Mr. A. M. Abrahams (President, S.A. Zionist Federation)

Mr. A. M. Abrahams

(President, S.A. Zionist Federation).

ABRAHAM MARK ABRAHAMS, President of the South African Zionist Federation, is 65 years of age. Born in London and educated at the Jews' Free School, he settled in Johannesburg 27 years ago, and was, until he reached retiring age, Principal of the Jewish Government School in that city, so that a very large percentage of the younger generation of Johannesburg Jewry have passed through his hands.

Mr. Abrahams has played a very prominent part in the organisation of the teaching profession in this country. He was a founder of the Transvaal Teachers' Association, and has been its President and Treasurer, whilst he was also twice President of the Johannesburg and Rand Teachers' Association.

He has also had a distinguished Masonic career, having been Master of two lodges and having also held District Grand Office.

During the whole of his life in South Africa, Mr. Abrahams has thrown himself into communal work. His activities in this field have been too widespread and extensive to enumerate: amongst them may be mentioned many years' service on the Executive of the S.A. Jewish Board of Deputies, and of the Johannes-burg Chevra Kadisha.

But far and away his most important Jewish activity has been in connection with the Zionist Movement. He has been actively and prominently associated with the administration of South African Zionism practically from the moment of his arrival in this country. He was already on the Executive of the S.A. Zionist Federation before the first South African Zionist Conference of 1905; he was a delegate to that Conference and was elected by it to the new Executive. At the second Conference, in 1906, he was elected the Federation's Treasurer, at the third (1909) Vice-President, and at the fourth (1911) President, to which office he has been continuously re-elected by each successive Conference, up to and including the twelfth, held last May.

As President for eighteen years, it has been his heavy responsibility to lead the Zionist Movement in this country both in the difficult and dark years of the war period and in the ensuing decade, when the Movement has made such giant strides. It speaks volumes for his sincerity, his ability, and the personal esteem in which he is held that the Zionists of South Africa have shown their confidence in him by re-electing him time after time. Advancing years appear to have no effect upon him, for he attends to the discharge of his exacting duties no less assiduously than twenty years ago. His strong common sense, his marked abilities as a chairman, and his considerable powers of oratory, constitute a combination of qualities which has proved for many a long year one of the most valuable assets of South African Zionism.The Nature and Extent of South African Zionism.

South African Zionists can claim a long and distinguished record of service to the Jewish National cause, both in advocacy of its principles and in practical work and sacrifice for their realisation. In both respects South Africa enjoys an enviable reputation and is regarded throughout the Zionist world as a model for other countries. Through fair weather and foul, its Zionism has been of a stalwart and uncompromising brand, and has from the first rejected the somewhat pusillanimous and apologetic tone which has marked Zionist propaganda in many other countries. Both in the percentage of Zionists to the total Jewish population and in per capita contributions to Zionist funds, it stands easily first among the Jewish communities of the whole world. The movement has permeated, and largely captured, all classes and ranks of the Jewish population, and although far from the stage when it can claim all South African Jews as active Zionists, it can count, either as active workers, convinced