News and Announcements

After 25 Years, 300,000 Victims of Nazism Have Received Payments Through Hardship Fund

June 03, 2005 - More than 300,000 Jewish victims of Nazi persecution have been paid a total of approximately $800 million from the Claims Conference Hardship Fund, a program founded in 1980. The Hardship Fund was negotiated in order to bring a small measure of justice to Jews who were "double victims" of Nazism and Communism but whose residence in Soviet bloc countries made them ineligible for postwar German compensation payments.

The Hardship Fund was the first Holocaust compensation program directly administered by the Claims Conference. In the 25 years since the fund’s creation, the Claims Conference has paid approximately $4 billion to Jewish victims of Nazi persecution in more than 60 countries under eight separate programs. This is in addition to the more than $50 billion in German government compensation negotiated by the Claims Conference in the 1950s.

West German compensation laws enacted in 1953 and thereafter excluded from eligibility victims of Nazi persecution resident in the Eastern Block countries and the Soviet Union, i.e., behind the "Iron Curtain."

Beginning in 1975, following the agreement of the Soviet Union to allow Jewish emigration, the Claims Conference began negotiating for compensation to be made to Jewish victims of Nazism from Soviet bloc countries who had emigrated to the West and Israel after 1965, the filing deadline for West German government compensation. Following these negotiations, in 1980, West Germany created a "Hardship Fund" of DM 400 million. Eligible Jewish Nazi victims would each receive one-time payments of DM 5,000 (approximately $2,500), with five percent of the amount set aside for grants to institutions aiding needy Jewish Holocaust victims.

The Hardship Fund compensates primarily Jewish victims of Nazism from Soviet bloc countries who suffered considerable damage to health during the Holocaust and emigrated to the West after 1965.

West Germany created this fund only on the condition that the Claims Conference, rather than the government, administer applications and payments pursuant to German government guidelines.

Based on the original size of the fund, it was estimated that 80,000 Holocaust survivors would benefit from it. The collapse of Communism and subsequent Jewish emigration from Soviet bloc countries greatly increased the number of Jewish victims of Nazism eligible for payments.

The Claims Conference continues to approve approximately 700 applications per month for Hardship Fund payments.

The Claims Conference is negotiating with the German government for the creation of a similar compensation program for Jewish victims of Nazism who suffered the same experiences as those paid under the Hardship Fund but who still reside in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union.