoot theU' Jewish comrades. In Katowice, Cracow and in other towns, Jewish v/omen, children and old men took positions behind barricades and fought, together with Polish soldiers, until they were shot down.
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PLAINTALK
(Continued from Page 1)
THE HAGUE, Netherlands (WNS). —Official sources said that the government has decided to close its frontiers to all refugees, including Jews, pointing out that several other European countries already had taken similar action.
James (who is the oldest) will be in the university next year. Will he have'to go to-die on account of Hit-ler?, ■: ,^ ■ ■■■■■■■ ,
Yea, it used to be an untroubled vista for the McGuires, what witli Mr. MoGuire's modest but solid success in his business, what with his happy children.
So, finding himself in one boat with the McGiiires^ the Smiths, the Joneses and the Arbuthnots, Mr. Segal can'work up no special interest in the travail of Jews. It's a drifting, leaky boat in a thickening storm and where are we all going, Mr. Mc-Guire ? We must stick bravely together in our boat, Mr. McGuire.
Mn Segal has ho more heart to cry out any special pain of Jews in the storm. There is no special pain any-more< 7 Mn Segalj lamenting for ,the Jews, would sound ridiculous . . . like a man blowing a little tin whistle amid the crash of chaos.
The Nazi bombs fell on Christian and Jewish children alike.in Poland and the Nazi:machine rolled, over jews and Endeks as well. : (The En-deks were Polish people who had no use for Jews at all.) The Nazi guns ground the crucifix in the Polish church and the Torah in the.synagogue in one heap of rubble.
Mr. Segal does not gloat that Jews now have a vast company in their misery. It was bad enough when Jews alone were suffering the affliction of persecutors; the,crime is.now agains all mankind and the weeping of Christian and Jew. is one voice of amentatioh and Mr. Segal can not distingruish^ a Jewish .voice from a Christian.
Yet he dares hope that people will come to see ihat'suffering is indivisible.- This is to say that this catastrophe, will not be altogether in vain f anti-Semitic Endeks, for example, come to spiritual illumination; "'Yes, the bodies of our dead children lay in one sacrifice with the dead children of the Jews and the pain of heir mothers arose to God in one lamentation with the voices of our mothers and. Death reaped us all With one scythe. We were all one."
Yes, says Mr. Segal, if such enlightenment comes out of this it will not all be senselessly in vain; it will be a dazzling vindication of Grod.
Mr. Segal has been troubled about God these past few weeks, as has many another beli^viug man. Believing people whose faith is founded on a God of wisdom and justice and mercy and loving-kindness have been wondering: Where, is the ineffable mercy and loving-kindness in which we have believed? Where is the hand of God that' executeth righteousness and acta of justice for all that are oppressed, as we have read In our prayer books. ..
REFUGEES ON ROADS ARE BOMBED ANO JAGHINE GUNNED
- - BUCHAREST' ..<W.N^.) -T.ThC ands of refugees, trudgtag'a^^ main highways of south-eastern and, were reported tO: be under co tinual fire of German: planes . bombs and machine guns. Polish iigees reaching here said that ev ^ train, railroad station, bridge automobile in the area was an act or potential target of the aerial vaders. At least 100,000 Poles, m of them on foot, were fleeing Pola war-swept zones toward the ian and Russian borders.
Anticipating an influx of tens; thousands of Polish refugees Rumari ia took steps to regulate: their ent by establishing concentration cam for refugees at Hotin and Soroca,: Bessarabia, near the frontier. A naa jorlty of the" Polish refugees are sai to be Jews whom Riunania is reluc tant to admit because of the likell hood that few ever would depart. N other country in southeastern Europ Jo willing to admit them.
Poland bias 3,000,000 Jews half o who mlive in Galicia. Virtually a of them are orthodox. Large groii of Jewish refugees poured into Ru mania in 1921 during the Russo-Ppi ish war. Thousands - remained northern Rumania. Rumania about 1,000,000 Jews, who niake u about five per cent of the populatio
On the eve of Rosh Hashonah Mr Segal read it in his prayer book: 1" Lord, on this eve of the New Year we think of the mercies withou number, that Thou hast shown ] u during the ages. . . . Thou hast eve been our refuge and support."
Mr. Segal found his mind assaile by impious doubts which were ce tainly unbecoming in the holy hou How long must mandkind wait these mercies ? How many miiis perish before the hand of God i made visible to the innocent and i turned against the wicked? Th bodies of the children are shattere by the power of the arrogant.
So Mr. Segal made a prayer of hi own: O Lord.God, give us quickly sign that thieves and murders shal not prevail in the world. If they \ what can men believe of Thee,'-God? And what will these syna^ gogues and churches mean to men And yet, O Lord, it will not b
do
enough that the wicked are laid low Grant that from their common suf fering men will learn their essentia
unity; so that it may at least be sai^ that with the lives of its youth man kind purchased a bit of understand
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