Harry Greenstein, adviser on Jewish Affairs to the American Military Government, last night hailed the action of John J. McCloy, American High Commissioner-designate for Germany, in approving the general claims restitution law for indemnification of Jewish and non-Jewish victims of the Nazi regime in the face of opposition from the State Department and the British Military Government in Germany. (See page 5 for reaction of American Jewish groups.)
Mr. McCloy’s approval, overruling the highest military government authorities, was reported by the Jewish Telegraphic Agency from Washington five days ago. It became known here yesterday. Proclamation of the indemnification law by the minister-presidents of each of the four Western German states is expected within the next two weeks. Its beneficiaries will include displaced persons in Germany and Nazi victims who were forced to emigrate to other countries. Each of them will receive either a monthly pension or lump sum payment.
Expressing “the deepest gratitude of thousands of Nazi victims” to Mr. McCloy for his “sympathetic and unstinting aid” on their behalf, Mr. Greenstein revealed that he had urged Mr. McCloy to take an unyielding stand on the restitution law because he considered that the law is weak enough as it is since the Germans can never really indemnify Nazi victims because at the magnitude of their crimes.
(The New York Times reported from Germany that Mr. McCloy has made a great impression on Jews there because of an incident whose telling is gaining wide circulation. According to the story, confirmed by Mr. McCloy, the High Commissioner-Designate was asked recently by a German leader “to forget the Dachau and Belsen concentration camps and think of us Germans in terms of the new Germany.” “I assure you,” said Mr. McCloy, “that while I shall do everything in my power to help you get a fresh start and win a dignified and responsible place in the family of nations I shall not forget Dachau and Belsen.”)
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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.
