Inference of Jewish Social Workers Opens in Cleveland; First Session Hears Silver

Plans concerning Jewish community life in America during and after the war were discussed here today by various commissions of the fifty annual conference of Jewish social workers which opened this afternoon at the Hotel Statler, with more than 500 delegates in attendance.

The conference, which is being held jointly by the National Conference of Jewish Social Welfare, National Association of Jewish Center Workers and National council for Jewish Education, was addressed tonight by Rabbi Abba Hillel Silver on the Stake and Responsibility of the American Jewish Community in the Present World.” emphasizing that neither America nor American Jews can be isolationist in theory or practice, Dr. Silver said: “America is the center of world. Politically, economically and culturally it is now enmeshed in common destiny with rest of the world. American Jews have also come to share, however reluctantly, the common, inescapable destiny of their fellow Jews in the rest of the world.”

American Jews therefore have a double responsibility, Dr. Silver continued. First, to do their part as Americans to bring this war to a successful conclusion. This,” he said, “we are doing in full measure. Jews know how to fight for the things they love and they love America. They understand, too, the nature and the intent of the enemy – and this knowledge lends drive and resoluteness to their war efforts. The second responsibility is to save what we can of European Jewry, which has been the victim of the most horrible catastrophe in world history. They will emerge from physically ravaged and seriously depleted of numbers and resources,” he pointed out. “Our first task will be to salvage, to rebuild, to re-unite broken families, to re-establish shattered communities.”

“Many communities cannot be rebuilt, many countries will be closed,” Dr. Silver stated. “Palestine alone offers a sound and realistic prospect for mase-scale immigration, provided political barriers which the mandatory power has illegally erected are removed.” He concluded by emphasizing that physical rehabilitation is not enough. “We must also plan for our cultural and spiritual rehabilitation – how to keep alive the spirit of Israel, the light of Jewish thought – and the torch of Jewish learning, how to safeguard our heritage which alone gives dignity and distinction to our lives and meaning to our millennial suffering, how to vitalize those institutions which have preserved the ethical and religious idealism of Judaism for ourselves and for mankind.”

Louis Kraft, president of the National Conference of Jewish Social Welfare, in his presidential address said that a three-fold responsibility faces Jewish social workers. First: to serve normal and emergency social welfare needs of America in time of war. Second, to participate in plans now under way to make America a better place to live in after the war. Third: to do their part, as Jews well equipped for serving, in the building of an enduring Jewish life in America-a life of dignity, security, and fulfillment for Jews as individuals and as a group.

The question of aid by Jewish social workers to organizations active in interracial work and anti-discrimination was discussed by a special commission prior to the general session of the conference, under the chairmanship of Mr. Nraft., Other commissions discussed problems dealing with social security, demobilization, post-war economic readjustment and Jewish community planning. The general Wession wad greeted by Joseph M. Berne, president of the Jewish Welfare Federation of Cleveland.