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Germans Showing No Sense of Guilt, Jewish Leader Reports

August 17, 1954
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Germans in general are “showing no sense of guilt whatever for their past crimes,” Dr. J. Maitlis, London Jewish community leader, declared here today upon his return from a fact-finding mission to Germany.

Dr. Maitlis said he found economic conditions among German Jews strained.

“There are few young people among the German Jews,” he reported. “There are many families entirely dependent on small state pensions. The problem of restitution to individual victims of Nazism–though enacted into German law–is far from settled.”

There is “a tremendous feeling of isolation” among German Jews, the London Jewish leader stated. They are very anxious to be in contact with Jews outside their country, particularly Israel, “he said. The re-establishment of the German Zionist Organization, recently reconstituted in that country, was highly welcomed as a sign that German Jewry is again part of the world Jewish community, Dr. Maitlis asserted.

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