"The United Jewish Appeal - Noble Past: Future Changes

MS-763: Rabbi Herbert A. Friedman Collection, 1930-2004. Series I: Wexner Heritage Foundation, 1947-2004. Subseries 2: Writings and Addresses, 1947-2003. Box Folder 71 9 "The United Jewish Appeal - Noble Past: Future Changes. Thoughts for the 90's." 1 July 1991. For more information on this collection, please see the finding aid on the American Jewish Archives website. 3101 Clifton Ave, Cincinnati, Ohio 45220 513.487.3000 AmericanJewishArchives.org THE UJA - NOBLE PAST:FUTURE CHANGES Thoughts for the 90 ' s by Rabbi Herbert A. Friedman July 1, 1991 Common wisdom states that American Jewry, for a variety of reasons, was silent d uring the six years ( 1939-1945) when the six million were murdered. I f, by silence , o ne refers to absence of mass protest demonstrations, mass demands on western governments to intervene, mass pressure o n the media to keep the Holocaust constantly on the front page, c easeless pressure on individual Congressmen to find back channels for negotiations with the Nazis to rescue Jews - yes, American Jewry was largely silent. Rabbi Stephen Wise managed to promote one l arge anti- Nazi rally of 20,000 persons in Madison Square Garden in April, 1933, and even this was o pposed by some o rganizations o n the theory that public pr otest might ~o rsen the situation for German Jews, especially if one b elieved that Hitler was a passing phenomenon, better ignored t han given the publicity which a mass protest would engender. While there are some historians who have a ttempted to mitigate the seriousness of this c harge of silence, by citing cases, here and there, where protest efforts were made, still the indictment is largely true for the critical years of the Holocaust. Yet we should look back to the earlier y ears , when the good instincts of a n even smaller a nd less well organized Jewish -1 - community in the U.S. to work on behalf of endangered Jews abroad did manifest themselves in creating concrete programs of assistance . The Hebrew Immigrant Aid Society (HIAS) was organized in 1884 to assist immigrants with shelter, loans, l egal protection and reorganized in 1954 into United HIAS Service (UHS). The Joint Distribution Committee (JDC) was born in~ to provide assistance everywhere in the world that Jews were in trouble or danger. During these earliest decades in the century the Zionist movement also began to stir and in the 1920's the campaigns for settlement i n Palestine began with visits to the U.S. by Albert Einstein and Chaim Weizman, establishing the Keren Hayasod, Jewish Foundation Fund. These various early efforts worked independently of each other, and sometimes even antagonistically because of ideological differences. The JDC , for example, supported the Russian Birobidjan proposal for creating a Jewish "homeland" i n Siberia, while the Zionists argued that all that money and effort should be devoted to the only true homeland in Palestine. When Kristallnacht burst like a black thunder-cloud i n November 1938, the shattered windows of synagogues and store f ronts in Germany also shattered Jewish disunity in America. The fission which marked decades of separate fund- raising by the three major organizations (HIAS - Hebrew Immigrant Aid society; JOC - Joint Distribution Committee; and UPA - United Palestine Appeal ) was replaced by a fusion in only six weeks . A new instrument was forged with the signatures of three Reform Jews - -2- Rabbi Stephen s. Wise, Rabbi Jonah Wise and William Rosenwald. The Un ited Jewish Appeal was born and started its first campaign on January 1, 1939. For more than a half-century now this major c reation has per formed the twin miracles of uniting American J ewry while serving the noblest causes of rescue throughout world J ewry and rebuilding the Third commonwealth of Israel. True , little could be done during the black years of the Holocaust. The united campaign functioned, with some o rganizational splutter ing in its first few years; not much money was raised; and nothing signif ican~ could be done even with the s mall f unds available, because of the political and military inhibitions imposed by the war. Roosevelt a nd Churchill both turned down demands for the bombing of Auschwitz with the reply that all strength had to be devot ed to winning the war. Beating Hitler was the only way to stop the murder machine which was destroying Jews . No diversions were to be allowed . So - only a few millions were raised each year, and the campaign total for 1945 , the last year of the war Nas a mere $32 million. But the unity held, wait ing for the moment when an explosion of useful e nergy could replace the agonizing years of frustration. That moment came in December 1945, a t the annual Conference of the UJA i n Atlantic City. The war i n Europe had e nded i n May, and the remnant of Jews i n Germany and Eastern Europe was gradually being g athered i nto a series of Displaced Persons camps in the American and British -3- zones of occupied Germany and Austria. The Haganah was operating in a plan designed to bring as many survivors as possible f rom the East (Russia, Poland, many other countries) to the West (Ameri can Zones of Germany and Austria). Various border crossings and clandestine routes were organized in order to assemble the refugees f or organized relief - food, shelter, medical care, search f or relatives and movement to Palestine on the illegal s hips. This was to mark the next three years. The DP population, f irst tens, then scores and ultimately hundreds of thousands i n 64 camps i n Germany and Austria was fed by the American a nd British armies, supplemented by the J DC, a nd received many other s ervices from the J ewish Agency, ORT a nd other s ocial welfare organizations which quickly mobilized personnel and supplies to assist i n camp life. A self-government sprang up in the f orm of Central Committees i n each zone - the one in the American Zone actually receiving official recognition from the United States Supreme Commander in the European Theatre . Henry Monter, the dynamic hard-d riving director of the UJA, understood intuitively that t he moment had a rrived to confront American J ews with evidence that at last something could be accomplished with money to alleviate the suffering and pain of the survi vors. He decided to bring f rom DP camps i n Germany two .. persons to speak on behalf of the remnant l eft alive, a nd s elected Dr . Zalman Grinberg, the first president of the Central Committee of Liberated Jews i n Bavaria and Yosef Rosenzaft, chairman of the c amp c ommittee in Bergen- Belsen, the former from -4- t he American Zone and the l atter from the British. These men s poke i n Yiddish to the t housands of d elegates at the UJA Annual Conference, pouring out the pain, a gony, frustrations, and s orrows, the t rembling f ear and black d espair o f the years of fire a nd gas and decimation. The words f lowed as did the emotions and t ears. There flowed also a sense o f relief, a nd relaxation, f or the speakers knew that a t l ast the link was being establi shed wi th the f ree J ewish worl d which c ould help their f ellow s urvivors . The audience wallowed with them in waves of grief , r ose i n billows of e xalta tion, s ank i nto pits of icy fury a s the i rreversible f act o f the slaughter s ank home , a nd rose again i n the f ierceness o f d etermination t o a id the r emnant. Human s entiments to s end help mingled with the rapidly developing understanding t hat the only real a nd permanent help was political - i . e. the establishment o f a homela nd. The Zionist movement d eveloped a s ense of terri ble urgency t hen and t here , f or s uddenly i t b ecame c l ear that a J ewish soverei gnty was the permanent solution. The m ee~ i ng was f illed with tears and j oy , t ension and r elief, t hunderous a pplause a s a tribute to the DPs a nd a t ribute t o t hemselves , t he d elegates , f o r t he streng th they were now exhibiting i n their response to the c all f or a ction. They voted to raise 100 million dolla rs in 1946 ( i n c ontrast to the $32 million of 1945 ) . They a ctually succeeded i n raisi ng $102 million . A new energy was born, a nd the UJA was finally on the way to f ulfilling its d estiny. I n i ts more-than-half-century o f e x i stence i t has p rovided more than $8 b illio n of no-strings a ttached philanthropic aid to I srael and endangered J ews - 5- world-wide. Having served longer than any other chief executive officer in the UJA's history, I will presume to express some long-held thoughts concerning directions, methods and goals which might usefully be considered as a new administration takes shape under Rabbi Brian Lurie. My ideas have usually been different, i nnovative and some would say radical.

Load more