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 75

75 ing the admission of relatives should be relaxed by the restoration of the former practice. 4. In general, I would strongly deprecate any policy tending to restrict immigration on the ground that the total number of Jewish immigrants which Palestine has proved capable of absorbing in any past year is for some reason regarded as too large. It must again be emphasised that the main factor creating the remarkable powers of absorption revealed in Palestine today is Jewish immigration itself. Limitations upon Jewish immigration restrict that absorptive capacity and consequently slacken the pace of the development of the Jewish National Home. The elementary struggle for existence now facing large sections of the Jewish people, and the central part played by Palestine in the solution of this problem, make It imperative for the Jewish Agency to insist on the utmost possible utilisation of the economic resources created by Jewish effort in Palestine for the absorption of the largest possible number of Jewish immigrants. It is submitted that, particularly in view of this situation, the duty imposed on the administration of Palestine to facilitate Jewish immigration is not fulfilled merely by allowing this immigration to proceed unaided, but involves the adoption of positive measures on the part of Government, with a view to increasing the opportunities of absorption for Jewish immigrants. On the other hand, it would be contrary to this obligation to adopt measures calculated to prevent Jewish immigration from increasing to the fullest extent warranted by the country's absorptive capacity. 5. In connection with the subject of immigration there is one other urgent problem to which I would beg leave to call attention. The Executive of the Jewish Agency have on several occasions urged that the position of those Jewish immigrants who, though completely absorbed in the economic life of Palestine, continue to be considered illicit residents should be regularised. Most of these people are refugees from Eastern and Central Europe and from oriental countries, where conditions of great distress prevail. They now suffer under a series of disabilities which make their position anomalous and painful. Above all, those of them who left their families abroad are doomed to permanent, separation from their closest kith and kin, with all the mental suffering and financial hardship involved thereby. I would submit that in view of the virtual stoppage of illegal immigration and the reduction to very small proportions of the number of travellers remaining in the country without permission, the time has come when these persons might well be registered as permanent residents. I would point out that the Government has deducted from the past five labour schedules a total of 8,000 certificates on account of illicit settlers, without registering a corresponding number of settlers of this class actually in the country, and that it can now either by the restora-