The Pittsburgh Press (November 28, 1944)
Agency planned for missing, slain Jews in European area
Atlantic City, New Jersey (UP) –
A Jewish Agency for Reconstruction which would act as administrator and heir of missing or slain European Jews was recommended yesterday by the War Emergency Conference of the World Jewish Congress.
Asserting that “the majority of Jews of Continental Europe have fallen victims to Nazi policies of discrimination and extermination,” the statement adopted by 300 delegates from 40 countries attending the Congress proposed that the funds of the Jewish agency be used “for Jewish resettlement and reconstruction.”
The statement said:
The value of property belonging to Jewish community organizations, funds, trusts and other public institutions which have ceased to exist, should be transferred to the Jewish Agency for Reconstruction which should be declared sole heir to all property rights and interests belonging to Jewish families considered extinguished by the respective laws of their countries.
American Jewry must accept responsibility for providing a “keystone of security” for Jews everywhere in the post-war world, the conference was told today by Dr. Israel Goldstein of New York, president of the Zionist Organization of America. He called upon Jews of this country to come out of “their intellectual and spiritual sloth and isolationism” to fulfill the role.