Political report of the Executive of the Jewish Agency submitted to the ... Zionist Congress and the ... session of the Council of the Jewish Agency · 1937-08-01 · 8.1937 · p. Seite 47

47 through a specially appointed representative, to unite the various interests concerned in one joint body so that there might be an effective instrument for carrying the project into effect once the necessary authority had been obtained from the Government. 62. On May 15th, the High Commissioner communicated to the Executive his decision to authorise the landing of goods on the foreshore of Tel Aviv. This oral communication was subsequently confirmed by an official letter to the Jewish Agency on the 21st May. On the 17th May representatives of the Jewish Agency and of the joint body established in Tel Aviv, negotiated with the Director of Customs an arrangement whereby certain categories of goods of a limited scope were licensed for off-loading at Tel Aviv. On the 18th May work was started on the construction of a temporary wooden jetty with funds provided in the first instance by the Jewish Agency and the General Federation of Jewish Labour. On the 19th May, the first consignment of goods was unloaded from a steamer which anchored off Tel Aviv amid scenes of great excitement and jubilation. The event was hailed with extraordinary enthusiasm by the Jews of Tel Aviv and the whole country, which reverberated throughout the Jewish world. 63. The susequent history of the Tel Aviv port as an economic enterprise and the account of the Jewish Agency's financial participation in its development fall outside the scope of the present report. The "Tel Aviv Council for Harbour and Communications", set up at an early stage, transformed itself into the Marine Trust Ltd., for which funds were raised by public subscription. The development of the Port proceeded under the leadership of Mr. S. Hoofien, General Manager of the Anglo-Palestine Bank and President of the Tel Aviv Chamber of Commerce, who was elected to the Chairmanship of the Trust. Very soon a solid iron jetty was substituted for the primitive wooden one and in due course a lighter port was added which is being enlarged at the time of writing. The Political Department continued to maintain close contact with the progress of the Port through the representative of the Jewish Agency on the Board of Management. It was instrumental in obtaining from the Government assurances, whenever the future of the Tel Aviv port seemed to be called in question, that the work would be allowed to continue, and in securing the removal of certain disabilities under which the port was originally placed, such as the requirement