The Maccabaean

provinces visited by the war; liberty to emigrate and settle in any country; national self-administration and national equality in States or countries where there are Jewish mass-populations, and the securing of free colonizing activity if plans are advanced to establish a Jewish homeland in Palestine.

SOKOLOW REPORTS SUCCESSFUL NEGOTIATIONS.

Nahum Sokolow, who has just completed a series of visits to the capitals of the Entente Powers in behalf of the Zionist movement delivered an address in London recently during the course of which he said: "We are not conducting any secret diplomacy," said Sokolow, "Such a thing is obviously impossible for the Jewish people. The Zionist leaders are endeavoring to make clear to the Powers the aspirations of the Jewish people."

"While Dr. Weitzman was dealing with the British government and winning its favor for Zionism," continued Mr. Sokolow, "I undertook the same task with the French government. We were abundantly successful with both governments. Our success with the Italian government transcended all of our expectations, and the same is true regarding my interview with the Pope. His Holiness received me with great cordiality and distinction, and I left him with the warmest assurances of his sympathy. The Jewish community of Rome may now be properly called a Zionist community, having accepted the entire Basle program. The leaders of the community, Serini, Montefiore and Colombo, have assumed the responsibility of carrying on our work there. We have the right to expect much from these gentlemen, whose influence is tremendous."

"There can not longer be any doubt," concluded Mr. Sokolow, "that whatever may happen the question of Palestine for the Jews will have a prominent position in the discussions at the Peace Conference."

RUSSIA

THE ZIONIST CONVENTION IN RUSSIA

From the detailed reports of the Zionist Convention which was held in Petrograd, beginning May 24th, we have collated the following important items:

Officially, the gathering was the Seventh Zionist Convention in Russia, but, in fact it was the first that was ever held in that country at which a frank, open discussion of every question relating to the national regeneration of the Jewish people could be discussed without fear of governmental interference. It was attended by 572 delegates, representing 140,000 organized Zionists. Eleven delegates came from Siberia from the Kuban Dominion, and a number from Bokhara and the Crimea. Twenty-four delegates came from the military front. The press gallery contained 80 representatives of most of the leading papers of the country.

The parties represented at the convention included the "Zeire Zion" (The Youth of Zion), The Orthodox Zionists, represented by Rabbis, and The Poale Zion.

"Dr. Yechiel Tchlenow who was the presiding officer delivered a lengthy address in which he said, among other things:

"We beg the Provisional Government to believe that it may fully depend upon our forces and our support in its heroic efforts directed toward the strengthening of the freedom and greatness of Russia."

"What is necessary, and what we strive

for is to create a national territorial center for our scattered people. The construction of that center is already begun, and it will continue. The center will gradually be filled with the forces and means of the Diaspora."

"Who of you has not keenly followed for the last year and a half the life of the youngest branch of the Jewish people: the American? Hundreds of thousands of workingmen unified in their demand for national rights in the Diaspora and an autonomous center in Palestine, The New York Kehillah representing a million and a quarter Jews which comes forward with the same slogan. Finally, the powerful Congress movement embracing the entire three million Jewry which is to be crowned the coming autumn, by such important decisions. Weigh all the facts and you will agree that the harmony of which we dream is already coming to pass. With hope and with love we follow the work of our transcentic champions and send to them our brotherly greetings."

OO Ng “But what could not have been prophecied and what fills our hearts with untold joy and pride is the attitude towards our ideal on the part of the broad stratas of Jewry which was shown since the time of the Great Revolution.

"From all corners of our great Russia come to us, together with cheers of joy over the emancipation, assurances of unshattered faith in the eternal ideal —the renaissance of our native Palestine. Old and young, rich and poor, from the front and from the rear, Orthodox and free thinkers declare in one voice: "Now, even now, freed from the chains of slavery, shall we be able to zealously and gladly give ourselves to the service of our ideal.

“I cannot refrain here from underscoring with the feeling of deepest recognition the invaluable services which the Government of the United States has so nobly and warmly shown to our pioneers. The noble ‘president of the United States has acted from motives of humanity and brotherly relation of peoples, but at the same time also from deep sympathy in our regeneration. The noble impulses of America have found a worthy instrument in the person of former Ambassador Morgenthau, that faithful son of the Jewish people, whose services in these hard years, Jewry will not forget.

"But all this time, while working and building, we have not lost sight of the basic point inscribed upon our banner—the public, legal character of the hearth which we are creating. We are convinced that the moment has come for reiterating our Program."

"We deem it necessary that the nations called upon to establish the standard of the future national political life should reckon with the definitely express will of the Jewish people, to populate and regenerate Palestine as its national hearth. We deem it further necessary that all obstacles should be removed from our path and that guarantees and conditions should be created which will insure the unobstructed and speedy development of our work in the land."

"I am happy that I am able to declare that all the leaders of diplomacy and public opinion even in the most powerful countries, understand us, our problems and our purposes a good deal deeper and more concretely now than they did before. They are ready to support our claims when the proper moment arrives. Nations and their governments recognize that that which we demand is only a creation of conditions which will help us to stimulate and regulate our great national work and no more."

After paying a tribute to the memories of Dr. Theodore Herzl and David Wolff-

sohn, Mr. Tchnenow read a letter from Foreign Minister Terestchenko, greeting the convention and expressing his indignation over the outrageous treatment of the Jews of Palestine by the Turks, which had moved him to appeal to the neutral countries for their intervention.

Supreme Court Justice Sliosberg was among those who greeted the convention. “When Judaism was about to disappear, when traitors betrayed their brethren, their religion and their traditions, Zionism held the banner of Judaism aloft before the whole world. The Zionist ideal is precious to me, and I believe that we will attain our goal. But if our strivings will not unite all of our brethren then may we all be united by our past, by our culture, by our eternal, national spirit. Let us unite and exclaim: “L’shono Habo Beyurushalayim.”

Duma Deputy Friedman expressed the hope that Palestine shall enjoy the same freedom that is now Russia's."

Menacham Mendal Ussishkin, the acknowledged leader of the movement in Russia delivered a report on conditions in Palestine, during the course of which he said:

"We did not think that the war would touch Palestine because it is a land holy to all peoples and civilizations; but the impossible has proved to be possible. In the desert of Sinai, where, for the first time was heard the command, 'Thou Shalt Not Kill,' groans are now heard.