The Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany, or Claims Conference, represents the world's

Jews Jews (, , ), or the Jewish people, are an ethnoreligious group and nation, originating from the Israelites of History of ancient Israel and Judah, ancient Israel and Judah. They also traditionally adhere to Judaism. Jewish ethnicity, rel ...

in negotiating for compensation and restitution for victims of

Nazi Nazism (), formally named National Socialism (NS; , ), is the far-right politics, far-right Totalitarianism, totalitarian socio-political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Germany. During H ...

persecution and their heirs. According to Section 2(1)(3) of the Property Law of Germany, the Claims Conference is a legal successor with respect to the claims not filed on time by Jewish people. This fact was reasserted in decisions of some lawsuits which attempted to redefine the Claims Conference as a "trustee" of these assets. These lawsuits were dismissed. The Claims Conference administers compensation funds, recovers unclaimed Jewish property, and allocates funds to institutions that provide

social welfare Welfare spending is a type of government support intended to ensure that members of a society can meet basic human needs such as food and shelter. Social security may either be synonymous with welfare, or refer specifically to social insurance p ...

services to

Holocaust survivors Holocaust survivors are people who survived the Holocaust, defined as the persecution and attempted annihilation of the Jews by Nazi Germany and its collaborators before and during World War II in Europe and North Africa. There is no universall ...

and preserve the memory and lessons of the

Holocaust The Holocaust (), known in Hebrew language, Hebrew as the (), was the genocide of History of the Jews in Europe, European Jews during World War II. From 1941 to 1945, Nazi Germany and Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy ...

. Julius Berman has led the organization as chairman of the board, and currently president, .

History

The organization was founded in 1951 as a result of negotiations between 23 national and international Jewish organizations and the government of

West Germany West Germany was the common English name for the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) from its formation on 23 May 1949 until German reunification, its reunification with East Germany on 3 October 1990. It is sometimes known as the Bonn Republi ...

under Chancellor

Konrad Adenauer Konrad Hermann Joseph Adenauer (5 January 1876 – 19 April 1967) was a German statesman and politician who served as the first Chancellor of Germany, chancellor of West Germany from 1949 to 1963. From 1946 to 1966, he was the first leader of th ...

Compensation programs

As of 2012, the Claims Conference had administered the following programs, which provide direct payments to Jewish victims of Nazi persecution. Programs were negotiated with the German government and are subject to eligibility criteria determined by the German government. The Conference continually negotiates to expand and liberalize eligibility criteria in order to include additional victims in the programs. In 1978, after 25 years of payments, the total Federal Republic of Germany compensation payments amounted to 53 billion Deutsch Marks. Payments from some programs continue to this day. * The Article 2 Fund, a lifetime

pension A pension (; ) is a fund into which amounts are paid regularly during an individual's working career, and from which periodic payments are made to support the person's retirement from work. A pension may be either a " defined benefit plan", wh ...

for certain persons who were incarcerated in

concentration camp A concentration camp is a prison or other facility used for the internment of political prisoners or politically targeted demographics, such as members of national or ethnic minority groups, on the grounds of national security, or for exploitati ...

ghetto A ghetto is a part of a city in which members of a minority group are concentrated, especially as a result of political, social, legal, religious, environmental or economic pressure. Ghettos are often known for being more impoverished than other ...

s, or forced

labor battalion Labour battalions have been a form of alternative service or unfree labour in various countries in lieu of or resembling regular military service. In some cases they were the result of some kind of discrimination, discriminative segregation of t ...

s, or who were forced to go into hiding. Eligibility criteria have been negotiated continually with Germany, and include limits on income, established by the German government. * The Central and Eastern European Fund, a pension program similar to the Article 2 Fund, which distributes payments to survivors located in

Eastern Europe Eastern Europe is a subregion of the Europe, European continent. As a largely ambiguous term, it has a wide range of geopolitical, geographical, ethnic, cultural and socio-economic connotations. Its eastern boundary is marked by the Ural Mountain ...

and the

former Soviet Union The post-Soviet states, also referred to as the former Soviet Union or the former Soviet republics, are the independent sovereign states that emerged/re-emerged from the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991. Prior to their independence, they ...

(FSU). * Hardship Fund, a one-time payment for Jewish victims of Nazism who emigrated from Soviet bloc countries and meet certain eligibility criteria established by the German government. * Holocaust Victims Compensation Fund, a one-time payment for Jewish victims of Nazism who fled from the Nazis. Comparable to the Hardship Fund but for current residents of the Former Soviet Union. Application deadline has expired. * The Child Survivor Fund is a one-time payment intended to acknowledge the suffering of

survivors who endured unimaginable trauma in their childhoods. This fund is open to Jewish Nazi victims who were persecuted as Jews and were born January 1, 1928, or later. * The Spouse of Holocaust Survivor Fund is a fund to compensate the spouses of deceased recipients of the Claims Conference's Article 2 or Central and Eastern European (CEEF) pension funds. * Romanian Survivor Relief Program - in 2018 the Claims Conference announced the availability of funds from the Caritatea Foundation in Romania to be distributed to Jewish Nazi victims who lived under the Romanian regime anytime between 1937 and 1944 and currently live outside of Romania and Israel. The Caritatea Foundation was created by the Federation of Jewish Communities in Romania and the World Jewish Restitution Organization (WJRO). These funds are from the restitution of communal properties wrongfully taken from Jewish communities of

Romania Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern Europe, Eastern and Southeast Europe. It borders Ukraine to the north and east, Hungary to the west, Serbia to the southwest, Bulgaria to the south, Moldova to ...

during and after

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

. * Program for Former Slave and Forced Laborers, a one-time payment for persons "compelled to perform work in a concentration camp...a ghetto, or a similar place of incarceration under comparable conditions." Application deadline has expired. * Fund for Victims of Medical Experiments and Other Injuries: Application deadline has expired. *Fund for the Vaccination of Holocaust Survivors In 2022, the Claims Conference allocated funds for welfare services to support approximately 10,000 Jewish Holocaust survivors (5,000 with home care and 500 bed-bound) in Ukraine, who required additional assistance due to the

Russian invasion of Ukraine On 24 February 2022, , starting the largest and deadliest war in Europe since World War II, in a major escalation of the Russo-Ukrainian War, conflict between the two countries which began in 2014. The fighting has caused hundreds of thou ...

in February 2022. The organization also committed an additional $47 million for welfare services in 2023, alongside other direct payments to survivors.

International Holocaust Survivors Night (IHSN)

Every year since 2017 the Claims Conference has hosted International Holocaust Survivors Night on the third night of Chanukah to honor Jewish survivors of the Shoah. Events have been hosted in Jerusalem, Berlin, the New York/New Jersey metro area, Paris and Moscow.

Criticism

On May 19, 2006, ''

The Jewish Chronicle ''The Jewish Chronicle'' (''The JC'') is a London-based Jewish weekly newspaper. Founded in 1841, it is the oldest continuously published Jewish newspaper in the world. Its editor () is Daniel Schwammenthal. The newspaper is published every Fri ...

'' revealed that the Claims Conference highest-paid official, executive vice-president Gideon Taylor, was awarded $437,811 (£240,000) in salary and pension (2004 numbers). An advisor to British survivors in compensation claims in the 1990s, Dr Pinto-Duschinsky, commented: "It is wrong for the executive vice-president to earn annually the same as the compensation for several hundred former slave laborers. The moral authority of the leading Jewish organizations is gravely weakened by excessively high salaries for top officials." One of the most outspoken critics of the Claims Conference is Isi Leibler, the former chairman of the Governing Board of the World Jewish Congress, who cites allegations of incompetence, impropriety and cover-ups as well as the absence of an independent review board, bureaucratization and a domination by a small clique.Isi Leibler (May 8, 2007).
Now, the 'March of the Living' scandal
. ''Jerusalem Post''. Retrieved 2020-09-26.Isi Leibler. "At the expense of survivors. Candidly Speaking from Jerusalem". November 8, 2010, Available: http://wordfromjerusalem.com/?p=2513 In an article of ''

The Jerusalem Post ''The Jerusalem Post'' is an English language, English-language Israeli broadsheet newspaper based in Jerusalem, Israel, founded in 1932 during the Mandate for Palestine, British Mandate of Mandatory Palestine, Palestine by Gershon Agron as ''Th ...

'' he says that "the richest Jewish foundation in the world, has still failed to provide adequate financial assistance to elderly and sick Holocaust survivors who live in abject poverty in the twilight of their lives. An organization which boasts that it currently holds in trust $900 million in assets, yet fails to rectify such a condition, must be held accountable for one of the greatest scandals in contemporary Jewish life." The priorities of the organization have also been criticized. Among the critics is the Claims Conference own treasurer, Roman Kent, a Holocaust survivor, who told ''The Jewish Chronicle'': "Survivors are suffering. Our only priority should be the survivors, and everything else should be secondary. We are spending money for thousands of projects, but the health of the survivors can't wait. They are dying daily." .."I'm not saying that these are bad programs, but they can wait – or else they should be the responsibility of the world Jewish community, not the Claims Conference. In a 2006 investigative report, it was claimed the organization, while having $1.7 billion in its accounts, finances welfare assistance for only 9,000 survivors while "tens of millions of dollars each year" are spent on management expenses. Amidst this mounting criticism, the office of Germany's independent federal auditor announced it was considering an investigation of the Claims Conference in June 2008. In 2023 Claims Conference launched an international investigation into

Holocaust denial Historical negationism, Denial of the Holocaust is an antisemitic conspiracy theory that asserts that the genocide of Jews by the Nazi Party, Nazis is a fabrication or exaggeration. It includes making one or more of the following false claims: ...

ism. They presented the claim that a large percentage of Dutch youth dismissed the Holocaust. However, several investigators and reporters postulate that the research was done shoddily. Yet a more recent and extensive investigation by the Dutch government in 2024 does seem to correspond with the key findings of the Claims Conference report.

Money stolen from Claims Conference

On November 9, 2010, the US Attorney's Office announced an

indictment An indictment ( ) is a formal accusation that a person has committed a crime. In jurisdictions that use the concept of felonies, the most serious criminal offense is a felony; jurisdictions that do not use that concept often use that of an ind ...

against 11 employees of the Claims Conference and several other individuals for

fraud In law, fraud is intent (law), intentional deception to deprive a victim of a legal right or to gain from a victim unlawfully or unfairly. Fraud can violate Civil law (common law), civil law (e.g., a fraud victim may sue the fraud perpetrato ...

and

embezzlement Embezzlement (from Anglo-Norman, from Old French ''besillier'' ("to torment, etc."), of unknown origin) is a type of financial crime, usually involving theft of money from a business or employer. It often involves a trusted individual taking ...

of over $42 million from the Claims Conference. The Claims Conference management alerted the

Federal Bureau of Investigation The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the domestic Intelligence agency, intelligence and Security agency, security service of the United States and Federal law enforcement in the United States, its principal federal law enforcement ag ...

as soon as it discovered the fraud in 2009, and continues to cooperate with the FBI. On October 19, 2012, ''

The Forward ''The Forward'' (), formerly known as ''The Jewish Daily Forward'', is an American news media organization for a Jewish American audience. Founded in 1897 as a Yiddish-language daily socialist newspaper, ''The New York Times'' reported that Set ...

'' reported that the fraud had grown to $57 million. In 2013, an 8-year jail sentence was handed down to Art. 2 funds director Semen Domnitser.

Notable people

* Stuart E. Eizenstat, Chief Negotiator Ambassador * Nahum Goldmann, lead negotiator against Germany in 1951

References

External links

*
Rachel Blumenthal Lectures on the Creation of the Claims Conference
{{Authority control Holocaust charities and reparations Jewish charities based in Israel Fraud Compensation for victims of crime