100 Years Ago in the forward

The Forward received a heartbreaking letter from the two young Volotshinsky sisters, 6-year-old Hinde and 4-year-old Gishe, addressed to their father, who abandoned them and their mother in a shtetl near Minsk nearly five years ago: “Dear Father, we’re sending you a photograph of us so you can see what we look like. You shouldn’t get the idea that because we are barefoot in the photograph we sent that we go out and play in the street like that. The fact is, we just don’t have any shoes. We are thin and bent from hunger. Have pity on us, dear father. Think about your poor children. It is time that you took some pity on us. Help, save us, dear father. Now you can see with your own eyes what has become of us. Mother is sick and cannot care for us. Take pity on us.”

75 Years Ago in the forward

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Although German government officials deny it, their supporters are still distributing significant amounts of pro-Nazi propaganda throughout the United States. It was recently discovered that a Nazi front group, the German-American Commercial League, had set up shop in the pretty little town of Suffern, N.J., where the group maintains a kind of summer resort in which, it was noticed, members walk around naked a lot and hold pro-Nazi rallies. It was also noticed that every car in their parking lot has a swastika emblem. They also occasionally march through the town in rows of six, singing Nazi songs and cursing Jews. Suffern’s residents have had enough of this behavior and are taking measures to put a stop to it. The German-American Commercial League was not available for comment. Two things that are known are that the group claims 380,000 members in the United States and Canada and that its headquarters is at 12 West 77th Street in Manhattan.

50 Years Ago in the forward

In a dramatic speech to the Knesset, Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion warned both the Eastern and Western blocs against appeasing the Arabs at the expense of Israel. The Israeli prime minister said that the Jewish state would fight with all its military might against any attempts to reduce the borders of the country. He also said that he would request that, instead of using either the Soviets or the Western countries as a conduit, the Israelis meet the Arabs face to face in order to achieve a lasting peace. Ben-Gurion added that all the parties involved, from the West to the Soviets to the Arabs themselves, know that Israel will meet with anyone in order to discuss a permanent peace.

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