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Alliance Israélite Universelle CercaNota d'ambito
Use when survivors discuss their experiences with this organization. (en-US)
Definizione
Founded in 1860 by six French Jews moved by the freedoms and rights they enjoyed in France, the Alliance Israélite Universelle (AIU) was the first modern universal Jewish social welfare organization. Its purpose was to help Jews in need around the world through political, educational, and financial means. It used international law and politics to minimize discrimination, secure equal rights and protections for the Jews in Christian and Muslim countries, and eliminate prejudices. By the late 1800s the Alliance served as the voice for international Jewry, agitating for equal rights and citizenship for Jews in Romania, Serbia, and Russia and for the right to emigrate from those countries. The Alliance also promoted general Western education and acculturation for all members of the Jewish community so that Jews around the world could become full and equal members of society. The Alliance created and supported schools that provided a modern, secular and Jewish education; the educational mission was particularly active in North Africa and the Ottoman Empire, where the French language as well as the local language was included in the curriculum. The Alliance Israelite Universelle was an activist, publicly visible and vocal social defense organization. By 1881 it had over 24,000 members throughout sixteen European countries, North Africa, the Ottoman Empire, and North and South America. In France, it grew to be one of the two major Jewish communal organizations, sharing power and responsibilities with the Consistoire.
In the interwar period, the Alliance opposed the creation of a Jewish state on the grounds that it would require Jews to be loyal to two nations simultaneously, which would undermine Jewish civil rights in their countries of residence. During the 1930s the AIU lobbied against the anti-immigration decrees of the French government. It also encouraged the French government to grant visas to Jews coming from Eastern Europe, promising that the French Jewish community would take care of the immigrants and not let them become a financial drain on the country.
After Kristallnacht, the Alliance Israélite Universelle coordinated efforts to rescue Jewish children from Germany and Austria. During World War II, the Alliance was cut off from its activities outside France. After the war the Alliance restated its commitment to fight for the rights of Jews around the world and to support full education, but it revised its anti-Zionist position to support the right of Jews to immigrate to Palestine. Throughout the postwar period, the Alliance continued to work for civil rights, against antisemitism, and to support its schools that provide secular and Jewish education. (en-US)
Fonte
Hyman, Paula E. The Jews of Modern France. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1998. p. 64, 77-90, 109, 110, 116, 117, 132, 138-139, 140, 141, 150, 191, 194, 201, 20