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Welcome to the
HSF-USA website.
Holocaust
Survivors' Foundation (HSF-USA)
is a national alliance of elected leaders of grassroots
Holocaust survivor organizations
To learn more
about our mission, leadership and contact
information, click
here.
Tax deductible
contributions to HSF-USA can be made safely and
securely through PayPal.
In a
May 2011 letter, HSF advocated for a "more
responsive, responsible, and untainted advocate" for
Holocaust survivor concerns within the Administration,
and insisted that Stuart Eizenstat be replaced as the
State Department’s Special Adviser to the Secretary of
State for Holocaust Issues.
DOCUMENTS
OBTAINED FROM U.S. DEPARTMENT OF
JUSTICE
The following
documents were obtained from the Civil Division of
the U.S. Department of Justice through Freedom of
Information Act (FOIA) requests by HSF leaders.
They have a material bearing on the issues raised in
the certiorari petition in Weiss v. Assicurazioni
Generali, and the legislation pending before
Congress to restore survivors’ and heirs’ access to
courts, HR 4596.
HSF is providing
open access to these documents in the interest of
transparency and as a public resource.
In July 2008 the Claims
Conference
released a long-delayed list of over 11,000 former Jewish-owned properties
in eastern Germany (including East Berlin) that it
recovered between 1993 and 2008 and either sold or been
compensated for. Proceeds for
the listed property exceed $2
billion or
€1.4 billion
(Euro).
Because the posted list is not in a searchable or
sortable format, HSF has converted the data to a more user-friendly Excel file format
to assist the public in accessing the list and locating family
property. To open or download the HSF file, and for more
information, click here.
Generali Litigation Timeline
The
Generali
Litigation Timeline is provided by HSF as a public resource. It
features links to essential documents relating to a major Holocaust
justice case covering a thirteen year
period, including many court documents not currently available for
free on the internet.
English Translation of
Dorner
Commission Report
HSF has obtained an
UNOFFICIAL English translation
of the report of the State Commission of Inquiry into the
Israeli governments' treatment of Holocaust survivors. The
Commission was chaired by former Supreme Court Judge
Dalia Dorner. The hard-hitting report was
issued in June 2008, and has resulted in
increases in monthly pensions paid to needy survivors in
Israel. It also helped focus attention on the way
funds from the Claims Conference are allocated in Israel.
(NOTE: The translation is in Microsoft Word document format.)
Ad Targets American Jewish
Committee
To view the ad
that appeared in the May 3, 2012 edition of The
Washington Post, click on the image below.
May 3, 2012
HSF ad calls out American Jewish
Committee
View the May 3,
2012 ad in The Washington Posthere.
December 11, 2011
NY State's failure on Holocaust insurance
claims
New York Jewish Week has the story
here.
New York survivors demand action by the state
authorities
here.
HSF President
David Schaecter and
Renee Firestone were among
panelists testifying before the U.S. House of
Representatives Committee on Foreign Affairs on the
"Enduring Wrongs of the Holocaust." A complete transcript and streaming
video of the hearing are available
here.
June 21,
2011
"New Momentum" for survivor legislation in Congress
Opponents of
bill admit: No "legal peace" promise made to
European insurers
The struggle over
federal legislation allowing Holocaust survivors
access to courts to pursue their family claims over
unpaid insurance policies is intensifying,
reports Stewart Ain in
New York
Jewish Week.
As establishment
Jewish organizations staked out a position publicly
opposing the bills,
H.R. 890 and
S.
466, the American Gathering, a survivor group
that usually allies with those organizations,
broke away and announced conditional support for
the main thrust of the legislation.
Facing questions,
prominent opponents of survivors' rights were forced
to admit that European insurers were not promised or
granted "legal peace" from the threat of lawsuits in
return for their voluntary participation in the
international commission (ICHEIC), formed in 1998 to
address looted Holocaust-era insurance assets:
"[T]here
was no commitment that they would have [legal] peace
if they participated [in ICHEIC], but there was a
representation that we – the Jews – would not make a
deal for ICHEIC and then go to Congress and suggest
that we could still arrange for lawsuits against
them."
Julius
Berman
Claims
Conference Chairman
Opponents
continue to raise baseless fears that, if such
legislation passes, the German government will
suspend or reduce social welfare support for aging
and ailing survivors. This charge was
previously disavowed by the German Ambassador to
the U.S. In a 2009 letter to HSF, Amb. Klaus
Scharioth wrote:
[Germany] has
never threatened to respond [to passage of insurance
legislation] by cutting existing benefits to poor
survivors, and we have no intention to do so in the
future.
Writing in early
June, Ha'aretz columnist Anshel Pfeffer
called on Jewish establishment leaders to stop
ignoring and belittling the voices of survivors
speaking up for themselves:
[E]ven if it
took over six decades for some of the survivors to
find their own voices, and their actions may delay
the next round of quiet agreements, they must be
given satisfaction. The day when there are no longer
any survivors among us may not be that far off, but
that is no reason for acting as it is already here.
The rights of
survivors, Pfeffer stated, should not be hostage to
"whims" of Jewish establishment:
[T]he
conferences and congresses should accord a last
gesture of respect to the survivors, provide them
with all the legal means at their disposal to pursue
their cases with dignity, and stop insulting them by
telling them what is their best interest.
June 2, 2011
New York Times
reports on push in Congress for survivor rights
Survivor:
"They’re just waiting for all of us to die"
A
feature in the June 1 edition of the New York
Times spotlights the battle brewing again in the
U.S. Congress over guaranteeing the rights of
Holocaust survivors and heirs of victims to bring
claims against European insurers in U.S. courts.
(Additional stories
here and
here).
The story quotes
survivor Renee Firestone, who is pursuing a claim
for life insurance
originally taken out by her father in pre-war
Czechoslovakia, but faces opposition from her own
government. “What’s so painful is that we can see
they’re just waiting for all of us to die.”
Excerpts:
The legal
claims by hundreds of American survivors ... have
set off an intense lobbying campaign in Washington
on their behalf. But opposition from the government
and even from leading Jewish groups has created an
uncomfortable rift between groups that are normally
in alliance and has created a potential minefield
for President Obama.
“The whole
thing saddens me,” Elie Wiesel, the Nobel laureate
who is perhaps the most well-known Holocaust
survivor, said of the rift over the insurance
benefits. “I don’t know how or why this has
happened, but the survivors should be helped however
we can.”
“The
whole thing saddens me...I don’t know how or why
this has happened, but the survivors should be
helped however we can.”
Elie Wiesel
The State
Department, under both the Obama and George W. Bush
administrations, has vigorously opposed the idea of
allowing survivors to press claims in court against
European insurance companies because they say it
would undermine a reparations agreement that the
United States reached in 2000 with Germany, which
led to $300 million in insurance payments to
survivors and their heirs.
The threat
of private lawsuits, administration officials say,
treads on the president’s authority to set foreign
policy.
In line
with the State Department, leading Jewish groups
like the American Jewish Committee and the
Anti-Defamation League have also opposed the
survivors’ attempts to plead their case in court and
have lobbied against prior efforts by Congress to
intervene, as have the insurance companies
themselves.
Now,
however, a new push in Congress on behalf of the
survivors appears to be gaining some ground.
“I’m
feeling optimistic that this is our year,” said
Representative Ileana Ros-Lehtinen, a Florida
Republican who introduced legislation in the House
in March that would force insurers to disclose the
names of Holocaust-era policy holders and allow
survivors and their heirs to seek claims in American
courts.
“This will
not
usurp anybody’s authority,” she said in an
interview. “This is about giving the survivors their
day in court. We’ve already waited too long.”
The Times
story also highlights the recent efforts of HSF:
One group
of survivors, known as the Holocaust Survivors
Foundation USA, has been ratcheting
up its efforts in recent weeks to bring pressure on
the Obama administration and on leading Jewish
groups to change their stance on the volatile
insurance issue.
The
survivors group took out full-page advertisements in
Jewish and mainstream newspapers last month accusing
leading Jewish groups like the American Jewish
Committee of “dishonoring” the memories of the
Holocaust.
The ads
accused Jewish groups of “protecting” European
insurers like Allianz because the insurers gave
money to American-Jewish causes. (Allianz, based in
Germany, had committed in 2008 to buying naming
rights to the New Meadowlands Stadium for $25
million a year, but the Jets and the Giants pulled
out of talks after publicity over the company’s role
in insuring Nazi facilities, including Auschwitz,
and of blocking payment of survivors’ claims after
the Holocaust.)
May 27, 2011
Wiesel: Help
survivors in poverty
Nobel laureate
Elie Wiesel has publicly urged the leadership of the
U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum to take note of
survivors living in poverty and "do whatever we can"
to help them. Wiesel, speaking at a National Tribute
Dinner on May 16, 2011 at which he received the
Museums's
inaugural annual award that will in future bear
his name, used the occasion to remind Museum
supporters that it has always been a priority of the
Museum to give survivors a "place of honor" in
society and do "whatever we could, always for
survivors - first."
For
video of Wiesel's remarks, click the screen
below. Reference to survivor poverty begins at 6:20
mark (Note, you may have to adjust your volume
settings to hear audio):
Statement of
the Holocaust Survivors Foundation USA March 3, 2011:
The Holocaust
Survivors Foundation USA will not be demonstrating this
Friday when President Obama visits Miami. The education
that has occurred over the past few weeks with the
survivors’ and their supporters’ demonstrations and
public statements about the failure of global insurers
such as Allianz, Generali, AXA, Munich Re, Swiss Re,
Swiss Life, Zurich, RAS, and others to honor their
insurance obligations to Holocaust victims, has been
widespread and very important.
The American
public has been mostly unaware that its own government
supports foreign insurance companies that assisted the
Nazi regime and exploited the Holocaust to steal
billions of dollars from Holocaust victims and their
families, making survivors, including U.S. veterans and
combat veterans, second class citizens under American
law.
We are extremely
grateful that Senator Bill Nelson has filed legislation
in the U.S. Senate to restore our full rights as
American citizens. We look forward to working with him
as he brings other senators on board, and expect him to
tell President Obama personally how important it is to
Holocaust Survivors that the insurance companies be held
fully accountable.
We are calling off
this protest on Friday at the request of the Members of
Congress and the Senate who have pledged to do
everything in their power to enact legislation restoring
our legal rights, including a concerted effort to
persuade the Obama Administration to support full rights
for Holocaust survivors and adequate support for dignity
and health in their final years.
It is now our
expectation to work with Congress and the White House to
restore our rights and address the survivors’ desperate
needs that have been ignored for so long. We are and
remain deeply grateful to Reps. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen,
Debbie Wasserman Schultz, Alcee Hastings, Ted Deutch,
and our other supporters in Congress for their
long-standing and steadfast support for our rights and
interests.
We hope our
friends in Congress will be successful in persuading the
Administration to engage with the survivors directly,
and to grant survivors long overdue justice, so that
future demonstrations will not be necessary.
March 3, 2011
Parallel Bills
Introduced in Both House and Senate
Legislation has now
been introduced in both houses of the 112th Congress to
restore the rights of Holocaust survivors and claimants.
News report
here. Link to full text of both bills below:
To allow for the
enforcement of State disclosure laws and access to
courts for covered Holocaust-era insurance policy
claims.
March 2, 2011
Nelson Changes Course
Florida Democrat
Introduces Holocaust Insurance Bill in Senate
In an abrupt
about-face, Sen. Bill Nelson has decided to introduce
legislation opening the way for Holocaust survivors to
pursue legal claims against European insurers who never
honored Holocaust-era life insurance policies.
HSF and supporters had announced plans to protest at the
site of a fundraiser for Nelson to be attended by
President Obama on March 4. In a statement, HSF said it
looked forward "to working with [Nelson] as he brings
other senators on board, and hopes he will tell
President Obama personally how important it is to
Holocaust Survivors that the insurance companies be held
fully accountable.”
Protest Planned at
Miami Fundraiser Attended by Obama
Survivors and
supporters will protest outside a political fundraiser
in Miami featuring President Obama on March 4 to
publicize their struggle to collect $20 billion in
Jewish insurance policies never
paid by European companies. HSF contends that Nelson
broke a promise to introduce Senate legislation on the
issue.
Members of the
Holocaust Survivors' Foundation USA want Obama and
Sen. Bill Nelson (D-FL) to push legislation that
would force companies such as Germany's Allianz and
Italy's Assicurazioni Generali to disclose lists of
pre-World War II policies. The bill would also give
survivors the right to sue the insurers in U.S.
courts to satisfy their claims.
Miami Herald
coverage
here. A story broadcast on WLRN-FM/Public Radio for
South Florida is available
here.
February 24,
2011
Florida Protest
Reported in German Press
Germany's leading
daily, the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung,
covers the Feb. 13 protest in Boca Raton, Florida.
Original story (in German) here. Unofficial translation
here.
February 16,
2011
Rally Follow-Up
A
lengthy report from Stewart Ain appears in the
New
York Jewish Week, with quotes from HSF Board members
Alex Moscovic and Jack Rubin. Also, Abe Foxman, national
chairman of ADL, reaffirms his opposition to survivor
claims, even though he terms them "probably rightful."
But, he argues, "the Jewish community and the Holocaust
community had to sign-off on closure."
That meant the
case was closed. ...in our system, once you bring
something to closure, that’s the end.
A survivor commenting
on the Jewish Week website responds:
Abe Foxman ... was
never authorized to speak for me or my children.
Interestingly he does not mention that his organization
has taken money from Generali, the Italian insurance
giant, that also owes billions of dollars to Holocaust
survivor families...We would like the ADL's
justification for such a blatant conflict of interest.
...[T]o take money from Holocaust profiteers and oppose
Holocaust survivors' rights is unconscionable.
February 13.
2011
Survivors Rally Again at
Close of Allianz-sponsored Golf Tournament
"Teed Off with
Allianz"
Protesters gathered
once again in Boca Raton, Florida on February 13 to
target the German insurer Allianz for its failure to
honor Holocaust-era insurance policies. The rally drew
about 75 protesters -- survivors, family members and
community supporters, including Shalom International.
HSF issued the
following statement:
February 13,
2011 Statement of David Schaecter
President of
Holocaust Survivors Foundation - USA
On Friday [Feb.
11], Mr. Wolfgang Ischinger, Allianz’s Global Head of
Group Government Relations and Public Policy, responded
to the Holocaust Survivors Foundation USA. The letter
was politely worded but still highly offensive because
it ignored the fundamental problem that Allianz failed
to honor insurance policies that it sold to tens of
thousands of Holocaust victims. The letter instead
uses the company’s familiar Washington lobbying tactic
of changing the subject, emphasizing Germany’s payments
to Jewish slave laborers ($1 billion) and non-Jewish
forced laborers ($3 billion) to settle lawsuits against
German manufacturers. These payments were long
overdue, but have nothing to do with Allianz’s unpaid
debts to Holocaust survivors and victims’ heirs for
insurance contracts that Allianz refuses to honor.
That is what this and future protests are all about.
Mr. Ischinger
offered to meet with us, and if he truly believes in
honesty and reconciliation, I urge him to come here and
meet with us within the next two weeks. It is
imperative that Allianz, like Generali and the other
defaulting insurance companies, hear our concerns and
address them face to face.
Video interviews of
some of the participants have been posted on
YouTube:
Follow-up Rally
Set for Last Day of Golf Tournament
HSF has sent a
letter to a top executive of Allianz, seeking a
meeting in the wake of
protests
on February 7 at the site of the Allianz-sponsored PGA
golf tournament in Boca Raton, Florida.
An excerpt:
In response to our
campaign over the past few weeks, the Jewish Telegraphic
Agency quoted Allianz’s spokesperson as asking:
"We've never denied any of the allegations. What else
should we be doing?"
The answer should
come as no surprise, as we survivors have been saying
for years, and as the attached flyer sets forth.
Allianz still needs to come clean with complete
disclosure of policy holder information, payment of
claims at fair value (not the 10% values approved by
ICHEIC), support full legal rights for Holocaust
survivors and heirs, and contribute immediately
significant resources to assist Holocaust survivors in
need, not through the Claims Conference, but via
agencies known and respected by grass roots survivor
leaders, which we will address in our meeting.
A
factsheet provides background on the issue and sums
up the demands of survivors.
February 7, 2011
Protests Target German
Insurer Allianz
HSF members and
supporters picketed the opening day of the "Allianz
Championship" PGA golf tournament played at Broken
Sound in Boca Raton, Florida. The protesters called on
the tourney sponsor, German insurance giant Allianz,
to disclose its records and pay claimants the $2 billion
in looted Holocaust-era assets they are due. See
coverage in the
Sun-Sentinel (Ft. Lauderdale),
Palm Beach Post,
WPBF-TV and
Cybergolf.com.
Contrary to
Allianz’s statements to South Florida media, the company
has not been “open and honest” about its Holocaust era
conduct toward the families whose insurance policies it
dishonored. It refused to identify the names of
policyholders, paid only 10-15 percent of actual value
on policies it admitted, and according to Sidney
Zabludoff, the economist who worked for the commission
Allianz cites, the company continues to owe over $2
billion to Holocaust victims and heirs. Further,
Allianz’s statement that it paid $300 million through
the insurance commission is untrue; the commission’s own
data show the company by itself paid only $34 million to
policyholders. Meanwhile, Allianz was willing to spend
$300 million for naming rights to the New York
Jets-Giants stadium in 2008, but was rejected because of
its Holocaust related conduct. It continues to spend
millions of dollars for golf tournaments, soccer
leagues, and other high-profile public relations events,
using the money it stole from Holocaust victims, in
order to mask its past.
December 21,
2010
Damning report hits
Claims Conference
An extraordinary
independent report has been issued that addresses
the Claims Conference’s handling of heirs’ property, and
its overall record of transparency and accountability.
The report was
authored by a prominent British barrister, Jeffrey
Gruder, and commissioned by the Board of Deputies of
British Jews, the main representative body of British
Jewry, after persistent concerns were expressed by
survivors and others about the operations of the Claims
Conference.
Jerusalem Post
commentator Isi Leibler unpacks the findings in an
open
letter to the Claims Conference Board. Some
excerpts:
1. “The
Jewish community is entitled to expect that the
Claims Conference acts, and appears to act,
ethically and with the highest possible standards of
integrity, transparency and sensitivity … The Claims
Conference must be open to scrutiny and cannot be
immune from justified and constructive criticism.”
2. The Claims
Conference refused to publish or disclose details of
heirless properties it recovered or claimed, both
before and after the deadline set by Germany to
claim property in 1993. “The fact remains that
before the expiry of the time limits, the Claims
Conference was in possession of information that may
have been of assistance to owners and heirs in
making a valid claim on their own behalf.”
3. When
pressured to provide information, it did so in a
manner that made it impossible for heirs to identify
or claim their assets. To this day, they refuse to
provide a list which could help owners or heirs
identify their assets.
Coverage in the
London-based
Jewish Chronicle features complaints from Claims
Conference Chairman Julius Berman that he was not
granted the privilege to review the final text before
publication, a charge that the Board of Deputies
publicly
refutes.
UPDATE: The
Jerusalem Post reports
here.
Ha'aretz has a lengthy follow-up
here.
December 15,
2010
Senate Bill
Introduced
S. 4033 - "A bill
to provide for the restoration of legal rights for
claimants under holocaust-era insurance policies"
Outgoing
Sen. Arlen Specter (D-PA) has introduced
new legislation
in the final days of the 111th Congress to restore the
rights of claimants seeking resolution of unpaid
Holocaust-era insurance policies.
In his
statement, Specter urged that the legislation be
taken up by the next Congress.
Specter said the bill
would "restore the right of Holocaust survivors and
their descendants--many of them United States
citizens--to maintain lawsuits in our courts to recover
unpaid proceeds under Holocaust-era life insurance
policies. Recent decisions of the federal courts about
which I have spoken at length in prior floor statements
and confirmation hearings have denied survivors and
their descendants that right."
November 27,
2010
"Holocaust Survivors
Struggle for Claims"
"Can you tell me
why the Justice Department would fight us instead of an
Italian insurance company? It's unbelievable.''
Feature story
in The Miami Herald spotlights HSF's lengthy
struggle to secure the rights of survivors and heirs of
victims seeking to recover looted and unpaid insurance
claims from the Holocaust era.
In an
interview with
New York Jewish Week, Claims
Conference Chairman Julius Berman digs in, refusing to
resign or apologize for the massive fraud that occurred
on his watch. Taking his defense a step further, he
casts blame on his critics: "An apology to survivors
should be coming from those who made even the implicit
suggestion that survivors were hurt by this fraud.”
Meanwhile, an
Associated Press feature highlights the painful
fallout from the fraud on ordinary survivors, echoing a
story
reported in The Forward.
In the same Jewish
Week interview, Berman, under pressure from survivor leaders in Israel,
appears to be yielding to calls for a review of the
Claims Conference's much-criticized allocations
policy.
November 18,
2010
HSF President: "Demand
Justice, Dignity"
HSF President
David Schaecter's op-ed
in The Miami Herald calls for a "complete
overhaul" of the Claims Conference's governance
structure.
November 17,
2010
Claims Conference
Fraud Roundup
After a lengthy
investigation by federal authorities, 17 indictments
were handed down on November 9, 2010 in a massive case
of fraud and theft of Holocaust restitution funds
administered by the New York-based Claims Conference.
The $42 million fraud was alleged to have taken place
over a sixteen year period. Six of the indicted were
Claims Conference employees working for the Hardship
Fund and Article 2 Fund; eleven other conspirators were
also charged.
Here are a collection
of links to stories and reactions:
An
editorial in
The Jewish Sentinel (Pittsburgh)
focuses on lack of transparency by the Claims Conference
over the years, and the Jewish press' collective failure
to pursue accountability : "We haven’t
monitored the Claims Conference news as carefully as we
should....[t]hat ends now."
Call for
"Ombudsman"
In tacit
acknowledgement of the Claims Conference's failure to
adequately represent the interests of Holocaust
survivors, Elan Steinberg, a Vice President of the
American Gathering of Jewish Holocaust Survivors and
Their Descendants,
has called for the creation of an ombudsman role
within the Conference to advocate on behalf of
survivors.
Claims Conference:
We're the "Victim"
On a very different
note, the
Claims Conference described itself
as a "victim" of the
crime and spotlighted their cooperation with the FBI.
Shalom TV Features
Debate
A
lively debate
on the controversial practices of the Claims Conference
was featured in November 2010 on
Shalom TV
cable network. The half hour exchange, produced just
before federal charges were handed down in the $42
million fraud case, featured Jerusalem Post Columnist Isi Leibler and Sam
Norich, Claims Conference Board member and publisher of
TheForward.
October 13, 2010
DOJ Changes Mind, Wants Documents Back from HSF
In a strange twist,
the Department of Justice has asked HSF to return
documents it legally obtained in July under the Freedom
of Information Act, and to destroy all copies. The
documents show that department officials had misgivings
about their response to the New York-based Second
Circuit Court of Appeals before it ruled in a case
involving Holocaust insurance claims. Links to the
documents are found in the column at left.
The Center for Public
Integrity, a nonprofit, non-partisan organization
dedicated to producing original, responsible
investigative journalism on issues of public concern,
reports the story
here.
September 22,
2010
Judiciary Hearing Features Dubbin Testimony
A
hearing was held on September 22, 2010 by the House
Judiciary Committee's Subcommittee on Commercial and
Administrative Law to consider H.R. 4596, the "Holocaust
Insurance Accountability Act of 2010." HSF Counsel
Sam Dubbin
testified at the hearing. Official hearing
transcript here and news coverage
here.
July 27, 2010
IMPORTANT
DOCUMENTS OBTAINED BY HSF FROM U.S. DEPARTMENT OF
JUSTICE
The following
documents were obtained from the Civil Division of
the U.S. Department of Justice through Freedom of
Information Act (FOIA) requests by HSF leaders.
They have a material bearing on the issues raised in
the certiorari petition in Weiss v. Assicurazioni
Generali, and the legislation pending before
Congress to restore survivors’ and heirs’ access to
courts, HR 4596.
HSF is providing
open access to these documents in the interest of
transparency and as a public resource.
The New York
Jewish Weekreports on an expanding federal investigation of the
theft of more than $7 million from the Article 2 Fund, a
pension program for Holocaust survivors administered by
the Claims Conference and funded by the German
government.
The suspected
multi-million dollar fraud appears far larger than an
earlier fraud that came to light in February, also
first reported by the
Jewish Week. At that
time, three Claims Conference employees, including a
supervisor, were fired in connection with hundreds of
thousands of dollars in fraudulent claims under the
Hardship Fund, a program designed to benefit Holocaust
victims originally from Eastern bloc countries. Only
after that news report did the Claims Conference issue a
brief
public acknowledgement that a loss had occurred,
without mention of a dollar amount.
The FBI investigation
is ongoing and few new details have been divulged. The
Claims Conference provided statements for the Jewish
Week's latest story, but has not made any official
pronouncements since February addressing concerns about
their handling of hundreds of millions of German and
other funds designated for survivors, many of whom are
needy.
Long-time Claims
Conference critic and communal activist Isi Leibler has
reacted to the scandal with an
opinion column in the
Jerusalem Post.
UPDATE: Leibler
has followed up with a
scathing column focusing on the lack of action taken
at the just-completed Claims Conference annual meeting.
One week after the
coverage in Jewish Week, the JTA's Jacob Berkman
filed a story
on the scandal.
July
1, 2010
Restore Survivors Rights
An
op-ed in
the Miami Herald by HSF President David Schaecter
and Esther Toporek Finder, president of The Generation
After and a member of the Coordinating Council of
Generations of the Shoah International (GSI), urges
President Obama and Congress to support the rights of
survivors and heirs seeking justice on Holocaust-era
insurance claims.
At the June 30th
Senate Judiciary confirmation hearing on the
appointment of Elana Kagan to the U.S. Supreme
Court, Sen. Arlen Specter (D-PA) asked Kagan whether
she would, if seated on the Court, agree to hear an
appeal of the
Generali
case brought by Holocaust survivors. Kagan
declined to answer directly. JTA summarizes the
exchange
here.
June 30, 2010
Specter: "You ought to be able to go to court and
sue them"
Sen. Arlen
Specter prefaced a question to Supreme Court nominee
Kagan with the following statement:
...the
Holocaust issue was one where Holocaust victims
suffered terribly, brought lawsuits against an
Italian insurance company, and the administration
took the position that the Supreme Court should not
hear the decision by the Court of Appeals for the
2nd Circuit, which decided that the claims were
preempted by an executive branch foreign policy
favoring a resolution of such claims through an
international commission. Well, that seems like a
wrong decision to me. You have an insurance policy,
insurance company won't pay on a claim, you ought to
be able to go to court and sue them, and not to have
the governments of the two countries decide what you
can sue.
Link to video of Specter's question time (the
Generali case is referenced at 1:31:48 mark)
June 9, 2010
One year after global conference, "Guidelines" for
Holocaust property restitution announced
No attention to
survivor poverty
Forty three nations
have endorsed non-binding guidelines for the return of real
estate stolen by the Nazis during the Holocaust to
rightful owners or heirs.
H.R. 4596 Introduced: "Holocaust Insurance
Accountability Act of 2010"
Rep. Ileana
Ros-Lehtinen joined by bipartisan co-sponsors
"This Act
expresses the intent of Congress to deem valid State
laws protecting the rights of Holocaust survivors and
the heirs and beneficiaries of Holocaust victims to
obtain information from insurers and to bring actions in
courts of proper jurisdiction to recover unpaid funds
from entities that participated in the theft of family
insurance assets or the affiliates of such entities."
The full text of the
legislation and list of initial sponsors is
here. A statement released by Congresswoman
Ros-Lehtinen is
here.
February 3, 2010
It's
Our
Last Chance to Help Survivors
An
op-ed by Esther Finder urges
Jewish leaders to fulfill their moral responsibility by
acting on commitments to help needy Holocaust survivors.
Second Circuit rejects appeal of Generali decision
The United States
Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit has
affirmed the dismissal
of plaintiffs’ claims,
agreeing that such claims were preempted by an Executive
Branch foreign policy favoring the resolution of such
claims solely through an international commission.
"Time for everyone
on Capitol Hill to stand up for Holocaust survivors and
the families of the victims"
On the eve of
reintroduction of legislation to require insurance
companies
to disclose the names of Holocaust-era insurance
policyholders, and allow Holocaust survivors or their
heirs to sue the insurance companies in U.S. courts,
Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (FL-18), Ranking Member of the
House Foreign Relations Committee, has penned
an op-ed in the Jewish news service JTA.
December 18,
2009
Generali developments
A powerful
Friend of the Court brief
by eminent constitutional
and foreign policy law professors has been filed in the
pending Generali appeal. In the brief, the scholars
argue in support of plaintiffs-survivors seeking
overturning of a 2004 District Court decision blocking
suits against the large Italian insurer accused of
failing to honor Holocaust-era policies.
Attorney Sam Dubbin,
who serves as counsel to HSF,
has filed a response on behalf of plaintiffs in the
Generali appeal to the
Department of Justice brief
in late October. The
response challenges basic arguments and omissions made
by the government.
November 5, 2009
State Department urges remaining Swiss funds go to
needy survivors
Eizenstat: "The
needs of the U.S. survivor community are pressing and
well-documented."
The U.S. State
Department is urging the federal judge overseeing the
Swiss bank settlement to consider the "significant
social welfare needs" of U.S. survivors in determining
the allocation of hundreds of millions of dollars in
unspent settlement funds. A letter
to U.S. District Judge Edward Korman from Stuart
Eizenstat, former U.S. Envoy and current Special Advisor
for Holocaust Issues to Secretary of State Clinton,
briefed the court on the accomplishments of the June
2009 Holocaust Era Assets Conference in Prague, and about
new opportunities to develop effective social welfare
programs to address the special needs of aging survivors
worldwide. The letter was co-signed by Christian
Kennedy, the Obama administration's current
Special Envoy for Holocaust Issues.
The Eizenstat-Kennedy
letter was transmitted via the U.S. Department of
Justice, which added its own Statement of Interest.
November 5, 2009
Obama administration opposes survivor lawsuits
DOJ: Holocaust
assets litigation conflicts with U.S. foreign policy
In a
brief to a U.S. Appeals Court filed in late October
2009, the Department of Justice confirmed that the Obama
administration has decided to adopt the position of the
Bush administration that opposes survivors and families
pursuing justice through the U.S. courts against global
insurance companies that failed to pay on insurance
policies they sold to Holocaust victims. The brief
states that “non-adversarial mechanisms” are the
“preferred way” of ensuring compensation to Holocaust
survivors, and that in the case of Holocaust-era
insurance claims, it is “the foreign policy of the
United States that the International Commission on
Holocaust Era Insurance Claims (ICHEIC) should be
regarded as the exclusive forum and remedy for claims.”
The statement to the
court is related to the pending appeal of a
2004 District Court ruling dismissing cases by
survivors and heirs against the Italian insurer
Assicurazioni Generali.
The plaintiffs in the
case have asked the appellate court for an opportunity
to respond, stating: “It would be fundamentally unfair
if the rights of the Holocaust survivors and heirs with
claims against Generali were decided without giving them
a chance to respond,” and noting that the Obama
Administration’s brief, like the Bush Administration’s,
“(a) fails to demonstrate any adverse reaction from the
government of Italy; (b) fails to show how plaintiffs’
litigation against Generali would in fact undermine any
U.S. foreign policy interest; (c) fails to explain how
foreign policy interests emerged in 2008 and 2009 when
the U.S. government denied they existed for the previous
eight years; (d) fails to address the profound
inconsistencies between the Bush and Obama
Administrations’ broad statements of foreign policy
conflict and the Clinton Administration’s positions; and
(e) is replete with specious reasoning, misleading
claims, and erroneous statements of law. Appellants
deserve, and the Court should obtain, an accurate
record.”
Several members of
Congress, including U.S. Senators Arlen Specter and Russ
Feingold, and U.S. Representatives Ileana Ros-Lehtinen,
Robert Wexler, Alcee Hastings, Dan Burton, Debbie
Wasserman-Schultz, Elton Gallegly, Ron Klein, Chris
Smith, Kendrick Meek, Mike Pence, Mario Diaz-Balart, and
Lincoln Diaz-Balart, sent letters to Attorney General
Eric Holder and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton
urging the Administration to side with the survivors’
and heirs’ right of access to courts.
August 12, 2009
11 Years: The Swiss bank settlement process grinds on
Today is the 11th
anniversary of the Swiss Bank Settlement ("In re
Holocaust Victim Assets Litigation"). For more
background, see our entry
below from a
year ago marking the 10th anniversary.
The
latest claims & distribution statistics have not
been publicly updated for over seven months. These
figures show that as of December 31, 2008, Deposited
Assets settlement awards stood at $545,814,793. This is
about two thirds of the amount originally set aside for
the Deposited Assets (bank account) category.
The U.S. District
Court overseeing the settlement continues to consider a
recommendation to distribute the unspent quarter of
a billion dollars by recalculating & increasing previous
awards.
HSF and the
State of Israel have both filed formal objections to
that recommendation.
The New York
Jewish Week has published an
analysis of the recent Prague Conference by
Sidney Zabludoff. In April, Zabludoff
shared some hopes and expectations for the
conference.
July 24, 2009
Op-Ed: "Should the Killers be the
Victims' Heirs?"
Commentary
by Esther Toporek Finder, member
of U.S. delegation to the Prague Conference.
GSI leader Esther Finder speaks at Prague Conference
Esther Toporek
Finder spoke on "Caring for our Aging Survivor
Parents" at the Special Session on Caring for
Victims of Nazism and Their Legacy at the Conference
on Holocaust Era Assets. Text is available
here.
Finder was the
only member of the second generation who spoke in
Prague on survivor issues from the perspective of
the survivor families. She is a member of the
Coordinating Council of
Generations of
the Shoah International (GSI) and was part
of the official U.S. delegation to the Prague
Conference.
June 29, 2009
HSF leader Alex Moskovic reacts to conference
HSF Board
member Alex Moskovic, a survivor living in Florida and
member of the U.S. delegation to the Prague Conference,
is quoted in an
Associated Press story as seeing "no forward motion"
coming out of the conference.
June 26, 2009
Prague Conference Gets Under Way
Wire
coverage by Associated Press cites HSF concerns
about lack of survivor voices.
June 22, 2009
HSF confers with Eizenstat, offers support
Following
direct discussions with Ambassador Stuart Eizenstat on
issues related to the Prague
Conference
on Holocaust Era Assets, HSF has informed Secretary
of State Hillary Clinton that it no longer is asking
that Eizenstat be
replaced as head of the U.S. delegation to the
conference.
HSF looks forward to working
with Eizenstat on matters
affecting Holocaust survivors’ rights and interests.
UPDATE:
Complete U.S. delegation listed
here. Of 24 total delegates, five are Holocaust
survivors.
June
14, 2009
Israel shakes up
delegation to Holocaust Assets conference after survivor
criticism
The Israeli
government
plans to replace Reuven Merhav, a private citizen
and top officer of the Claims Conference, as head of the
official Israeli delegation to the international
Conference on Holocaust Era Assets set for late June.
The move came after survivors and others
expressed opposition to Merhav's appointment over
conflict of interest concerns.
UPDATE: Information and
Diaspora Minister Yuli Edelstein has been
appointed to head the Israeli delegation to the
conference.
June 3, 2009
HSF urges Obama to address
needs of living survivors
Statement coincides with
President's visit to Buchenwald
HSF has issued a
public statement
on the occasion of President Obama's visit to the Buchenwald
memorial in Germany. In it, the President is asked "to pay
greater heed to the plight of so many thousands of survivors in
our communities who are living in poverty." The statement also
urges the administration to "take the lead in insisting that the
international community address the needs of living survivors as
a moral imperative."
"U.S. Holocaust
Survivors: Pres. Should Address Needs"
May 26, 2009
HSF publishes blog page
HSF has started its own
blog page to serve as
a grassroots forum for Survivors, the Second & Third
Generations, and those who support justice & dignity for
survivors. Read and join the conversation
here.
May 24, 2009
Israelis alarmed about
Prague Conference lineup
"Conflict of interest"
concerns
Ha'aretz reports
on the controversy that has
erupted over the appointment
of a top Claims Conference
official to head the Israeli
government delegation to the
Prague Conference on
Holocaust Era Assets
scheduled for June.
May 18, 2009
Si Frumkin
Si Frumkin, Holocaust
survivor and tireless activist on behalf of Soviet
Jewry and his
fellow survivors, died in California on May 15th. His obituary
in the Los Angeles Times is
here. HSF previously posted a link to his 2008
essay on restitution in
Reform Judaism Magazine. In the past year,
Frumkin threw his support behind passage of the Holocaust
Insurance Accountability Act in the U.S. Congress. Read his
appeals to Rep. Howard Berman, Chairman of the House Foreign
Affairs Committee, at this
link.
May
10, 2009
Claims Conference's hardball
tactics exposed
"Criticize us and lose aid"
The Ha'aretz
newspaper
reports on how the Claims Conference uses
Holocaust-related grant funds under its control to
squelch criticism and apply political pressure on social
welfare agencies serving needy survivors.
May 6, 2009
Agenda for Prague Conference
broadened
Discussion of survivor
welfare added after concerns voiced
The agenda of the upcoming
Holocaust Era Assets Conference in Prague, which originally
excluded any formal discussion of survivor welfare issues, has
been expanded after HSF and others expressed criticism. A
special session on "Caring for Victims of Nazism & Their
Legacy" has been added to the conference program |
Conference homepage
April 28,
2009
Holocaust Assets Conference
planned for June
Organizers lay out limited agenda
/
HSF leaders press
for more attention to issue of survivor needs
The European Union,
under the presidency of the Czech Republic, is hosting
an international
Conference
on Holocaust Era Assets set for June 26-30, 2009 in
Prague.
The Conference is
described as a follow up to an international gathering
held over ten years ago in
Washington. Organizers have chosen to focus on two
"unresolved" Holocaust issues, looted art and real (or
"immovable") property. The narrowness
of this agenda, and the absence of any sessions devoted
to the economic, social, housing, and health care needs
of survivors, quickly become the target of criticism.
UPDATE: At the
request of Florida Congresswoman Ileana
Ros-Lehtinen, Ranking Member of the House Foreign
Affairs Committee, a special public meeting to discuss
the Prague Conference and how the U.S. government can
influence the outcome was held in Miami on May 1st. At
the session, HSF leaders, local survivors, social
service professionals and elected officials shared
concerns over the Prague agenda with the State
Department's Special Envoy for Holocaust Issues.
On May 4th and 5th
the State Department held what was billed as a
"Town Hall" meeting in Washington, DC to solicit
information from interested individuals or organizations
regarding the planned conference. Representatives of HSF
were in attendance and submitted documents for the
official record. These included a formal
request by HSF
President David Schaecter to address the Prague session,
HSF's letter to Secretary
of State Hillary Clinton,
statement by HSF Counsel Samuel J. Dubbin, and a
summary of the Holocaust insurance issue.
April
30, 2009
Survivors suffering from
Post-Traumatic Stress have special needs
The Tampa Tribunereports on the high incidence of Post Traumatic
Stress Disorder among Holocaust survivors and the
special care they require.
April 7, 2009
"Unlike Madoff, European
Insurers Remain At Large"
Novelist,
Essayist, Law Professor and Son
of Holocaust Survivors Thane
Rosenbaum has posted a
provocative essay on the Huffington
Post site. Click
here to read.
April 2, 2009
Rep. Robert Wexler urges
Pres. Obama to support
justice for Holocaust
insurance claims
In a
letter to the
administration, the Florida
Democrat presses the case
for Holocaust insurance
legislation and just & fair
treatment of the claims of
survivors and heirs of
Holocaust victims.
March 19,
2009
Benefits extended to
survivors previously shut out
The Claims
Conference has announced a new agreement with the German
government that allows
needy survivors from the Former Soviet Union (FSU) who had been
unfairly rejected for benefits in the past to reapply. Although
no mention is made in the
official press release, the Israeli newspaper Ha'aretz
reports
that the agreement to allow FSU survivors
to reapply to the
Hardship Fund is actually designed to settle a lawsuit
brought against the Claims Conference. An Israeli court
ruled in June 2008 that the group improperly
misled thousands of claimants and denied them of their benefits.
See HSF post from June 2008
.
March 1, 2009
Editorial: "The survivors'
cause is more than just -- it is a grievous wrong that must be
righted."
In its lead Sunday March 1,
2009
editorial, the
Miami Herald calls for renewed effort
to pass the Holocaust Insurance Accountability Act.
February 24,
2009
HSF and State of Israel file
objections to Swiss settlement plan
Both HSF and the
government of Israel have raised objections to a
proposal to recalculate the value of compensation and
award additional compensation to some claimants who have
already received payments from the Holocaust settlement
involving Swiss banks.
The plan is under
consideration by U.S. District Court Judge Edward Korman,
who oversees hundreds of millions of dollars still not
distributed from the 10 year old Swiss Bank Settlement.
The Court has been criticized for not channeling the
funds more quickly to needy survivors around the world.
The HSF objections
are here, the Israeli objections
here. The original proposal and related court
documents are found
here.
February 10,
2009
German Ambassador disavows
threat to cut off survivor funding
Jewish
Organizations Raised False Red Flag to Oppose H.R. 1746
German Ambassador to the U.S.
Klaus Scharioth
has written to
HSF stating unequivocally that Germany has no intention to
reduce welfare allocations or renege on commitments to survivors
if the Holocaust Insurance Accountability Act passes into law.
The February 10th letter puts to rest the
scare tactics used by the Claims Conference, its
Treasurer Roman Kent, and other organizations that opposed the
legislation in 2008.
January 30,
2009
HSF seeks President Obama's support
President David Schaecter and
HSF Executive Board members have written
this letter to President Barack
Obama on January 30th asking his support for efforts to achieve
justice on Holocaust-era insurance claims.
January 13,
2009
"Record
Time"
Is the Holocaust museum
helping survivors research their families' fates? Yes, but not
fast enough for Leo Rechter.
HSF Board member Leo Rechter
is featured in Washington City Paper's January 7, 2009
cover story on the U.S.
Holocaust Memorial Museum and it's handling of Holocaust records
from the International Tracing Service in Bad Arolsen, Germany.
More information
here.
November 26,
2008
"Justice for Holocaust
Survivors"
"[M]aybe at long last, all
survivors will be afforded the dignity they deserve in their
last years"
Holocaust Survivor Herb
Karliner published an op-ed in the November 26th edition of the
Miami Herald.
November 12,
2008
"Battle for Holocaust Assets
Roils Israel"
A
front page feature in the
Wall Street Journal
describes the bureaucratic resistance & legal hurdles faced by
survivors and heirs in Israel trying to claim land investments,
bank accounts and other assets owned by their families in
pre-war Palestine. Unclaimed assets absorbed by the State and
private institutions have not been fully accounted for.
The Financial
Services Roundtable, an industry lobbying group whose
members include European insurers Allianz, AEGON, ING, AXA &
Zurich, has urged the Treasury Dept. to expand the size of the
government's planned stock purchase program designed to provide
emergency financial support for banks, and to broaden
eligibility to include foreign-based insurance
companies and banks.
In the letter, HSF states
that "[u]ntil the culpable insurance companies all disgorge
their records and their unjust profits from the Holocaust, we
believe it would offend basic notions of justice and integrity
for Americans’ hard-earned tax dollars to subsidize their
rapacious and immoral behavior." |
Full Letter here
The Treasury Dept. collected
public comments in October on a proposed
Guaranty
Program for Troubled Assets, part of the recently-passed
Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008 (EESA).
October 20,
2008
Vast sums devoted to
defeat H.R. 1746
Several Jewish Organizations, German
Embassy join effort
Through September 30, 2008, the
insurance industry -- led by Italian insurer Generali, Swiss
Reinsurance, and the
Association of Dutch Insurers -- spent over ONE MILLION DOLLARS on
lobbyists opposing H.R. 1746. See the detailed and up-to-date breakdown
here. This figure does not include the
unidentified portion of time and resources expended by European-based
insurance giants Allianz, Zurich, AEGON and ING, along with two
leading U.S. insurance trade associations in opposition to H.R. 1746
as part of their ongoing multi-million dollar lobbying programs.
The industry trade group, the
American Insurance Association, hired
Mara
Rudman, the former Chief Operating Officer of the International
Commission on Holocaust-Era Insurance Claims (ICHEIC), to represent their
interests on the matter in Congress. See filing for
1st Quarter 2008
and 2nd Quarter
2008.
Unreported lobbying expenses
were also incurred by German Embassy officials, and officers and
employees of the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against
Germany, opposing the legislation.
September 22,
2008
"Upstart" HSF among activists
challenging the establishment
In its
year-end review, the JTA news service highlights HSF's
leadership in battle to pass Holocaust insurance legislation.
September 22,
2008
110th Congress winds down
with action on H.R. 1746 unlikely
Latest
news in Roll Call
|
Background and additional archived news coverage
here.
September 13,
2008
Nazi-linked German insurer
abandons bid for New York stadium-naming rights
Germany's leading insurance conglomerate, Allianz AG, has
abruptly dropped its efforts to negotiate naming rights for a
planned New York-area football stadium after a spontaneous
public outcry led by local Holocaust survivors. HSF Executive
Board member Leo
Rechter was quoted in the New York Times citing
Allianz as one of the insurers "still preventing ...survivors
from fully collecting on valid policies — or from finding them
at all." See full
coverage here.
August 12,
2008
Ten
year anniversary of Swiss Bank Settlement
Ten years ago, Swiss banks
agreed to pay $1.2 billion as restitution to
Holocaust survivors to settle claims for their
assets. The largest portion of the settlement, $800
million, went to cover expected claims for
"deposited assets" -- dormant funds in Swiss bank
accounts never paid to rightful heirs. A claims
process was established under a special
Claims Resolution
Tribunal.
Ten years after the
historic agreement, only 60% of the deposited assets
settlement, about $489 million, has been paid out.
Detailed distribution statistics as of June 30, 2008 here.
The fate of the remaining hundreds of millions remains
undecided. The decision rests with Federal Judge Edward
Korman of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District
of New York, who oversees the settlement.
UPDATE: $21
million in additional payments to 27 claimants were made
during the three month period July 1-September 30, 2008,
bringing the total payouts to date to $510 million, about
64% of the amount originally earmarked for the Deposited
Assets category.
Details here.
Outgoing
Sen. Arlen Specter (D-PA) has introduced
companies
to disclose the names of Holocaust-era insurance
policyholders, and allow Holocaust survivors or their
heirs to sue the insurance companies in U.S. courts,
Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (FL-18), Ranking Member of the
House Foreign Relations Committee, has penned
Jewry and his
fellow survivors, died in California on May 15th. His obituary
in the Los Angeles Times is
Rep. Robert Wexler urges
Pres. Obama to support
justice for Holocaust
insurance claims
"Record
Time"
