LETTERS TO THE EDITOR
LIFE IN ISRAEL
should like to make a few observations on Mr. Owen Tweedy's article Solvency in Israel which was published in the Spectator of June 17th. Mr. Tweedy states that a severe Press censorship has been established in Israel and he relates the rumour that more than one newspaper has been suspended. He furthermore conjectures that the suspensions arose out of discussions of domestic problems, such as the absorption of immigrants, the high cost of living and financial stringency, in a manner calculated to create alarm and despondency.
As editor of a widely-circulating Israeli newspaper, I should like to point out that the picture painted by Mr. Tweedy bears no relation to reality. During the last 14 months on no more than one or two occasions were dailies closed down by military censorship—and then for one day only—for the publication of military information likely to be of value to the enemy. The economic and social problems mentioned by Mr. Tweedy arc under continuous and frank discussion in the Israeli Press and in the Constituent Assembly. Censorship intervention has always been restricted to material the publication of which would be dangerous to the security interests of the country.
Mr. Tweedy also writes that immigration is no longer controlled by the principle of " absorptive capacity," according to which immigrants should be persons of independent means or dependants of permanent residents or persons admitted to meet estimated shortages in the Jewish labour- market. He fails to mention that this principle of " absorptive capacity " has inot been applied during the last ten years of the Mandatory regime. It was replaced in 1937 by the principle of the " political high level," which meant in practice that not more than 1,500 immigrants were admitted monthly. Had it not been for this arbitrary restriction, hundreds of thousands of Jews, subsequently murdered by the Germans, would probably be alive today, and the influx of immigrants into Israel would have been spread out over a long period of years. The problems created' by the present mass-immigration belong, therefore, to quite a substantial extent, to the heritage left by the British administration to our young State. Mr. Tweedy further touches on the problem of the cost of living. He is perturbed by its rise to astronomic heights. He claims that no index figures are available and that salaries have had to be increased five- or six- fold in order to provide for a bare standard of existence. Cost of living index figures have, in fact, been published fairly regularly. According to the last published index, the figure for May. 1949, was 359 as compared to 328 at the end of the Mandatory administration.
For one who was advised to turn to Mr. Tweedy for correct and objec- tive information during the years in which he served as Directot of Public Information with the Palestine Government, it is somewhat disappointing to see him spreading rumours and unfounded conjectures of the state of affairs in Israel when the correct facts are obtainable from the Israeli Minister in London, and probably also from the office of the British Minister in Tel-Aviv.—Yours faithfully, G. SCHOCKEN.
Tel Aviv. Editor of Ilaaretz.
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