Report to the ... Zionist Congress and to the Council of the Jewish Agency in ... · 1935-08-01 · 8.1935 · p. Seite 287

'(3) The Palestine Offices alone to check the information supplied and approve the training. (4) In considering the proposals made by the Agudath Israel, the distribution of certificates according to category to be considered for each country individually. These new elements among the immigrants were the cause of :a good deal of protest in Zionist circles and conventions, it being objected that preference was thus being given to workers who may not have the slightest spark of Zionism in them, so long as they were applied for by industrial organisations, farmers and the Agudath Israel, in preference to Zionist candidates for immigration who had been waiting for certificates for years. But the Palestine Offices followed instructions and took into consideration these new 'elements in immigration. 5. The problem of relatives has become more difficult. We have already stated that there are about 17,000 applications lyingin the offices of the Jewish Agency from people in Palestine asking for certificates for relatives. This large number is due in part to the immigration of parents who can be accompanied on the same certificate only by their young children, being compelled to leave behind any sons or daughters over the age of eighteen. The latter can enter the country only under the Labour Schedule. Applications became so numerous that the Immigration Department laid down certain rules : only near relatives are considered (sons, daughters, brothers, sisters); preference is given to skilled workers;and to those applied for by farmers; there is strict rotation with regard to :applications of long standing. The relatives approved do not receive certificates made out in their own names, but a recommendation is forwarded to the Palestine Offices, which examine the possibilities that-exist. The number of recommendations is far in excess of the number of certificates for relatives at •our disposal. The position of the Palestine Offices is difficult— they cannot grant certificates for all those recommended (about 3,000); the relatives in Palestine find it difficult to appreciate the position and they demand the right, so natural in Jewish family life, to help their relatives who live in poverty and distress and whose one desire is to come to Palestine where they can find work and a livelihood. But we stand helpless before these just (demands. IV. Care of Immigrants in Palestine. In the coast towns, at Tel-Aviv and Haifa, immigration offices have been set up—branches of the Immigration Department of the Jewish Agency—whose special functions are the reception of immigrants and their care up till the time they are settled.* Officers of the Immigration Department go on board every boat * Almost all immigrants arrive at one or other of the two ports, Jaffa and Haifa, only some 2% entering by land at Kantara, Metullah or Ras-el- Nakura. 287