From: <http://interactive.wsj.com/articles/SB968811511846448251.htm> "Why are the Bronfmans stumping for Hillary when Lazio has done more for their cause?" September 13, 2000 The Strange Politics Of Holocaust Restitution By Seth Lipsky, a Journal contributing editor. He writes a column every Wednesday for OpinionJournal.com. The little band of demonstrators outside New York's Pierre Hotel Monday evening was shouting "One two three four, Show Hill-ar-y-the-door" and holding up signs for "One Jerusalem." Inside were gathering -- at the invitation of the World Jewish Congress -- a glittering array of leaders of the Jewish community, as well as their financial backers. They were there to honor the politicians from home and abroad who have played a role in pressing Jewish claims for restitution of property stolen and lives ruined during the Holocaust. But behind the facade I sensed a real unease about the evening -- and about the juncture the restitution movement has reached. Part of it had to do with the rank politicization of the event, which stemmed from the decision of the president of the World Jewish Congress, Edgar Bronfman, to bring not only the president but the first lady to be honored. Mr. Bronfman is an important adviser to Mrs. Clinton's senate campaign. Her opponent, Rep. Rick Lazio, was pointedly not invited to the dinner, even though he played a real role in passing legislation in support of the restitution effort. Mr. Bronfman's son, Edgar Jr., announced he was exercising a point of personal privilege, then turned and said, "President and Mrs. Clinton, thank you for these past eight years." He added that he looked forward to working with "President Gore and Senator Clinton." It was an error of judgment that caused a number of people in the room to wince. The elder Mr. Bronfman explained his decision to include Mrs. Clinton by disclosing that he had used a 1996 meeting with her at a fund-raiser for the Democratic National Committee to try to gain access to the president on the subject of Holocaust restitution. She responded by saying, "Edgar, is there a chance that we can get at the Swiss banks?" She arranged a meeting with Mr. Clinton for the next day. The president, according to the senior Mr. Bronfman, inquired about the involvement of then-Sen. Alfonse D'Amato of New York, a Republican, and asked Mr. Bronfman to tell Mr. D'Amato that Mr. Clinton was prepared to work with him on the restitution campaign. One can take that as a willingness to rise above politics or, as so many are given to do in the wake of the Clinton-Gore presidency, as an effort in an election year to deflect the congressional investigation into Whitewater, an investigation in which Mr. D'Amato played a key role. In any event, Mr. Clinton proved to be an attentive figure in the fight. The unease in the room ran deeper than American politics, to themes that were aired on the eve of the banquet in a courageous article in the September issue of Commentary, "Holocaust Reparations -- A Growing Scandal" by Gabriel Schoenfeld. Mr. Schoenfeld quotes columnist Charles Krauthammer as saying he is worried about what he terms a "grotesque scramble for money" whose only certain result is the "revival of Shylockian stereotypes." And he quotes the Anti-Defamation League's Abraham Foxman, who has voiced his fear that people may be led to believe "that the Jews died not because they were Jews, but because they had bank accounts, gold, art and property." No one suggests that Jews -- or any organization on behalf of Jewish individuals or estates -- should be shy about pressing any claim stemming from the Holocaust. I have come to the view that neither should they worry much about the consequences. Jews have long since learned that those in Europe, or elsewhere, who will be put off by the pressing of such claims are not going to be mollified by restrained behavior. Anti-Semitism is not, and has never been, a function of Jewish behavior. But Mr. Schoenfeld raised, more pointedly than most others, the problem presented by class-action lawsuits. He cites the highest-profile of the class-action lawyers, Edward Fagan, and reports that in the Swiss settlement he claimed an hourly fee of $640, higher than the average annual pension that Holocaust survivors receive from the German government. Mr. Fagan disputes the $640 figure, saying he's billing $295. But whatever the details of the matter, there can be no doubt the American tort system provides enormous temptations that must be difficult to resist. And unfortunately, the entry of the class action lawyers into the Holocaust restitution fray has elided the distinction between restitution, meaning the return of a measure of individual property, and reparations, a word that connotes repair, which is impossible. Serious as these questions are -- and in my soundings I find a lively appreciation for the sentiments voiced by Messrs. Foxman, Krauthammer and Schoenfeld -- there are still others. As important as restitution and the fight for historical truth are, there is a growing recognition that they are not the road to the Jewish future. The American Jewish community faces a demographic crisis to which the banquet at the Pierre was largely irrelevant. It faces an education crisis, in which the only relevant public policy reform -- vouchers -- is one that the Clinton administration has set itself athwart. And if there is a military and diplomatic challenge to the Jewish future, it is one in which the administration has stood not behind the Jewish state but between it and its enemies. The very week that was capped by the World Jewish Congress honoring Mr. and Mrs. Clinton, the president spent trying to gain an acceptable way to break the undivided Jewish sovereignty over Jerusalem to which Yitzhak Rabin went to his grave committed. The demonstrators were gone when my wife and I left the Pierre, but my wife leaned over to me in the cab and pointed to where they'd been standing. Of all the individuals we'd met that evening, she said, they were the ones who had their eye on the ball. ================================================================= Kadosh, Kadosh, Kadosh, YHVH, TZEVAOT FROM THE DESK OF: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> *Mike Spitzer* <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> ~~~~~~~~ <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> The Best Way To Destroy Enemies Is To Change Them To Friends Shalom, A Salaam Aleikum, and to all, A Good Day. ================================================================= <A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/">www.ctrl.org</A> DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. Proselytizing propagandic screeds are unwelcomed. Substance—not soap-boxing—please! These are sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory'—with its many half-truths, mis- directions and outright frauds—is used politically by different groups with major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought. 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