The Israeli government has done little or nothing regarding the expropriation of Jewish property in former Communist countries. Knesset Economics Committee chairman MK Avraham Poraz (Shinui) attributes the above comment to former US Deputy Secretary of the Treasury Stuart Eizenstat. Poraz was speaking at a special committee session on the refusal by former European Communist states to return the expropriated properties to their owners. Poraz said that Eizenstat made the comment to him just before Eizenstat ended his term of office and the Bush Administration took office.
According to Poraz, Eizenstat told him that the Israeli government is avoiding any involvement in the matter of Jewish property so as not to damage its interests in Eastern Europe.
World Jewish Restitution Organization chairman Naftali Lavie said that Eizenstat assisted in both the Swiss banks affair and in the compensation arrangement for former forced labor victims. Lavie claims however that Eizenstat has not helped in the matter of restitution of Jewish property in Poland and the Czech Republic, and has even done harm by intervening to prevent Congress from taking action against these countries.
Lavie claims that the late Prime Minister Yitzhak Rabin and former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu were the only Israeli prime ministers to seriously raise the matter of property restitution.
For now, the Economics Committee decided to request Knesset Speaker MK Avraham Burg to petition the US Senate and Polish Sejm to change the law so that Poland will not discriminate against Jewish Holocaust survivors. Burg will also be asked to make a similar appeal to the Romanian government.
The committee also discussed taking steps against the Hungarian government, which settled for paying compensation of only $100-130 for each Hungarian Jew murdered in the Holocaust.
Published by Israel's Business Arena on 21 March 2001