A Geneva court ruled last week that the famous Wolf Haggadah will remain in custody of the examining magistrate here, pending the outcome of a three-way legal battle to establish its ownership.
That was the decision sought at this stage by the World Jewish Congress, according to Gerhard Riegner, co-chairman of the WJC Governing Board, who lives in Geneva.
The organization is representing the Jewish communities of East and West Berlin as the rightful owners.
The other claimants are the Polish Ministry of Culture, which claims the haggadah was stolen from Warsaw in 1984; and the haggadah’s putative owner, identified as a Canadian Jew named Hecht, who put the rare item up for auction in Geneva.
But the WJC and its clients appear to have won the latest round.
Riegner quoted the ruling by the Tribunal of First Instance here to the effect “that the claim to property made by claimant (the two Berlin Jewish communities and the WJC) is the most likely and that no other party can offer a more likely claim.”
The ruling allows the WJC 90 days to introduce principal court action before the competent tribunal, Riegner explained in a letter to Elan Steinberg and Israel Singer, respectively the executive director and secretary-general of the WJC in New York.
The letter was made available to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency in New York by Steinberg. Riegner spoke to the JTA in Geneva.
The haggadah, written in French and dating back to the 13th or 14th centuries, is valued at between $1 million and $1.5 million.
CANADIAN ACCUSED OF THEFT
It was to have gone on the block at the Habsburg and Feldman firm’s Judaica auction in June. But the haggadah was withdrawn from the auction at the last minute because of the conflicting claims of ownership.
The haggadah had been part of an outstanding collection of Judaica owned by a German Jew, Albert Wolf, who died in 1907 at the age of 66. He left the haggadah to the Berlin Jewish community. It became part of the Jewish Kunstmuseum in Berlin.
Wolf’s collection was confiscated by the Nazis in 1938. Part was transported to the town of Glatz in Silesia, which was then part of Germany but is now Glodzko in Poland, where it was found by the Russians in 1944.
The Polish government brought it back to the Jewish Historical Institute in Warsaw. There it stayed for 40 years, where it was appraised by a Judaica scholar, Professor Arthur Eisenbach, at the request of the Polish authorities.
How the haggadah was removed from Poland is not known.
The Canadian claiming ownership insists he has no knowledge that it was stolen. But Riegner has accused Hecht of the theft.
The Polish authorities are seeking Swiss assistance for legal action against him.
Philippe Grumbach, a Jewish lawyer here who represents the WJC, said the case may continue for years. It is even possible the Geneva court will declare itself not competent to rule, he said.
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