“You Saved Them in 1917 Will You Let Them Starve Now? Look… Read… Act…”

(WORLD WAR I).

New York, c. 1918

Designed by Cozzy Gottsdanker for the American Jewish Relief Committee for Sufferers from the War. Includes image after Szmuel Hirschenberger’s “Exile”

Central image of telegram to Felix Warburg of the Joint Distribution Committee from the Secretary of State Robert Lansing beseeching him: “For God’s sake raise all the money you can - conditions indescribable Poland Lithuania - one million people perishing… An unexampled catastrophe faces the Polish Jews…” The American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee (known as the Joint), was founded in 1914, following the outbreak of World War I, in order to provide aid to the Jews of Palestine and Eastern Europe who were in danger of starvation due to the chaos of war.