Negotiations
The Negotiations were held between Israeli Foreign Minister Moshe Sharett and West German Chancellor Konrad Adenauer.
In 1951, Israeli authorities made a claim to the four powers occupying post-war Germany regarding compensation and reimbursement, based on the fact that Israel had absorbed and resettled 500,000 Holocaust survivors. They calculated that since absorption had cost 3,000 dollars per person ($26,862 in today dollars), they were owed 1.5 billion dollars ($13,400,000,000 in today dollars) by Germany. They also figured that six billion dollars worth of Jewish property had been pillaged by the Nazis, but stressed that the Germans could never make up for what they did with any type of material recompense. Negotiations leading to the Reparations Agreement between Israel and West Germany began in March 1952, and were conducted between representatives of the government of the Federal Republic, the government of the State of Israel, and representatives of the World Jewish Congress, headed by Dr. Goldmann. These discussions led to a bitter controversy in Israel, with the coalition government, headed by David Ben-Gurion, claimed that reparations were necessary to restore what was stolen from the victims of the Holocaust.
The agreement was signed by Adenauer and Moshe Sharett on September 10, 1952 in the town hall of Luxembourg. The German Parliament (Bundestag) agreed March 18, 1953 with a low majority only.
Read more about this topic: Reparations Agreement Between Israel And West Germany
Famous quotes containing the word negotiations:
“But always and sometimes questioning the old modes
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Parlor, demands to be met on its own terms now,
Now that the preliminary negotiations are at last over.”
—John Ashbery (b. 1927)