Oct. 15



USA//CALIFORNIA:

Elizabeth Taylor sued over van Gogh----Family: Painting was looted by
Nazis


Four descendants of a German woman whose possessions were confiscated by
the Nazis in the 1930s sued actress Elizabeth Taylor in federal court
Wednesday to recover a valuable Vincent van Gogh painting.

Taylor failed to review the ownership history of "View of the Asylum of
Saint-Remy" before acquiring it more than 40 years ago, according to the
lawsuit. The descendants of the late Margarete Mauthner are seeking
restitution and the painting, which has been appraised between $10
million to $15 million.

The plaintiffs are Andrew J. Orkin of Canada and three South African
residents, F. Mark Orkin, Sarah-Rose Josepha Adler and A. Heinrich Zille.

Andrew Orkin said in a phone interview that he, F. Mark Orkin and Adler
are the great-grandchildren of Mauthner, who died in 1947 in South Africa
at age 84.

"We want the painting back right now. It's a Nazi-confiscated asset and
we're entitled to have the painting returned to us," Thomas Hamilton, the
plaintiffs' attorney, said in a phone interview from Washington, D.C.

Phone calls to attorneys for Taylor were not immediately returned.

The lawsuit followed one Taylor filed in May requesting to be declared
the rightful owner of the painting, which had hung in the living room of
her Bel-Air estate.

In 1963, Taylor's father, Francis Taylor, bought the painting on his
daughter's behalf for $257,600 at a Sotheby's auction in London. At the
time, it was owned by art collector Alfred Wolf.

The sales brochure warned that the painting was likely confiscated by the
Nazis, according to the lawsuit.

At least three publications used by art dealers showed that Mauthner
owned the painting, Hamilton said, adding that the Holocaust Victims
Redress Act mandates that seized artwork be returned to victims of Nazi
persecution.

In a statement after her lawsuit was filed, Taylor said, "I have not been
presented with any information that suggests the painting was ever in
Nazi possession, nor that there is any other basis for these claims."

(source: Associated Press)



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HUNGARIAN GOLD TRAIN----Administration ignores Holocaust survivors' right
to restitution


On an issue that defines a moral nation, the Bush administration fails
where so many other governments are succeeding.

At the urging of the United States, governments and institutions worldwide
have been conducting unpleasant research, facing long-suppressed facts and
restituting assets belonging to Holocaust survivors. The test for the
United States is now, as mediators attempt to conclude a three-year
dispute before a federal district court hearing in Miami in a matter of
days.

As is now well-recognized, Nazi persecution of Jews and other minorities
involved theft on a breathtaking scale. Over the past decade, German,
French, Austrian and Swiss firms and governments have paid $8 billion to
victims. Relying on its own moral leadership, the United States urged
other countries to create commissions to do the same; 17 nations did so.
Our own government's response came in 1998 when, by statute that was
demonstrably bipartisan, Congress created the President's Advisory
Commission on Holocaust Assets in the U.S.

The commission, which I chaired, reported its unanimous analysis of those
assets that had come under U.S. control during and after World War II.
Thus it is dismaying that the Bush administration has been fighting hard
against the interests of Holocaust survivors in the most recent struggle
for restitution. In the matter of the Hungarian Gold Train, the United
States refuses to compensate thousands of Holocaust survivors whose
property was misused by the U.S. government itself.

Our work documented one instance, among others, that we specifically
called 'an egregious failure of the U.S. to follow its own policy
regarding restitution of Holocaust victims' property after World War II.''

In 1944, Germany's occupation of Hungary included the swift and systematic
confiscation of property belonging to Jews, Romas and others, even giving
receipts. A train loaded with more than two dozen boxcars of such stolen
loot as art, religious items, Persian rugs and thousands of wedding rings
was taken to Austria. After the war, this train was turned over to the
U.S. Army, which was obligated by U.S. policy and law, to return its
contents to their rightful owners.

Instead, as evidence has shown, the property was mishandled. U.S.
officials declared the property's national origin and ownership
''unidentifiable.'' No inventory was made. There was widespread looting,
including improper requisitions of property by senior U.S. military
officers.

Eventually, with its value plummeting, the United States auctioned off the
remaining items in 1948. Proceeds went to refugee organizations, but they
did not go to the Hungarian owners, who were begging for their property's
return.

Since publication of this particular study in 1999, more research brought
new and confirming facts to light. Surely some feared that their
disclosure would taint the Army's reputation. But the commission closed
its doors in 2000 believing that we had provided the work for an historic
moral reckoning, in the best traditions of our nation.

Unfortunately, since taking office, the Bush administration has ardently
worked to block the Gold Train survivors from achieving restitution.
Justice Department attorneys have deployed an array of technical devices
-- asserting the same arguments of statute of limitations, sovereign
immunity and proof of property that the United States so adamantly
deplored and successfully urged other nations to forswear.

The department even conveniently questioned the bipartisan conclusions of
the commission and has wrongfully claimed that we somehow backed away from
our own findings, a claim whose inaccuracy I have addressed recently in
the Congressional Record. The commission stands by its report: We never
did retract it, undermine it or walk away from it. It is disgraceful that
the administration now asserts otherwise.

It is not too late for the Bush administration to right this wrong.
Officials should work in the current mediation with survivors to achieve a
fair and immediate settlement, paying reasonable compensation. These
Holocaust survivors are elderly, many frail and ailing, some dying.
Continued delay is the enemy of justice. In this greatest of moral issues,
courtroom antics, legal tricks and political posturing have no place.

The United States appears to be in retreat from a hard-won global
consensus on the importance of historic justice. The idea that nations and
corporations should look into their own pasts and act accordingly --
regardless of who might have been at fault, or how painful it may be --
was a proud achievement. Then, the United States had the standing to
advance it. With its conduct in the Gold Train case, the U.S. government
is at risk of squandering that moral standing.

(source: Opinion; Edgar Bronfman, president of the World Jewish Congress,
served as chairman of the President's Advisory Commission on Holocaust
Assets in the United States during its entire tenure from 1998 to 2000;
in the Miami Herald)

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Rebuilding a Holocaust Museum


A Holocaust museum in Terre Haute, Indiana is being rebuilt
after it was burned down in an arson attack last year.

According to a New York Post report, a groundbreaking ceremony was held
for the new CANDLES Museum, which stands for Children of Auschwitz Nazi
Deadly Experiments Survivors. The event was made possible by backers
raising $300,000.

Persons involved in the project are optimistic; hoping the museum will
reopen its doors in February 2005, adding an additional $150,000 will be
needed to accomplish the goal.

(source: IsraelNationalNews)



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Federal Judge Dismisses 20 Holocaust Suits


In New York, a federal judge Thursday threw out 20 lawsuits accusing an
Italian insurance company of failing to pay benefits to victims of the
Holocaust.

U.S. District Judge Michael Mukasey said the lawsuits are pre-empted by
the U.S. government's policy of trying to resolve such claims through a
special commission.

The class-action lawsuits - filed in New York, Wisconsin, Florida and
California by Holocaust survivors and their heirs - claimed Assicurazioni
Generali refused to honor policies held by victims of the World War II-era
genocide.

The company was pleased with the ruling, adding it "stands by its moral
commitment and its responsibilities to continue to pay all proper claims,"
lawyer Kenneth Bialkin said. "No deserving policy holder should have any
concern."

Lawrence Kill, a lawyer for the plaintiffs, said he had not read the
ruling and that no decision about an appeal had been made.

The judge said his findings were guided in part by the Supreme Court
ruling last year that struck down a California law enacted to help
Holocaust survivors or their heirs collect on dormant insurance policies.

In 2000, Generali agreed to pay up to $100 million to settle thousands of
Holocaust-era claims through the International Commission for Holocaust
Era Insurance Claims.

The commission includes Jewish organizations, U.S. and European
regulators, Israel and five European insurance companies that operated
during the Nazi era and now have subsidiaries in the United States.

(source: Associated Press)




(in) BELGIUM:

Rabbis laud European Parliament for condemnation of Holocaust remarks


Jewish leaders in Europe are praising the European Parliament for its
swift condemnation of a far-right French legislator's remarks questioning
the Holocaust.

The French official was quoted as saying earlier this week that historians
need to decide if gas chambers were used to kill Jews.

European Parliament officials called the remarks deeply shocking. And
calls have been made to have the legislator removed from his university
post.

Jewish leaders say they appreciate the public condemnation. They also say
Jews across Europe are concerned about all "matters relating to Holocaust
denial."

(source: WHO television news)




RUSSIA:

Memorial Event Honors Holocaust Victims


A Holocaust commemoration ceremony took place in Pushkin, a city located
not far from S. Petersburg. Participants in the event marked the
anniversary of the tragic events of October 1941, when Nazi forces
massacred several hundred Jews in the streets of this occupied city.
Though Soviet authorities did not publicize these murders for many
years following the war, nothing could wipe this tragedy from the memory
of those who lived to tell about it.



It was only in 1986 that the first testaments from witnesses of this
genocide act were recorded. According to Konstantin Plotkin, the historian
and artist who authored the book "Leningrad: Holocaust Zone", believes
that the death toll of the Pushkin massacre was no less than 250-300 Jews.
With many years of archival research behind him, on the basis of
historical documents, Plotkin is considered to be a specialist in this
area. Additional research done by Gennady Farber, Alexander Frenkel, and
Leonid Kolton have since revealed many more new horrifying details about
this Jewish massacre.

There were three waves of killing in Pushkin. First, Jewish families were
rounded up and executed on a central square. Then, the Nazis issued an
order obliging Jews to register in the commandants office. The hundreds of
Jews who came to the office were then brought to the Yekaterina's Castle
and shot to death in the neighboring parks. Finally, children were led to
their death near the southern branch of Alexanders Palace, the dead then
buried in a ditch. The second stage was particularly degrading, with Nazi
officers killing Jewish men upon observing whether or not they had been
circumcised.

In 1990, the Holocaust Research Group, which is part of the Leningrad
Jewish Association, requested permission from City Council to put up a
monument to these victims on the site of this mass killing. Vadim Sidur's
artwork 'Formula Skorbi' (Formula for Grief) was chosen for the memorial,
to commemorate the memory of these Holocaust victims. The monument was
inaugurated on October 13th, 1991 and memorial ceremonies are held here
every year on this date.

Alexander Frenkel, the Director of the Memorial Center and one of the
persons who helped to establish a monument at the site of the mass burial
site, gave the opening address at the memorial ceremony. Cantor Grigory
Yakerson of the Great Choral Synagogue in S. Petersburg recited a prayer.
Participants then laid stones at the memorial in honor and remembrance of
these Holocaust victims.

Natalya Shifrina, who lost all her relatives at the age of six, had
miraculously left the city with her kindergarten group several days before
the Nazis entered Pushkin. She was one of the first participants to lay
flowers on the monument. "I feel pride to say that I contributed to the
memorial's construction," she stated.

Another elderly participant, Arkady Lipkind, is leading his own
investigation of local Nazi crimes. He is convinced that at least 800 Jews
were killed in Pushkin. Other Jews came for the event on several buses
from S. Petersburg.

The 'Nigun' and 'Zmires' bands performed a song Ghetto lullaby; a student
Matvey Gordon sang a verse in Yiddish presumably written by Shmerke
Kocherginsky while he was in the Lodz Ghetto.

"With each passing year, I see more and more youth participating in this
memorial event," stated Alexander Frenkel. "Remembering Holocaust is
important part of our culture."

(source: Federation of Jewish Communities of the CIS)






FRANCE:

L'Oral profited from victims of Nazis, court told


The French cosmetics company L'Oral profited from a house which had been
confiscated from its Jewish owners when they were sent to their death in
concentration camps during the second world war, it was claimed in the
appeal court in Paris yesterday.

Edith Rosenfelder, the sole survivor, now 76, has embarked on a long legal
battle for compensation from the company, which had its German
headquarters on the site of her childhood home for more than 30 years.

The case is complicated by years of confusion, worsened by the frequent
sale and resale of the property, but the family claims that L'Oral is
guilty of receiving stolen goods.

"L'Oral know that the property was confiscated, and they know that the
owners are still alive, Mrs Rosenfelder's daughter Monica Waitzfelder
said.

"All the other businesses which took Jewish property have since returned
it, without any great debate. I don't understand why L'Oral should be any
different from the others."

The battle has been waged by three generations of the Rosenfelder family.
In 1937, as the Nazi persecution of Jews increased, the family abandoned
its three-storey house in the German industrial city of Karlsruhe and fled
to France.

Fritz Rosenfelder was forced to sell the house to a Nazi offi cial who ran
an insurance company, BGV.

Ms Waitzfelder says that the proceeds of the sale, which amounted to only
12% of the 1936 value of the house, were never paid to her family.

The family was later deported. Edith Rosenfelder escaped but her mother
died in Auschwitz in 1942 and her father died in a Red Cross camp in
Switzerland in 1945.

The Jewish restitution legislation signed by the allies at the end of the
war stated that even transactions which appeared to have been made with
the owners' consent could be declared invalid.

The Rosenfelders' case centres on the argument that since the original
sale was illegal, all subsequent sales were equally unlawful.

They stress that although a restitution payment was made in 1951 to the
Jewish Restitution Successor Organisation, it was done without the
family's knowledge and none of the 5,000 German marks paid by the
insurance company BGV ever reached the family.

In 1954 BGV sold the property to an offshoot of L'Oral, Haarfarben und
Parfmerien GmbH - later L'Oral Allemagne - which introduced the brand to
the German market.

L'Oral says it bought out the offshoot in 1961, and cannot be held
responsible for transactions before then. The property was sold for DM5.3m
in 1991. Yesterday the court began considering whether L'Oral can be sued
for compensation.

(source: The Guardian)