The Jewish Trail of Tears The Evian Conference of ... - Haruth.com

movement of “dispersion.” Moreover, land was available to the Greek and Bulgarian
refugees due to the evacuation of other peoples and most of the migrants were
agricultural rather than urban workers. Outside of Zionist circles the concept of Jewish
statehood was not envisaged as a rational solution by this and most other papers, the
general public and governments. 59
During July, in the Portsmouth Evening News, English philosopher Bertrand
Russell called for aid to the displaced Jews. He believed that it was essential to exert
“pressure [upon] our own Government to be hospitable to refugees and not too niggardly
in granting them” entry and the right to re-establish a new life on British shores. This
prompted a response by the paper’s leading commentator, Raymond Burns, who believed
that the refugee issue could only be solved if it was not tainted by “helpless
emotionalism” which had the potential to create a “real anti-Semitic problem” in the
island nation. Britain, like France and the United States, Burns believed, could make the
“greatest contribution” to solving the problem of resettlement but all three were nearing
the “saturation point.” Further Jewish immigration, he predicted, would generate “latent
hostility to the newcomers” and could only result in a “sense of grievance” among the
domestically unemployed natives. Significantly, such emotion was shared by the
professional classes, including physicians who feared that foreign doctors would engage
in a “cut-price racket.” Burns acknowledged that some form of resettlement was
necessary but “for the sake of the refugees [Jews] it must not mean Great Britain.”
Consequently, “extensive territory [such as East Africa and excluding Palestine] must be
delineated for mass colonization. The Bournemouth Daily Echo asserted that Britons
59 Round Table, September 1938 cited in Katz, “Public Opinion,” 107.
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