Data Suggest Some Nazi Gold Was Jews’, U.S. Official Says

Portions of gold looted by the Nazis in World War II and still held in Britain and the United States might go to victims of the Holocaust, a senior Clinton administration official hinted strongly Tuesday.

Undersecretary of Commerce Stuart E. Eizenstat, who is coordinating a U.S. government investigation into the origins of the gold, told reporters that there is “preliminary evidence” to indicate that at least some of the precious metal seized by the Nazis came from Holocaust victims.

For most of the post-World War II period, the unchallenged assumption was that virtually all the 370 tons of Nazi gold recovered was “monetary gold”--material looted from national treasuries of countries conquered by Adolf Hitler.

A postwar commission made up of officials from Britain, France and the United States determined how to return all but six tons, now worth about $68 million, to affected countries. But the three countries agreed in December to halt further disbursements pending the outcome of the U.S. investigation.

The American study was launched amid claims by a number of Jewish groups that the looted gold included property from Holocaust victims and that those victims or their families have a right to be compensated, at least symbolically, from what remains.

Eizenstat said a report of the investigation will be completed and made public next month. It will focus on a review of archives and will seek to determine if the Nazi loot included gold taken from Holocaust victims. The report will not make policy recommendations. “That will come later, in a separate report,” he said.

“The United States, [both] the administration and the president, are deeply committed to seeing that Holocaust victims are given justice to the extent possible,” Eizenstat said. “We take very seriously the claims that the remaining gold should be used to compensate victims of the Holocaust.”

But diplomatic officials and international law experts cautioned that a swift transfer of part or all of the $68 million to any Holocaust restitution agency could be hampered by legal obstacles and likely opposition from some nations with outstanding claims on the bullion.

Last Friday, French diplomats told a visiting delegation of American Jewish leaders that part or all of France’s remaining claim to the gold--which at $26.5 million is the largest outstanding such claim--might be used to compensate Jewish families who lost property in World War II.

Similar decisions by other nations with claims, said one tripartite commission official, may be the quickest, least complicated way for part--if not all--of the $68 million in gold to make its way to Holocaust victim families and survivors.

“It’s very clear that there’s a sense of urgency and a real commitment,” said Rabbi Abraham Cooper, associate dean of the Simon Wiesenthal Center. “It’s refreshing, astonishing and new. For once, the victims, as opposed to statecraft, are being put first.”

But State Department officials warn that legal difficulties mitigate against any easy, swift disposition. Nations controlling the gold in question are bound by a 1946 Paris agreement that required that all such loot recovered from the Nazis had to be reallocated to European national treasuries robbed during the war. Any attempt by the three controlling nations to divert some or all of the gold to Holocaust victims would be illegal under the treaty terms, diplomats said. Attempts to alter the agreement would require the claimants’ consent.

Marshall reported from Washington and Braun from Chicago.