noise and the color of the National Fund stamp are intended for Jewish congregations that understand our movement, and are not afraid of methods that are as old as the synagogue. The American Israelite may continue to mislead its readers with malicious opinions and distorted versions of the news, but all good Jews understand that whatever is Jewish is foreign to present editors of the American Israelite, who have inherited a "Jewish" newspaper which they persist in using as the opponent of all Jewish progress.
COMMUNICATIONS
A DEFENSE OF DR. GASTER.
TO THE MACCABAEAN:
In your current issue you write of "The Troubles of Zionists in England," and tell your readers that it is owing to "Dr. Gaster's evident desire to keep out of his organization all who differ with him on questions of policy"; and with other disparaging remarks of him, you espouse the cause of Messrs. Greenberg and Cowen, saying that they "have given years of their lives to the Zionist movement without hope of favor or reward." Wherein have these gentlemen shown their loyalty to Zionism? The Zionist Congress by a large majority favored the repeal of the power to use the funds of the Jewish Colonial Trust to promote colonization anywhere else than in Palestine and adjacent places. The executive endeavored to carry out the will of their constituents "in the spirit of genuine democrats"; but Mr Zangwill wanted its money to further his own leadership in the Ito, and Messrs. Greenberg and Cowen aided him in his warfare against the Trust. Is it surprising that the Court refused the Zionist petition when two of its actual English leaders supported the antagonism of a former prominent representative? Does such conduct prove your assertion that "Zionists Stick to their Last?"
With regard to M. Ussischkin who comes in for a part of your attack: without the party he now leads, Dr. Herzl could not have established the Zionist movement. Let it withdraw its support, and the whole fabric
of Zionism will totter and fall. But to return to your partisan criticism of Dr. Gaster, I believe your predecessor, Mr. Jacob de Haas, is responsible for the statement that Dr. Herzl was first introduced to a London audience under the auspices of Dr. Gaster who presided at a hurriedly convened meeting at a time when no other leader in the Anglo-Jewish community could be found willing to identify himself with the Zionist scheme. After that, Dr. Herzl’s success on the Continent was made easier. The fact being well known in London, Mr. Greenberg— in the very speech in which he urged ousting Dr. Gaster from the party—could not help admitting—which you do not—“that Dr. Gaster has rendered eminent services to our cause. That Dr. Gaster was called upon to risk having to sacrifice his very position for the sake of Zionism in this country— and he did not flinch.” None but a man of character would have thus braved a faulty public opinion. But character also induced him to absent himself from the Congress at which the East African project was to be sprung upon the delegates; and because he took no active part in Zionist affairs while the matter was in abeyance, he has been charged with “sulking,” or as you put it, he “looked with suspicion upon the whole movement.” Dr. Gaster, it must be remembered, was also one of the promoters of the first colonies in the Holy Land, a quarter of a century ago, and it is not to be supposed that he will quiescently see the movement dere- ligionized.
If there should be disruption in the Zionist camp, it would, of course, be charged to the intolerance of such "despots" as M. Ussischkin and Dr. Gaster, and not to the disloyalty of the East African project. Much is said of Dr. Herzl's ability as a leader, now lost to Zionism. One thing certain is that were he living he would not persist in forcing a "night asylum" on the people for whom it was intended, but who prefer to suffer martyrdom rather than recreancy. I speak of this "coercive" effort because "tyranny" can be the only reason for countenancing the opposition to the will of the Basle Congress in the matter of the Jewish Colonial Trust.