the founder o f British propaganda during the war, CFG Masterman, was an ardent believer in the power of the image to alter the perceptions and attitudes o f the masses.^^
As part o f Hyamson’s overall propaganda strategy he planned to use these propaganda materials, both visual and textual, to infiltrate the Jewish public space, to determine and shape the Jewish ethnic imagination in relation to the war and Zionism. To that end, particularly in America, he sought to gain access to all Jewish periodicals, press, Jewish clubs, libraries and literary societies. The development of his propaganda campaign was also to be re-active, responding to “regular reports from all important Jewish centres on currents of opinion and needs of propaganda ...[,] copies of principal Jewish newspapers in English, Yiddish, Hebrew” and a list of addresses of all Jewish periodicals with details of circulation, status and attitude towards Zionism.
The objectives of Hyamson’s ambitious plan seemed to have been attained by the middle o f 1918. According to the Zionist Propaganda Committee’s report on the period from
14 December-30 June 1918, “a system of distribution of Zionist news has been built up under which every week, one can almost say every day, the communiques or other items of news originating from the Bureau or otherwise calculated to further the Zionist cause are published in the press, Jewish and non-Jewish, of every Jewish centre throughout the world. The committee sent a weekly bulletin of news to “every Jewish periodical whose existence is known” and telegraphed news items that were considered to be of particular i m p o r t a n c e .
This work was greatly facilitated by co-operation with Zionist publicity offices abroad.
Meiron and Susie Harries, The War Artists: British Official War Art o f the Twentieth Century (London; Michael Joseph in association with The Imperial War Museum and the Tate Gallery, 1983) p. 7.
Memorandum by Hyamson, c .l3 December 1917, PRO FO 395/86/237667.
‘Report o f Meeting o f Propaganda Committee, 14th December-30 June 1918,’ Zionist Organisation, (London Bureau). Z4/243 Papers o f the London Zionist Bureau, CZA.
particularly in the USA.^^ In a report from Harold Killock, Publicity Secretary o f the
Provisional Executive for General Zionist Affairs, it was estimated that one story, released in February 1918, was published in a hundred cities. By July 1918, A H. Fromenson, Killock's Publicity Director, had all news relating to Palestine, Zionism or Jewish conditions in Europe disseminated through him via the British Military Mission in Washington D.C. Fromenson considered that his mailing list included every Anglo-Jewish weekly published in the USA and some 200 secular dailies, as well as the Associated Press and the International News Service. Fromenson informed Simon Marks in London that “by a system of “releases”, 1 secure simultaneous publication in the great bulk of this list for almost every item issued. Significantly, the official nature of these news stories remained hidden. Hyamson made sure that they were “received indirectly from a source which shows no British official
connection.
The wide-ranging impact of Zionist news distribution was only possible due to the financial, material and organisational support o f the Department of Information, which in Febmary 1918 became the Ministry of Information, headed by Lord Beaverbrook.57 The stark transformation in the ability of the Zionist office in London to extend its influence, in order to undertake its work for the Government, was evident from the distribution o f its official publication. The Zionist Review. Prior to the formation of the Jewish Section of the
Department o f Information, Hyamson had struggled to have a thousand copies of The Zionist
53 With regard to Zionist propaganda in the United States the distribution was undertaken by Jacob deHaas, a leading member o f the Zionist Organization o f America and editor o f The Jewish Advocate in Boston and A.H. Fromenson, the Publicity Director o f the Z O A Minute for Colonel Woodwark, British Bureau o f Information, N ew York by A Hyamson, 11 June 1918. PRO FO 395/213/242073.
54 Ibid.
55a.H. Fromenson, Publicity Director Department, Zionist Organizations o f America, to Simon Marks, London, 1 July 1918, Z4/177 IV, Papers o f the London Zionist Bureau, CZA.
Review printed. By 1 February 1918, the Foreign Office was printing half a million copies for distribution outside of Great Britain. As a report of the Zionist Propaganda Committee put it, in a rather understated manner.
The propaganda Committee had the good fortune from the
commencement of its work of having one of its members in charge of the Jewish Department of the Ministry o f Information. As a result, the great facilities of the Ministry of Information in the way of distribution of news, printing of pamphlets, etc, were able to be utilised by the Committee . . . The small amount expended in proportion to the large output o f propaganda material is accounted for in this way.^®
The amount of pamphlets alone that were either in preparation or had already been printed and distributed by the British Government between January and July 1918 numbered just over one million. This propaganda campaign was intended to have an impact across the geographical, social and linguistic spectrum of the Jewish Diaspora. As such, pamphlets were printed in a wide array of languages, including, Yiddish, Ladino,^^ Hebrew, Spanish, Dutch, French, Portugese, Danish, German, English and S w e d i s h . ^ 2 particular, Yiddish was seen
by Hyamson and members of the British Government as the language of the Jewish masses, which were a main focus in the attempt to counter supposed pacifist and revolutionary sentiment. It was considered by the British representative in Zurich, for example, that
Sanders and Taylor, op. cit., p. 78-89. Hyamson to Weizmann, n.d., WA.
‘Notes on Zionism,’ 1 February 1918, Milner Papers.
'Report o f Meeting o f Propaganda Committee, 14 December-30 June 1918, Zionist Organisation, (London Bureau),’ Z4/243- Papers o f the London Zionist Bureau, CZA
The Ladino speaking population o f Salonika was considered by the British Government to be one o f the most important Jewish communities in the world. ‘Memorandum on the Attitude o f Enemy Governments towards Zionism,’ Intelligence Bureau, Department o f Information, Section Environment, 13 February 1918. PRO FO 371/3388/29730. For a recent discussion o f the influence o f the Zionist movement amongst Salonikan Jewry during this period, see Maria Vassilikou, Politics o f the Jewish Community o f Salonika in the Inter-War Years: Party Ideologies and Party Competition (PhD Thesis, University o f London, 2000) pp. 121-126. On the prevalent belief in the political power o f Salonikan Jewry amongst British policy makers during this period, see Kedourie, ‘Young Turks, Freemasons and Jews,’ pp. 243-262.
62 Ibid.