and beg the intervention of the Government when foreign Jews were being flagrantly persecuted.
The Anglo-Jewish Association was founded in 1871, to continue the work of the Alliance Israélite Universelle, which, before the Franco-Prussian War, had interested itself in the welfare of persecuted Jews all over the world. Its aims were 'to aid in promoting the social, moral, and intellectual progress of the Jew', and 'to obtain protection for those who may suffer in consequence of being Jews'. Accordingly, when any grave case of persecution arose, the Anglo-Jewish Association, like the Board of Deputies, sought the intervention of the British Government. This produced a certain amount of overlapping; and, from the year 1886, the Board of Deputies and the Anglo-Jewish Association appointed a 'conjoint' committee of both bodies to deal with the British Government in such cases. Its meetings were presided over alternately by the presidents of its constituents, and its political secretary was Mr. Lucien Wolf. This Conjoint Committee was composed of leading English Jews, and its relations with the British Government were always highly satisfactory. The Foreign Office never turned a deaf ear to its representations: and the Jews gratefully acknowledged that the Government could always he relied upon to bring its powerful influence to hear in lessening, and often preventing, the sufferings of Jewish victims of persecution. The Committee was in close touch with similar Jewish committees abroad, especially the American Jewish Committee, and its labours were attended with considerable success, so that, before the war, they had almost persuaded the Governments of Russia and Rumania to relax their Anti-Semitic legislation and administration. When the war broke out everything was altered. The persecuting Governments became our friends, and Palestine was a most important factor in the war policy of the Allies. To Zionists and non-Zionists alike the future of the country had become a matter of vital interest. On October 1, 1916, the
