Panel slams Israel's handling of Holocaust survivors

Haaretz Last update - 03:14 23/06/2008
By Anshel Pfeffer

A state committee appointed to review successive governments' aid to Holocaust survivors recommended, in a report submitted yesterday, that the government substantially increase stipends paid to 43,000 survivors, making them comparable to 75 percent of the reparations payment survivors receive from the German government. The committee, headed by retired Supreme Court justice Dalia Dorner, concluded that Israel was under a moral, as well as legal, obligation to take care of those survivors who could not sue Germany directly after the reparations agreement was signed in 1952, and said the state had evaded its responsibility for decades.

Speaking at a press conference yesterday, Dorner said that by forfeiting reparations on behalf of those survivors, the state had created a situation in which "whoever did not choose to live in Israel received much greater compensation." By the committee's calculations, the value of monies and goods Israel received under the reparations law now computes to NIS 61.5 billion, whereas over the years survivors received payouts and medical services valued only at NIS 38 billion in real terms. Some 43,000 survivors who came to Israel only after the beginning of 1953 were barred from suing Germany, accrued damages of between NIS 1.3 million and NIS 2.2 million per survivor (depending on an individual's disability ranking).

The committee found that the government ignored a High Court of Justice ruling from 12 years ago that ordered parity between the Israeli and German stipends. However, Dorner said the committee took into account the government's budget constraints in recommending that survivors be compensated retroactively only from the beginning of this year, and receive payments equal to only 75 percent of the German pension. This means that 43,000 survivors should soon see their monthly allowance increase by hundreds of shekels (depending on disability ranking), and would also be eligible for a one-time grant of up to NIS 3,900.

On submitting their report yesterday to Prime Minister Ehud Olmert, the committee members demanded that he take steps to begin implementing their recommendations within three weeks. Olmert ordered that a committee, headed by the director general of his office, Raanan Dinur, work to implement the report's conclusions. Implementing the report will cost an estimated NIS 262 million this year, but that sum is expected to go down in upcoming years, as some survivors die off.

About two-thirds of Holocaust survivors have already died without benefit of improved living conditions, Dorner said yesterday, and half of those still alive today will pass away over the next decade. The committee criticized the conduct of the Finance Ministry office in charge of handling survivors, saying it made things difficult for survivors and treated them in a "random" and sometimes even "arbitrary " manner. A committee member, Prof. Zvi Eisikovitz, said at the press conference that "survivors have to stop being treated like suspects." The committee recommended setting up a sub-unit in the office whose job would be to approach survivors, instead of waiting for them to apply, and help them to maximize their rights. Another recommendation is for the government to establish a special welfare service for Holocaust survivors.