Confiscated Jewish Property in Germany Worth “only Four Billions,” Nazis Claim

Obviously anticipating a demand by the Jews at the forthcoming peace conference for reparations for Jewish property confiscated by the Nazis in Germany, the German Ministry of Propaganda today issued a report in Berlin estimating that the property so far confiscated from Jews in the Reich is worth “no more than four billion marks.”

The Swedish press, publishing this report, points out that the Nazi estimate is only about one-fourth of the actual value of the confiscated Jewish property. Newspapers here declare that it can safely be stated that sixteen billion dollars worth of Jewish possessions have passed into Nazi hands since Hitler came to power ten years ago.

Swedish newspapers express surprise at the fact that the Nazis have suddenly found it necessary to issue an estimate of the value of the confiscated property of German Jews. They point out that the Nazi announcement is all the more puzzling in view of the fact that the joint declaration issued last month by seventeen of the United Nations and the Fighting French through the State Department in Washington promised restoration of property seized by the Nazis in occupied countries, but made no reference to property confiscated from Jews in the Reich.

GERMANY’S REPUTATION IN SWEDEN SINKS AS ANTI-JEWISH TERROR INCREASES

Germany’s reputation in Sweden has been damaged more by Nazi persecution of the Jews than by any other act, the conservative Swedish magazine, Svensk Tidskrift, declared in an article quoted by the Stockholm radio today.

“Millions of Europe’s population,” the Swedish publication wrote, “are now put to death or condemned to death without judgment and trial, yes, even without being accused of any juridical crime, simply because they belong to a race which is decreed to be inferior, and they are blamed for plans on whose existence no one outside of the National Socialist camp believes. The reaction has become tremendously strong, certainly much stronger than the Nazis expected, stronger certainly in the occupied countries, such as Holland, whose 180,000 Jews, now doomed to deportation, both as citizens and people enjoyed general respect.

“In Sweden, Jewish persecution, particularly in Norway, has brought forth a particularly united reaction. As a result of the Nazi mentality which it reveals, it has doubtlessly damaged Germany’s reputation more than anything else,” the article points out.