Oscar Wassermann

cf.: http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oscar_Wassermann

Obituary The Jewish Chronicle

                  Sep 14 1934

                  London, England, United Kingdom

HERR OSCAR WASSERMANN

The death occurred on Saturday, at Garmisch, Bavaria, of Herr Oscar Wasserinann, the German' banker, at the age of sixty-five. His family had been bankers in Barnberg (his birthplace) for 150 years. He was an active worker for Jewish institutions, especially in connection with the Central Committee for Jewish Aid and Reconstruction in Germany. The deceased was one of the founders of the Jewish Agency and a Director of the Keren Hayesod. He was until last year a member of the General Council of the Reichsbank in Germany. In May 1933, after Hitler came into power, he was ousted from the Board of Directors of the Deutsche Bank and Disconto-Gesellschaft. As German banker, Herr Wassermann won great prominence all over the world. On many occasions he represented Germauy at international financial conventions. Even after being ousted as Director of the Reichsbank and the Deutsche Bank and Disconto-Gesellschaft, he was consulted by Dr. Schacht, the President of the Reichsbank. Herr Wassermann was also Chairman of the Executive of the Academy for Jewish Science in Germany, and a member of the Curatorium of the High School for Jewish Science. In 1927 he was one of the members of the Joint Palestine Survey Commission, which resulted in the creation of the Jewish Agency in Zurich in 1929. Since then, he was a member of the Administrative Council of the Jewish Agency, representing the non-Zionists there. Addressing the first Jewish Agency meeting in Zurich in August 1929, Herr Wassermann said that he thought that many non-Zionists brought more understanding to the Conference than many Zionists. What the Zionists and non-Zionists required was unity, so did Palestine. Capital alone was not the essential thing: it was much more the political, moral unity of Jewry. Progress in Palestine is possible, he said, if we have the youth with us and enthusiasm. We must do nothing which will repel the youth.

Speaking at a Kerea Hayesod public meeting in Berlin in December last Herr Wassermann said: "We do not wish to de-Germanise our youth. We love the German culture in which we live, and to which we owe gratitude but to which we, too, have contributed a great deal. We shall teach our children to respect our past and our history, but at the same time to respect also all great achievements, whether by Jews or non-Jews. Yet the youth will not be held only by the road of the past; they must also be shown the future, and the future, is Palestine. That does not mean that we are all to go to Palestine," he said, "or that we all can go to Palestine. Our fate will be worked out here in Germany; but Palestine is important, perhaps decisive for our future in Germany. Palestine is to be the centre from which Judaism is to be spread throughout the world. Palestine is the only land where such a centre is today possible. It is the only land where we can have Jewish achievement."

The deceased was a brother of Mr. Jacob .Wassermann, one of the Treasurers of Jews' College, London. The funeral was on Wednesday at the Berlin Jewish Cemetery.