Evening star., 1919-02-23
BY DIR. STEPHEN $. WISE.

7IoNIsM has ceased to be. for
7 Zionism implies the necessity
~ of movement in order to
bring the possibility of the es-
tablishment of a Jewish or Zionist
commonw ealth before the eyes of the
world. Jewish and nonJeWish. | may
say without fear of contradiction that
the establishment of a Jewish Pales-
tine under the league of nations and
with the trusteeship that must OBJ
viously be granted to Great Britain is
just as truly before the mind of Eu-
ropean statesmen, and above all OF
American statesmen in Paris. as any
other question which lies before them
today.
Let it suffice to say that the wholly
sympathetic and favoring attitude or
President Wilson and Col. House and
their associates of the American peace
deputation-and herein they represent
the good will and conscience or
Americas shared by such European
craftsmanship in England, France ana
Italy and the lesser allied lands as
counts
To Come Out of Cont renee.
Two things will come out Of the
peace conference. and these two
things, after all. are among the main
detectives of the war. The over
whelming of Prussianism was MOTH
ing more than a means toward this
high end or these high ends These
two things-and they are almost in
terchangeable--are the establishment
Of a league of nations and the seeur-
ing Of independence for the smaller
nations. II the war had not been
fought, in order to create such an al
lance among the civilized peoples or
earth as would make the peace of
Justice possible hereafter, it would
have become necessary for the aiiled
nations to devise a method of guar
anteeing and perpetuating the moral
and political achievements of the war
The league of nations means that
the great nations, including our own
England Italy and France, which
have won the war, understand that IN
the future the right of people to
live is not to be determined by the
size of it's army or the might of its
navy, but by it's own will to live. the
will to live predicated upon those
conditions of nationality and history
which are the test of the reality OF
the claims of a people to live its own
life.
Russian Status Disadvantage.
Upon one thing I wish to comm ent
without delay because ii involves the
acceptance of certain inexorabie bur-
dens. One grave disadvantage under
which the Jewish. people rest in rela-
ton to the peace conference is the
status of the Russian empire, invoiv-
ing as it does a division of the great
est Jewry in the world, for time, in
any event, into a series of relatively
lesser Jewries. and the consequent
failure of the great Russian Jewry to
exercise in itself and through free
and united Russia that power which
would have been sure to have fallen
to the lot of Russian Jewry. This
means one thing-that the task of
leadership rests upon American Is
raei and the task of supreme service
falls to the lot of the American Jew.
If the Russian tragedy had been
averted. Russian and American Jew
ries would together have taken the
lead in organising world Jewry and
In securing those ends upon which the
Jewish people are bent. In the cir
cumstances of the breakdown and the
break up Of Russia, the chief respon-
sibility for the Jewish future, rests
upon American Israel. upon the
craftsmanship OF it's leaders. upon the
capacity for service of all the people.
/, Different From Status in 1878.
The position of Jews in respect to
the peace conference of 1919 is a
very different thing from the status
Of Jewry In 1873. Since 1873 not only
have the Jews come to command a
high place in the life of all the CIV