Some German credits in Britain may be made available to Israel for needed oil and other purchases, the Times of London reported in a special article on the German-Israel reparations negotiations at The Hague.
The article said there was also a proposal that Germany apply to the International Bank of Settlements for a loan of $150,000,000 which, if granted, would be placed to Israel’s account.
“There are a number of other provisions in the draft agreement which, when signed and ratified by the respective parliaments, should start, by the beginning of 1953, a considerable flow of German goods to Israel and help the new state overcome its present acute financial crisis,” the article declared.
“This flow should strengthen it also from a military point of view, a consideration which has played a part in Israel’s decision to start talks with Germany, ” the paper commented.
The paper sharply criticized the manner in which the negotiations have been conducted behind a veil of secrecy. This secrecy, it said, was imposed by Israel because of the bitter feeling, both in the Knesset and the country itself, against any form of negotiations with Germany. Many Jews in Britain and America, the paper added, shared this sentiment.
The West German Government likewise was anxious to avoid widespread publicity, the paper declared, because it was “conscious that anti-Semitism is far from dead in Germany and afraid of chauvinistic clamor on the part of millions of refugees from the East.”
The article questioned the wisdom of this secrecy. It described the cold atmosphere in which the talks were held and said that early in the talks, the Israelis refused to smoke in the conference room so that they would not have to offer the Germans cigarettes or be offered them by the Germans.
“Some of the Jewish delegates had themselves suffered grievously at the hands of the Nazis and before sitting down to the same table with Germans, had to submit to a difficult process of disregarding their own feelings-a process which was not made easier by the fact that some of the German delegates themselves had been members of the Nazi Party or had worked in the Foreign Office under Ribbentrop.” the paper said.
The Times believes that there is little prospect of any form of peace, or even of normal diplomatic relationship between Germany and Israel. “The most that can be said is that good beginnings have been made at The Hague and that the Jews, by virtue of their unfortunate history, have never made a cult of the long memory.” the article concluded.
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.
