Report to the ... Zionist Congress and to the Council of the Jewish Agency in ... · 1935-08-01 · 8.1935 · p. Seite 126

of Baron Edmond de Rothschild, the father of Jewish colonisation in Palestine. With him has passed away the most distinguished representative of Palestine and world Jewry. Baron Edmond de Rothschild was Honorary President of the Jewish Agency. In the darkest period of the Keren Hayesod and the Jewish Agency he came forward as their best friend. Together with the whole Jewish world the Keren Hayesod mourns the passing of Haim Nachman Bialik. Not content to fulfil the lofty tasks which destiny had set him, he gave of his help to every instrument working for national redemption and thus also to the Keren Hayesod. In Leo Motzkin the Keren Hayesod has lost one of its most sincere counsellors and friends. Year in and year out he took upon himself Keren Hayesod missions and carried them through successfully. After resigning his membership of the Zionist Executive in 1920, Dr. Victor Jacobson assumed a leading part in the development of the Keren Hayesod as member of the Central European Keren Hayesod office until the Zionist Organisation appointed him their representative at the League of Nations. Even then Dr. Jacobson kept in close contact with the Board of Directors and took advantage of every opportunity to be of signal service. His wide experience, his charm of manner and the great respect in which he was universally held were of inestimable value to us. On June 9th, 1935, death robbed us of Shmaryahu Levin. Together with Victor Jacobson, Dr. Levin had been a member of the Executive of the Zionist Organisation from 1911 to 1920. The outstanding part he played in the fight for the Hebrew school in Palestine from 1913-1914, in the establishment of the Zionist Organisation and the organising of collections for the benefit of Palestine in the United States of America during the War has been referred to in another place. Nor is this the place to speak of his part in the Hebrew renascence movement. But it is for us to underline his mastery in the realm of national propaganda, brimful as it was of Jewish values. As a member of the Executive, it fell to him to shape the lines of Zionist propaganda in Europe, South Africa and the United States and to create that synthesis of Zionism, Palestine and Jewish renascence which has become the characteristic feature of the Keren Hayesod and has raised its collecting activities to the level of a national-cultural propaganda. Right from the inception, of the Keren Hayesod until a few years ago, when illness overtook him and prevented his active cooperation, Dr. Levin stood in the front rank of Keren Hayesod delegates. Up to the last day we had the inestimable benefit of his advice. The Keren Hayesod deplores the loss of its delegate, Nathan Halpern, who was taken from us far too young in December, 1933. Mr. Halpern had worked with us practically from the first days and directed the work of the Keren Hayesod office in Paris and of the other French-speaking countries. In him we have lost a man 126