Jewish community leaders indicated immediate opposition today to the draft of a plan worked out by the Austrian Finance Ministry for restitution of Jews and other victims of Nazism. Wilhelm Krell, secretary general of the Jewish Agency Community Council, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency the offer was “insufficient, very poor.”
The proposal, which is expected to meet with opposition by all Jews and an official protest on the part of the Jewish Community, lumps Jews and other Nazi victims together with returning prisoners of war and others who were not victims of the regime of 1938-45.
Loss of apartment and furniture will be repaid on a point system which will give victims anywhere from 2,000 to 12,000 schillings (approx. $80 to $480), but only if their income in 1955 was no more than the equivalent of $2,880. The aged, sick and relief recipients will receive priority treatment.
Compensation for internment–applying equally to POW’s in the USSR and Jews who were interned all over the Pacific and Shanghai–will amount to the equivalent of $10 per month of detention.
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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.
