Germany makes list of Nazi-era Jews

Index lists 600,000 Jews living in country from 1933 to 1945, will be used to help research families' fate.

By JERUSALEM POST STAFF
holocaust survivor 244.8 (photo credit: AP [file])
holocaust survivor 244.8
(photo credit: AP [file])
Germany has compiled a list of some 600,000 Jews who lived there from 1933 to 1945 and suffered discrimination by the Nazis, an index that is to be distributed among leading archives to help descendants research the fate of their families. The government said Wednesday it would give the list to Israel's Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial, Washington's Holocaust Museum, the Jewish Claims Conference and the International Tracing Service in Bad Arolsen, Germany. Germany's federal archive drew up the list, which the government and a foundation that oversaw the compensation of Nazi-era slave laborers financed it to the tune of €1.57 million (US$2.24 million). "In handing over this list, we want to make a substantial contribution to documenting the loss that German Jewry suffered through persecution, expulsion and destruction," foundation leader Guenter Saathof said in a statement coinciding with a handing-over ceremony at the chancellery. The government said the idea for the list, drawn up over the past four years, first arose during negotiations over unpaid insurance claims dating back to the Nazi era. It was compiled using information held in the nation's federal archive, as well as municipal registries and deportation lists. The list was not released to the public on Wednesday. The foundation said it is subject to strict German data protection laws, given that it contains names of people who are still alive.