________________________________________________________________

Testimony

Yehuda Evron,

President

of the Holocaust Restitution Committee

Before the Subcommittee of Europe of the House Committee on Foreign Affairs

October 3, 2007

Thank you Mr. Chairman.

I sincerely appreciate the opportunity that you have afforded me to testify on the important issue of Holocaust restitution. I also hope that under your leadership the Holocaust survivors will be able to finally see some significant progress in this area.

I am the President of the Holocaust Restitution Committee, an umbrella organization in the forefront of fighting for the cause of property restitution in Poland for Holocaust survivors and their heirs.

Over the last few years, I and other survivors have had an opportunity to work with the Claims Conference on different issues, including property restitution in Poland. I would like to pay tribute to the remarkable accomplishments of the Claims Conference in securing compensation, recovering assets and assisting Holocaust survivors. The negotiating delegation of the Claims Conference, which includes Holocaust survivors, has brought many benefits to survivors all over the world. We coordinate activities regarding Polish restitution with non-Jewish owners organizations in the US and in Poland.

Unfortunately, our common efforts regarding restitution in Poland have not brought any positive results. We have been unable to secure even basic legislation for the return of confiscated property in . Speaking personally, the process of property restitution has been critically important to my family for the past twenty years. Like many other survivors, my wife lost every member of her family in the carnage of Poland, during World War II.

All that is left from my wife's family, are some tragic memories and her home. But a stranger lives in and “owns” the house in which my wife grew up. And, six decades after the Holocaust, Poland has no law providing my wife, and the many other survivors and heirs in a similar position, with the opportunity to recover what is rightfully theirs.

The individuals that our organizations represent are well into their 80's; some of their sons and daughters are in their sixties and they may even have adult grandchildren. They seek the return of their homes in an environment of fairness and equity.

Ladies and Gentlemen time is something Holocaust survivors do not have. We need closure now.

I serve on the Advisory Committee of Self Help – the major agency providing assistance to Holocaust survivors in New York. Despite the expanded funding from the Claims Conference and other sources over the past few years there are many survivors in need in the United States. Property legislation in Poland would allow them to pass their final years in dignity and, at the same time, release large resources to assist others.

We ask this Committee to support the work of the Holocaust Restitution Committee together with that of the Claims Conference and its sister organizations the World Jewish Restitution Organization and the World Jewish Congress in securing fair property restitution legislation in Poland.

The homes, businesses and other assets of the survivors were seized by the Nazis during World War II in what has come to be known as the Holocaust or the Shoah. These properties were expropriated by the subsequent Communist regime.

We expected that a nation like Poland that suffered so much during the Nazi and Communist eras, would understand the suffering of other people. There are no words to describe the suffering of the Jewish people during the Holocaust. Thus, we don’t understand why Poland continues to cause so much additional suffering by denying our right to our homes?

The Polish Government estimates the value of the survivors Real Estate at 40 billion dollars but most important is the moral aspect of this issue. Poland has no right to inherit, use and otherwise benefit from the assets of 3 Million Jews that were murdered there in the most barbaric ways.

Polish Efforts on Property Restitution

The Polish efforts to provide property restitution have, so far, failed. Every single year brings with it new reports that Poland is preparing comprehensive legislation to deal with the property restitution issue. Yet, even efforts to provide minimal, indeed, insulting restitution or compensation go nowhere. The present draft of a law, submitted to the Polish Parliament in September 2006, which would only offer a symbolic 15% compensation of the value of any property, has been delayed again and again.

In the end, I would like to ask and hope that this Committee adopts a strong resolution on this subject. The European Subcommittee is a most appropriate body to appeal to Polish authorities to resolve this problem, once and for all, and soon. This must be done immediately due to the age of the survivor’s population. Justice delayed, as we so often hear in this great land of ours, is justice denied.

Thank you