The Jewish Week - 12.04.2003

 

 

 

 

The Jewish Week

Focus On Needs In FSU

Claims Conference spending lion’s share of ’04 allocations to help Holocaust survivors ‘living in hovels.’ 

Stewart Ain - Staff Writer

The board of directors of the Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany is being asked to allocate $60 million to needy Jewish survivors worldwide next year, plus an additional $14.5 million for Holocaust education programs. 

Julius Berman, chairman of the Claims Conference, said that despite recently completed demographic studies that arrived at different figures for the numbers of survivors worldwide, the allocations committee focused on helping only those survivors in need. 

Experts presented the needs assessments for survivors in the United States, Israel, the former Soviet Union and Eastern Europe that were used to help guide the decision makers. 

The largest allocation, $24 million, is slated for programs in the former Soviet Union, the Baltics and Eastern Europe. Recent studies have calculated that there are about 150,000 survivors in the former Soviet Union. 

“A survivor in New York is nowhere near confronted with the needs survivors in the former Soviet Union face,” said Berman. “Similarly, there is a safety net in Israel. Therefore, while there are clearly survivors in need there — and we have a responsibility to them — there is no comparison to the needs of survivors in the former Soviet Union. They have no safety net and live in hovels. So we ignored the census data and focused on need and the extent of that need.” 

About 200 grants were awarded from the total of $74.5 million. Most of the larger grants are for the renewal of existing programs. 

Gideon Taylor, executive vice president of the Claims Conference, said the money would be used to support programs that will help more than 100,000 survivors worldwide. 

Berman said another $15.5 million would be allocated in the spring to bring the Claims Conference allocation in 2004 to $90 million. He said this was the same amount distributed last year. 

The money for distribution includes the sale of heirless Jewish property in the former East Germany, so Berman said this amount is not likely to be available much longer. 

“Our sales are decreasing because the value of the property now being sold is less [than property previously sold] and German real estate prices have gone down,” Berman said. 

At the request of survivors, the Claims Conference recently made public all of the unclaimed Jewish property it acquired from Germany. That list is now on the Claims Conference Web site, www.claimscon.org. 

Berman said that anyone who provides proof of family ownership of that property will receive 80 percent of the Claims Conference selling price. The deadline to place a claim is March 31. 

“That deadline is hard and fast,” Berman said, noting that the organization had advanced it several times in the past. 

Along with the $24 million for survivors in the former Soviet Union and Europe, programs for survivors in Israel will receive more than $20 million. Those in North America are slated to receive $12 million. 

Taylor said most of the money to be allocated in Israel would be used to provide survivors with home care. 

Elan Steinberg, executive director of the World Jewish Congress, wondered whether some of the allocations could truly be said to be helping survivors alone. He noted that $7.5 million has been recommended by the allocations committee to build geriatric wings for hospitals in Israel. Berman said those wings house a sizable number of survivors. 

But Steinberg was not convinced. 

“Hospitals are wonderful causes,” he said. “Holocaust survivors use them, but so do Arabs and others. Holocaust survivors also ride the city subways. Does that mean we should give a subvention to the Transit Authority?” 

The 58-member board of the Claims Conference is expected to vote on the allocation request early next month.