Swiss Banks Offer $600 Million to Close Holocaust Claims

Switzerland’s three biggest banks offered $600 million Friday to settle claims that they stole the assets of Holocaust victims. The banks called it their top offer; outraged Jewish leaders called it insultingly low.

It was the first time the banks--Credit Suisse, Swiss Bank Corp. and Union Bank of Switzerland--publicly specified a figure for a possible settlement.

“My 31,000 clients will not stand for this,” said Edward Fagan, attorney for a class-action claim in New York to dormant accounts in Swiss banks.

In Los Angeles, Rabbi Marvin Hier, dean of the Simon Wiesenthal Center, said the offer “will be unanimously refused by all the organizations dealing with the banks.”

“We consider it a lack of seriousness on their part. An independent study showed that $442 million was plundered by the banks. Over the course of 50 years, with interest, it is now worth about $4.5 billion.”

Other Jewish groups involved in the negotiations also rejected the settlement offer.

“We are pained by the monetization of a moral issue,” World Jewish Congress Secretary-General Israel Singer said in New York. “This has been done in a shabby manner, and hopefully this is a dip in an otherwise constructive discussion that may continue positively.”

Singer said the group had received assurances from the U.S. government that the negotiations on claims will continue.

Plaintiffs say bank officials stonewalled survivors and their heirs after World War II, claiming that they could not find accounts or demanding nonexistent death certificates before giving funds to relatives of those who died in concentration camps.

“The Swiss banks know that the amounts they are discussing are offensive, and if we were not dealing with such a tragic story, this would be laughable,” Yoram Dori, an Israeli spokesman for the World Jewish Restitution Organization, said in Jerusalem.

Recent reports from New York have said the banks were offering $1 billion or more.

The $600-million offer would include $70 million already paid into a Swiss fund to help needy Holocaust survivors, the banks said.

The banks’ announcement left unclear the future of their talks with Jewish organizations and lawyers for the lawsuit filed in New York.

“By all legitimate criteria, this is a fair offer,” the banks’ statement said. “The banks view this offer to be at the upper limit of what can be justified, based on the facts and circumstances.”

While they “expressed continued interest to reach a fair settlement,” the banks added: “The World Jewish Congress and the plaintiffs’ lawyers are seriously jeopardizing the settlement negotiations.”

Fagan, the lawyer in the class-action claim, said negotiations could continue but dismissed Friday’s offer as inadequate for the claimants. He has said even $1 billion wouldn’t be enough.

The claimants’ groups and the banks accused each other of violating a confidentiality agreement.

The banks said they were breaking their silence after two months of negotiations, mediated by Undersecretary of State Stuart E. Eizenstat, because of repeated news leaks by Jewish organizations and the claimants’ lawyers.

But the World Jewish Congress said it was the banks that were breaking the accord by going public with their statement.