{"id":11108,"date":"2025-10-19T17:02:14","date_gmt":"2025-10-19T17:02:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/newyorkmirror.us\/?p=11108"},"modified":"2025-10-19T17:02:14","modified_gmt":"2025-10-19T17:02:14","slug":"forgotten-fortunes-ubs-faces-global-reckoning-over-lost-holocaust-era-jewish-accounts","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pappusaha.com\/euronews24\/forgotten-fortunes-ubs-faces-global-reckoning-over-lost-holocaust-era-jewish-accounts\/","title":{"rendered":"Forgotten Fortunes: UBS Faces Global Reckoning Over Lost Holocaust-Era Jewish Accounts"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

By Rachel Maddow | The New York Mirror<\/strong>
Adapted from an interview originally published by the Abu Dhabi Times<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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A new wave of legal action is forcing Switzerland\u2019s UBS Group AG to confront allegations of concealing Holocaust-era bank accounts once used by Jewish families to safeguard their assets from Nazi seizure. In an interview with the Abu Dhabi Times<\/em><\/a>, Dr. Gerhard Podovsovnik, Vice President of AEA Justinian Lawyers, outlined the scale of the alleged cover-up \u2014 describing it as \u201cone of the largest financial injustices still unresolved today.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Dr. Podovsovnik represents Rabbi Ephraim Meir, the plaintiff leading an expanding global lawsuit against UBS. The case accuses the Swiss bank and related institutions of manipulating postwar restitution processes through the Claims Resolution Tribunal (CRT) \u2014 the international body once tasked with settling Holocaust-related financial claims.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u201cEvery day, new families come forward,\u201d Dr. Podovsovnik told the Abu Dhabi Times<\/em>. \u201cThey come from Poland, Austria, France, Belgium, and the United States \u2014 all told the same thing by the CRT: \u2018No matching.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

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Millions of Accounts Hidden in Plain Sight<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

According to Dr. Podovsovnik, the CRT\u2019s investigation was fundamentally incomplete. Of 471 Swiss banks officially listed, only 277 were ever reviewed, leaving 254 untouched \u2014 including several major institutions with vast client holdings.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe CRT only looked at accounts with identifiable names,\u201d he explained. \u201cBut many accounts between 1933 and 1945 were anonymous, password-protected, or accessed through codewords. These accounts existed to protect Jewish assets from Nazi confiscation \u2014 and they were never examined.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He estimates that while investigators identified 6.2 million accounts within the reviewed banks, another six million likely remained hidden elsewhere. Out of the 6.2 million, only 300,000 were closely reviewed and just 52,000 shortlisted.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cEyewitnesses later reported that data was intentionally miscoded,\u201d he added. \u201cLegitimate Jewish claims became untraceable. That wasn\u2019t incompetence \u2014 it was deliberate.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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UBS and Poland Named in Expanding Lawsuit<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

UBS, according to Dr. Podovsovnik, played a central role in managing the anonymous accounts excluded from the CRT\u2019s process. \u201cUBS was embedded in the system \u2014 organizationally, technically, and financially,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Many claimants, he noted, come from Poland, where no restitution law exists for Jewish property. \u201cPoland still holds vast amounts of confiscated Jewish wealth,\u201d he said. \u201cWe intend to name the Polish state as a co-defendant \u2014 not to reopen history, but to restore justice in the present.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Families Denied by Bureaucracy<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Dr. Podovsovnik shared stories of families whose restitution claims were dismissed despite clear evidence. One family near Krak\u00f3w saw its bank seized during the Nazi occupation, with its assets later traced to Switzerland. Their postwar claim was denied with the words \u201cNo matching.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In another case, a family even provided the exact password and codeword for an anonymous account. Still, the CRT rejected the claim because no personal name was attached.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThis wasn\u2019t oversight,\u201d Dr. Podovsovnik said. \u201cIt was administrative erasure \u2014 an injustice executed through paperwork.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Demands for a New Restitution Framework<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

The lawsuit calls for a comprehensive re-evaluation of all excluded accounts, particularly those anonymous or password-protected. It also demands the establishment of a new, internationally supervised restitution body with full digital and archival access.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Finally, the legal team seeks restitution of all remaining funds still held by UBS, Credit Suisse, and other Swiss institutions.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThese funds were placed in trust \u2014 not for profit, but for protection,\u201d Rabbi Meir said in the Abu Dhabi Times<\/em> interview. \u201cThey must be returned to rightful heirs or distributed to Jewish families in need when no heirs remain.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Switzerland\u2019s Image Under Scrutiny<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Dr. Podovsovnik argued that Switzerland must confront its role in perpetuating a restitution process that denied justice to Holocaust victims.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cSwitzerland can no longer claim neutrality,\u201d he said. \u201cIt built and benefited from a system that silenced millions of rightful claims. The time for quiet diplomacy has passed. The time for accountability has come.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He concluded with a reminder that the story is not only financial, but human:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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\u201cThese aren\u2019t just lost accounts. They\u2019re lost lives, lost families, lost history. Switzerland, UBS, and the CRT leadership must finally face that truth. This time, no one will hide behind the words \u2018No matching.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Rachel Maddow | The New York MirrorAdapted from an interview originally published by the Abu Dhabi Times A new wave of legal action is forcing Switzerland\u2019s UBS Group AG to confront allegations of concealing Holocaust-era bank accounts once used by Jewish families to safeguard their assets from Nazi seizure. In an interview with the<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":11414,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-11108","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pappusaha.com\/euronews24\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11108","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pappusaha.com\/euronews24\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pappusaha.com\/euronews24\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pappusaha.com\/euronews24\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pappusaha.com\/euronews24\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11108"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/pappusaha.com\/euronews24\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11108\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pappusaha.com\/euronews24\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/11414"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pappusaha.com\/euronews24\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11108"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pappusaha.com\/euronews24\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11108"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pappusaha.com\/euronews24\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11108"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}