06 February 2007
Holocaust survivors from around the world are to gather in Warsaw this month to urge the Polish government to compensate them for property confiscated by the former Communist regime. Poland, the biggest post-Communist European Union member, is the only country from eastern Europe, besides Belarus, which has not enacted a program for the restitution of property seized after World War Two. Attempts to solve the issue after the collapse of communism in 1989 have failed, mostly on the grounds that it would be too costly for the state budget. Representatives of Jewish groups will gather in the Polish capital on Feb. 27, hoping to convince the authorities to speed up legislation allowing the restitution of lost property.
"I am coming to Poland to meet Polish authorities and present our point of view," Israel Singer, chairman of the Policy Council of the World Jewish Congress, told the Polish newspaper "Rzeczpospolita". Poland had Europe's biggest Jewish community until World War II, when the Nazis killed nearly 90 per cent of the country's 3.3 million Jews. The post-war Communist rulers seized their property as well as that of people who left or fled the country. Naphtali Lavie, from the World Jewish Restitution Organization, told "Reuters" that he expected the government to take immediate action to resolve the issue. "We have been waiting for this for a very long time," he said by telephone from Jerusalem. "Many of the people who lost their goods are very old today ... How long are they supposed to wait?"
Poland's ruling conservatives promised to resolve the issue and pass relevant legislation in coming months. But the government proposal envisages compensation for only 15 per cent of the property lost. Polish officials estimate total claims for pre-war real estate and other property amount to at least US$ 20 billion. Germans who were displaced from Poland after the war and other groups are also seeking compensation. For many Holocaust survivors, 15 per cent is not enough. "How can you give someone back only a part of a house he lived in. This is not a restitution," Lavie said. "I would not call this a compromise ... it is depriving people of their property and parts of their lives," he said.
Relations between Poles and Jews were damaged by an anti-Semitic campaign conducted by the communist authorities in 1968 when most of the 300,000 Polish Jews who survived the Holocaust left the country. Relations have improved since the end of communism, with the authorities trying to fight Poland's reputation for anti-Semitism. The country now has strong ties with Israel and is an ally of the United States.
