Jews are not expected to be among the beneficiaries of a 150 million Mark special foundation the Bundestag will ask the government to create to compensate “hard core” cases of Nazi victims who have received no reparations under previous laws and agreements. According to financial sources, the monies will go primary to German Gypsies and victims who immigrated into West Germany from Eastern Europe after 1969, the cut-off date for claiming reparations.
Jewish claims still pending will be paid through the New York-based Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany which is expected to receive a total of 440 million Marks from the Federal Republic over the next several years in a “final financial gesture” toward Jewish Holocaust victims. The Bundestag has earmarked 50 million Marks in its current budget for that purpose.
The decision to call for a new foundation was supported by the Social Democratic Party Liberal coalition. The opposition Christian Democratic Union abstained. One CDU member, Franz-Heinrich Krey, observed that the plan failed to honor a decision in December, 1979 by all three factions to link the final round of reparations payments to Nazi victims with the financial claims of Nazi civil servants of the Hitler era for pensions and other back payments. The Social Democrats and Jewish organizations have attacked the linkage for equating “the fate of the victims and their oppressors.”
The Archive of the Jewish Telegraphic Agency includes articles published from 1923 to 2008. Archive stories reflect the journalistic standards and practices of the time they were published.
