Judging the Netherlands: Restitution Process, 1997-2000 Process, Restitution
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Manfred Gerstenfeld Manfred Gerstenfeld has done a masterful job of describing the more than sixty-year In the last years of the twentieth century, cycle that began with the Nazis’ destruction of Dutch Jewry, and then continued the many shortcomings of the postwar with the woefully inadequate immediate postwar efforts by the Dutch government Dutch Holocaust restitution became a at restitution of property, insurance claims, and other attempts to compensate Dutch major issue in the Dutch public debate. Holocaust survivors and families of victims. This book deals mainly, however, with The internationally publicized failures the belated but generally successful Dutch effort, in the last years of the twentieth of the Swiss banks regarding dormant Joel Fishman century and early part of the twenty-first century, to rectify the past deficiencies bank accounts from the war period and set a positive example of how governments can try to provide belated, although prompted investigations elsewhere as imperfect, justice, and to try to rectify in some small way the pain of their citizens Judging the Netherlands: the Judging well, including in the Netherlands. Copyright : stemming from wartime in general and the Shoah in particular. A further stimulus came when many Ambassador Stuart E. Eizenstat, Former U.S. Deputy Secretary of the Treasury; index cards of the Dutch looting bank Dr. Manfred Gerstenfeld is chairman of from the foreword Judging the LIRO, listing the stolen possessions of the Board of Fellows of the Jerusalem individual Jews, were found abandoned Center for Public Affairs. He has been in an Amsterdam attic. an international business strategist This book deals with the restitution of Jewish property that was looted during World Reports of the commissions of inquiry for forty years. His background is in War II. Jews who returned after the war were often made less than welcome. The Netherlands: revealed information about monies that chemistry, economics, environmental postwar restitution process was felt to be cold, bureaucratic, hostile, and humiliating. had belonged to murdered Jews and studies, and Jewish studies. This process ended in the 1950s. In 1997, however, bank records were accidentally were in the possession of the Dutch discovered that led to a renewed debate. The book discusses the various committees The Renewed Holocaust Gerstenfeld is a former director in an government, insurance companies, that were set up to deal with this second restitution. It also contains interviews with international business consultancy banks, and exchange brokers. the three ministers who were most involved. In the end the matter was settled and Restitution Process, 1997-2000 whose other shareholders included Negotiations between these parties apologies were made. Manfred Gerstenfeld has given a clear exposé of the various 1997-2000 Process, Restitution Holocaust Renewed The four of the world’s largest banks. He and representatives of the Jewish negotiations and written an important book that will always make very painful has worked in twenty countries and community led to sizable restitution reading for a Dutch public. his clients have included the boards payments. American intervention forced of several of the world’s largest Frits Bolkestein, former Dutch Minister of Defense; former EU Commissioner the Amsterdam Stock Exchange — multinational corporations, as well as Manfred Gerstenfeld which had been a major collaborator governments. He has also been a board Foreword by Stuart E. Eizenstat with the German occupiers — to pay member of several public companies This is oral history at its best. As a timely, well-documented, factual reconstruction tens of times more restitution than it including a large investment firm. and in-depth analysis of the Dutch Holocaust restitution process, this revealing was initially willing to. book is essential reading for everybody interested in the Holocaust-era restitution Gerstenfeld has authored fifteen books This book first gives the historical campaign of the 1990s. and edited five. Books of his have been background of the wartime persecution published in seven languages, including Johannes Houwink ten Cate, Professor for Holocaust and Genocide Studies, of the Dutch Jews, their chilly reception the Italian bestseller Revaluing Italy. University of Amsterdam Jerusalem Center For Public Affairs in the Netherlands after the war, and the His recent book, The Decay: Jews in a Institute for Global Jewish Affairs highly problematic postwar restitution Rudderless Netherlands, has sparked a process. major public debate in the country and The book then focuses on the reports of has had an international impact as well. the various commissions of inquiry in Gerstenfeld has also published articles the late 1990s, the development of the in leading newspapers and journals in negotiations, the reactions in the Jewish various countries on political, economic, community and Dutch society, as well environmental, religious, and historical as the emotional impact of the findings subjects. on commission members, negotiators, and journalists involved. The Epilogue describes developments over the past decade since the negotiations were concluded. Books by the Same Author Revaluing Italy, with Lorenzo Necci (Italian), 1992 Environment and Confusion: An Introduction to a Messy Subject, 1993 Israel’s New Future: Interviews, 1994 The State as a Business: Do-It-Yourself Political Forecasting (Italian), 1994 Judaism, Environmentalism and the Environment, 1998 The Environment in the Jewish Tradition: A Sustainable World (Hebrew), 2002 Europe’s Crumbling Myths: The Post-Holocaust Origins of Today’s Anti-Semitism, 2003 American Jewry’s Challenge: Conversations Confronting the 21st Century, 2004 Israel and Europe: An Expanding Abyss? 2005 European-Israeli Relations: Between Confusion and Change? 2006 The Abuse of Holocaust Memory: Distortions and Responses, 2009 Anti-Semitism in Norway (Norwegian), 2010 American Jewry’s Comfort Level: Present and Future, with Steven Bayme, 2010 The Decay: Jews in a Rudderless Netherlands (Dutch), 2010 Books Edited The New Clothes of European Anti-Semitism, with Shmuel Trigano (French), 2004 Academics against Israel and the Jews, 2007 Israel at the Polls 2006, with Shmuel Sandler and Jonathan Rynhold, 2008 Behind the Humanitarian Mask: The Nordic Countries, Israel and the Jews, 2008 Israel at the Polls 2009, with Shmuel Sandler and Hillel Frisch, 2010 Monograph The Autumn 2005 Riots in France: Their Possible Impact on Israel and the Jews, 2006 JUDGING THE NETHERLANDS THE RENEWED HOLOCAUST RESTITUTION PROCESS, 1997–2000 Manfred Gerstenfeld Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs Institute for Global Jewish Affairs The research and publication of this book was made possible in part by contri- butions of Kamer III of Stichting Marorgelden Overheid (SMO) and Stichting Collectieve Maror-gelden Israel (SCMI). This research project and publication of it has been supported by a grant from the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany. Copyright © 2011 by Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs (JCPA) and Manfred Gerstenfeld All rights reserved No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form, or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying or recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system—except for brief quotations in critical articles or reviews—without written permission from the JCPA, 13 Tel Hai Street, Jerusalem, 92107, Israel. Tel: +972 2 561 9281, Fax: + 972 2 561 9112. E-mail: [email protected], www.jcpa.org ISBN: 978-965-218-097-1 Set in New Times New Roman by Judith Sternberg, Jerusalem Printed at Hauser — Coop. Printing Press Ltd Cover design by Rami & Jacky Dedicated to the memory of Isaac Lipschits (1930–2008), the biographer of my late father, Dr. Rafael Gerstenfeld. Prof. Lipschits conveyed to me many initial insights into the new Dutch restitution process of the late 1990s. Table of Contents Acknowledgments 9 Foreword by Ambassador Stuart E. Eizenstat 11 Introduction 15 Chapter One: The Abandonment of Dutch Jewry 21 Chapter Two: The Postwar Years 29 Chapter Three: International Restitution at the End of the Twentieth Century 42 Chapter Four: Toward the Second Round of Dutch Restitution 54 Chapter Five: The Kordes Commission Reports 64 Chapter Six: The Scholten Commission Reports 73 Chapter Seven: Developments during the Van Kemenade Commission Investigations 90 Chapter Eight: The Van Kemenade Commission Report 107 Chapter Nine: Debates in the Van Kemenade Commission 123 Chapter Ten: Negotiations with the Insurers 136 Chapter Eleven: Negotiations with the Government 146 Chapter Twelve: The Debate during and after the Negotiations with the Government 160 Chapter Thirteen: A Major Defeat for the Banks and the Stock Exchange 170 Chapter Fourteen: Conclusion 183 Epilogue 192 Appendix: Interviews with Former Ministers 199 Index 211 Acknowledgments Thanks are due to the Jerusalem Center for Public Affairs for publishing this book, and appreciation is expressed to the Claims Conference, Kamer III of Stichting Marorgelden Overheid (SMO), and Stichting Collectieve Maror-gelden Israel (SCMI) for their financial assistance. Many people have provided insights for the book, either in writing or orally, for which I am very grateful. Their remarks have frequently been quoted. Memories of events on occasions differ to a significant extent between participants. Sometimes contradictory versions have been included in this volume. I want to thank in