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How the JC helped shape the debate

The JC's role with the Balfour Declaration

November 16, 2017 12:46
greenburg
7 min read

On 12 December 1906, Leopold Greenberg, the owner of a successful advertising agency and publisher of the Jewish Year Book, wrote excitedly to his Dutch friend and fellow Zionist, the banker Jacobus Kann: “I heard yesterday that the Jewish Chronicle is in the market for sale, and I today saw the proprietor and asked him if he would be willing to sell it to me.”

Greenberg was a leading English Zionist and a member of the Inner Actions Committee of the World Zionist Organisation, as was Kann. “I have an idea”, he continued, “that it would be the most excellent thing if our Movement could have the paper, assuming the price asked is not exorbitant and will show a fair return on the outlay…There is no necessity for me to point out to you the extreme value to Zionism in having such an organ, not only in so far as England is concerned, but because I believe that the future of our Movement is largely dependent upon this Country, and the JC has an influence outside the community.” On 21 December 1906, Greenberg telegraphed Kann to let him know that the transfer was completed.

Yet, although Greenberg certainly did put the Jewish Chronicle to the service of Zionism, it remained quite independent of the Zionist Organisation or any constituent faction. And by 1914 Greenberg no longer held office in any communal body and could not be accused of institutional allegiance.

During 1913–14, the WZO became bogged down in a wasteful dispute over whether the official language of Zionist enterprises in Palestine should be Hebrew or German. When Sir Francis Montefiore, one of the few Anglo-Jewish notables who identified with the Zionist movement, resigned from the English Zionist Federation in protest against the pro-German attitude of the Zionist Central Bureau in Cologne, Greenberg begged him not to publicise his action. At a time when anti-German feeling in England was running high, such news could have seriously damaged Zionism in public opinion. Greenberg told Kann that more than once he had kept sensitive news out of the paper.