Gideon Reuveni, "The Great Repair: Emotions, Memory, and the German–Jewish Settlement after the Holocaust" (Cornell UP, 2026)

Summary

---

Podcast Summary: New Books Network

Gideon Reuveni, "The Great Repair: Emotions, Memory, and the German–Jewish Settlement after the Holocaust" (Cornell UP, 2026)

Host: Dr. Miranda Melcher
Guest: Professor Gideon Reuveni
Date: May 9, 2026

---

Overview

This episode delves into Professor Gideon Reuveni’s new book, The Great Repair: Emotions, Memory, and the German–Jewish Settlement after the Holocaust, which investigates the little-explored history of reparations negotiations and agreements between West Germany, Israel, and global Jewish organizations in the years immediately following the Holocaust. The discussion illuminates the complexities of how and why reparations were undertaken, their moral and political underpinnings, and why this chapter has been largely forgotten or marginalized in public memory, despite its seismic historical importance.

---

Key Discussion Points and Insights

1. Genesis and Motivation for the Book

• Personal Connection:
  Reuveni grew up with reparations as a background feature of family life, with both parents receiving German reparations. Yet, he didn’t reflect deeply on the phenomenon until he considered it as a book topic in 2019.

  “Both my parents received reparations from Germany. And it was something that always was present in my life… it all seemed something which is very boring, if not annoying, definitely in some occasion, very upsetting.” (03:13, B)

• Core Research Questions:

  1. How did reparations negotiations come about so soon after the Holocaust (specifically, less than seven years post-war)?
  2. Why is this moment largely absent from the memory and commemoration of the Holocaust?

2. The Emergence of Reparations as a Conversation

• German Side:
  Postwar Germans avoided the word ‘reparations’ due to its association with the Treaty of Versailles and WWI. Instead, they used phrases like “making good again.” The notion of paying for the resettlement or compensation of victims existed at war’s end, but the Allies had already decided not to repeat Versailles' mistakes by seeking broad reparations from Germany.

• Jewish Side:
  The demand for reparations came chiefly from Jewish organizations, even during WWII, focused on restitution, compensation for absorbed refugees, and giving back stolen property.

  “…these ideas of paying reparations… originate mainly from the Jewish side. And Germans accepted that, especially the West Germans… motivated from the kind of realpolitik point of view, by the idea that we German, or we the new. We are a new German state and we want to reintegrate ourselves in the family of nations.” (09:33, B; 16:54, B)

3. Political and Moral Calculations

• Realpolitik and Moral Politics:
  For both postwar states (Germany and Israel), the reparations process was driven by pragmatism and realpolitik as much as by moral reckoning.

  • Germany: Needed to signal to the international community its willingness to accept responsibility (not necessarily guilt) and open a new chapter.
  • Israel: Needed economic support as a young state absorbing many refugees, and viewed reparations as a form of postwar peace-making.

  “The very nature of a reparation agreement is exactly that. It looks at the past, it acknowledges responsibility for the past, but in the sake of opening a new chapter for the future…” (16:54, B)

4. What Was Actually Claimed?

• Legal Context:
  Israel, founded after WWII, had no legal basis for claims for crimes committed before its existence; nor did “the Jews” as an abstract entity. The Allies had also declared that they themselves would not claim reparations from Germany.

  • Israel’s Argument:
    Framed its claim in terms of the cost of absorbing roughly half a million Jewish refugees from Europe (1933–1945). This approach found precedent in previous agreements surrounding refugee absorption.

  • Three-Party Negotiation:
    Negotiations took place between Israel, West Germany, and the Jewish Claims Conference (representing diaspora Jews). The Claims Conference had a separate agenda: restitution and compensation for individual survivors, rooted in postwar German occupation law.

  “Israel conceptualized its claim… that… because of Nazi persecution of Jews, a lot of Jews had to flee Europe and they ended up back then in Palestine and then the state of Israel and Israel demanded basically reparation for the costs of absorbing half a million refugees.” (22:45, B)

5. Global and Cold War Context

• Role of the Allies:
  The Allies (US, UK, France) weren’t opposed to Israel’s reparations claim but insisted Israel handle it directly with Germany. They saw this as strengthening Cold War alliances, encouraging both Germany and Israel to anchor themselves with the West.

  • The Soviet Union and East Germany were approached but did not respond.
  • The entire negotiation was, therefore, deeply embedded in Cold War calculations.

  “They wanted not to impose an agreement but to kind of bring these two countries together to negotiate such an agreement. And… if you look at any kind of history at that period, any story has to put in this context of the Cold War…” (31:30, B)

6. The Overlooked Palestinian Parallel

• Absorption Model:
  The reparations model—compensation for absorbing refugees—had parallels to the Palestinian refugee crisis post-1948. Israel suggested that Arab states could receive similar compensation for Palestinians they absorbed, but firmly rejected any right of return.

  • This complex, self-referential logic contributed both to innovative reparations policy and to its erasure from public memory.

  “From the Israeli point of view… paying compensation for the absorption of Palestinian refugees in Arab countries was basically the way forward… If you want to save Jews, and have the Jews need to find a place outside of Europe… This… corresponds with the Zionist narrative… They were willing to pay for the absorption… but not willing to accept the principle of the right of return. And that was… the end of that idea in the context of the Israeli Palestinian conflict.” (37:41, B)

7. The Human and Emotional Dimension: Inside the Negotiation Rooms

• Practical Realities:

  • Direct negotiations were emotionally fraught and highly controversial, especially in Israel and the wider Jewish world.
  • Israel sent negotiators who were German Jews, aiming for a practical edge but also to facilitate brevity.
  • Instructions given: no small talk, only English, and strict avoidance of informal interaction. Emotional and psychological toll was notable; participants became physically ill, and the meetings were exhausting.

  “There was a lot of resentment towards this idea that Germans and Jews will speak directly to each other… journalists going to Germany… feel sick after… having meetings with these people, with these Germans.” (45:23, B)

• Breaking the Tension:

  • The language barrier fell after a few days, with negotiations reverting to German and even moments of shared personal history (finding out they’d attended the same school).

  • Despite intentions for quick closure, the talks lasted half a year and were beset by crises, strategic pressure, and extensive compromise.

8. Public Reactions and Long-Term Forgetting

• Immediate Reaction:

  • Popular opinion in Israel and the Jewish world remained resistant or critical. Many felt the Germans got off “cheap” and that the agreement was the result of political insiders ignoring popular sentiment.
  • In Germany, political opposition came mainly from the governing coalition, not the opposition.

  “Politicians celebrated the agreement as a huge achievement. But very, very quickly… this whole thing is being kind of ignored, swept under the carpet.” (55:58, B)

• Shame & Resentment:

  • The implementation, e.g., Israel’s purchasing mission in Germany, made German presence more obvious and stoked resentment.
  • Seeking personal compensation carried a sense of shame, as if survivors were profiting from their suffering.

  “…it basically promoted a feeling of shame that people are making money out of their suffering, which is another layer of complexity… why this agreement was eventually… forgotten…” (55:58, B)

• Collective Memory:

  • The "boomerang effect": fears that accepting reparations would mean Holocaust closure led to renewed focus on memory, commemoration, and resistance.
  • Institutions like Yad Vashem and “never forget, never forgive” attitudes became entrenched partly as a response to reparations.

  “…this fixation with the suffering of the victims is very much connected to this agreement and this fear that a closure will mean that we're going to forget this tragic chapter in our history.” (61:25, B)

9. Implications for Holocaust Memory and Contemporary Commemoration

• The settlement is almost entirely divorced from how the Holocaust is publicly remembered, which focuses on suffering, not postwar reconciliation.

• Reuveni contends that a fuller view—one that acknowledges the reparations process as a form of reconciliation—would enrich our understanding of post-Holocaust history.

  “…what will happen to Holocaust commemoration, Holocaust memory, if we will not only focus on the suffering, which… is very important, but… after seven years after the Holocaust, the two sides sat together and signed a reparation agreement and started a reconciliation process?” (66:28, B)

---

Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

“Although everybody… mentioned the [Luxembourg] agreement… nobody really… tried to understand that. All of a sudden two main question kind of arose to me: how come… seven years after the end of the Holocaust… representatives … sit together and sign the reparation agreement? The other thing is… how come this history doesn’t really belong to the memory of the Holocaust?” (03:13, B)

"[The] idea of paying reparations was floating there all the time… But the main origin… came from the Jewish side and… was discussed during the war." (09:33, B)

“There was a lot of resentment towards this idea that Germans and Jews will speak directly… physically difficult… people… feel sick after… meetings with these… Germans.” (45:23, B)

“Politicians celebrated the agreement… but… very, very quickly thereafter… this whole thing is being… ignored, swept under the carpet… People try to… forget that this whole thing happened.” (55:58, B)

---

Timestamps for Key Sections

• Introduction to Book & Research Questions: 03:05–08:51
• Origins of Reparations Conversations: 08:51–14:47
• German and Israeli Motivations: 16:42–22:41
• Nature of Israel’s Claims: 22:41–30:55
• Cold War/Allied Responses: 30:55–37:22
• Palestinian Refugee Parallels: 37:22–43:27
• Inside the Negotiation Room: 44:48–55:42
• Public Reactions and Forgetting: 55:42–61:13
• Memory and Commemoration: 61:13–66:28
• Future Work Teaser: 66:45–68:19

---

Final Reflection & Preview

Professor Reuveni hints at his next project, co-authored with Daniel Siemens, examining the United Restitution Organization, which provided legal aid to claimants worldwide and built an unmatched archive of early Holocaust testimonies—offering another window into the complexities and aftermaths of reparations.

“We are writing the history of this again, another forgotten aspect of this history.” (66:45, B)

---

Summary prepared for listeners who want a thorough understanding of the podcast episode without hearing it in full.

Transcript

[A]

Ready to soundtrack your summer with Red Bull Summer All Day Play. You choose a playlist that fits your summer vibe the best. Are you a festival fanatic, a deep end dj, a road dog, or a trail mixer? Just add a song to your chosen playlist and put your summer on track. Red Bull Summer All Day Play. Red Bull gives you wings. Visit Red Bull.com BrightSummerAhead to learn more. See you this summer.

[B]

Where is Daredevil A minor don't miss the return of Marvel Television's Daredevil Born Again.

[A]

So what's next?

[B]

I feel liberated. We're gonna take this city back over medicated in an all new season.

[C]

Now streaming only on Disney plus.

[A]

They're hunting us. It's time we started hunting them.

[B]

I can work with them. This should be tons of fun. Marvel Television's Daredevil Born Again now streaming only on Disney Pl. This episode is brought to you by State Farm.

[A]

You know, those friends who support your preference for podcasts over music on road trips? That's the energy State Farm brings to insurance. With over 19,000 local agents, they help

[B]

you find the coverage that fits your

[A]

needs so you can spend less time worrying about insurance and more time enjoying the ride. Download the State Farm app or go [e-mail] like a good neighbor, State Farm is there.

[B]

Welcome to the New Books Network.

[A]

Hello and welcome to another episode on the New Books Network. I'm one of your hosts, Dr. Miranda Melcher, and I'm very pleased today to be speaking with Professor Gideon Reuveni about his book titled the Great Emotions, Memory and the German Jewish Settlement after the Holocaust, published by Cornell University Press in 2026. Now, this book takes us into a very specific moment, honestly, not even that many years long. We're not talking about a book that covers centuries or something like that. And yet there's a ton happening because while this is a fact embedded in German politics, I think still to this day, Israeli politics to some degree still, it's kind of taken for granted, I think in some cases and also then not known about more widely, which is the fact that really soon after the Holocaust, right, less than a decade after the Holocaust ends, Jews and Germans, and we'll talk about kind of what those two categories mean, start to talk about reparations. That's a tricky thing to talk about kind of in any time or place where that sort of discussion comes up for obvious reasons, especially in this moment. And yet these aren't necessarily negotiations that we already know that much about, right? That's why a book like, this is really helpful to take us in some cases, as I'm sure we'll talk about literally into the rooms where these conversations are happening to figure out what is going on on both sides, between the sides. There's a lot to get into. So, Gideon, thank you so much for joining me on the podcast.

[B]

Thank you, Miranda, for inviting me.

[A]

Well, I'm very pleased you said yes. Could you start us off by introducing yourself a little bit and tell us why you decided to write this book?

[B]

Okay. I'm a history professor at the University of Sussex, and I run here Institute for Jewish Studies. The Weinfeld Institute for Jewish Studies. Yes. So after finishing my last book, I kind of consider different options. And believe it or not, this book actually was never supposed to be written, at least not in this format as I wrote it. So I, in many ways, grew up with reparations. Both my parents received reparations from Germany. And it was something that always was present in my life. And I didn't really reflect on that. It all seemed something which is very boring, if not annoying, definitely in some occasion, very upsetting. And when I kind of started considering different topics, I all of a sudden thought, you, you know what, maybe it's worthwhile to go back to this history and start asking the kind of obvious questions about what were these reparations for these people who received them and for the families. So that was basically in 2019, and I received two venerable, generous scholarships to start basically writing a book on personal compensation for Holocaust survivors. But then Covid hit and I couldn't go to the archives. And then something very unique in the kind of, for at least for historians happened. Archives kind of people know, open their doors. And we could have. A lot of us used that to start. They start digitizing collections and files. And I had this options of, you know, getting files of things that, you know, I otherwise needed to go there. And one of the first things that I actually wanted to do is start understanding where these compensation from the beginning come from. I mean, this agreement between Germany or West Germany, Israel and the Jewish Claims Conference, which was an organization basically set up to negotiate these kind of compensation with Germany. And we can talk about that also later. So I quite fast realized that although there are a lot of or there's already established literature on that agreement, which in the literature, you will find it under the Luxembourg agreement of 90 10, September 1952, by simply going back to the sources, I suddenly realized that although everybody or a lot of people mentioned the agreement and it was something which seemed for historians and people who deal with this period and with the German Israeli relations or German Jewish history, it's kind of a concept and something that they know, but nobody really kind of looked at, as you said at that moment, and tried to understand that. And all of a sudden two main question kind of arose to me. So the first one was how come not a decade, but seven years after the end of the Holocaust in 1952, representative of both sides sit together and sign the reparation agreement? The other thing is that how come we basically forgot and don't really recall that? And to be more specific, how come this history doesn't really belong to the memory of the Holocaust? So basically it's divorced from the memory of the Holocaust. We are very much focused on the Holocaust as the experience of the victims, of course, and we do a lot of research on the Holocaust from the perspective of the perpetrators. But this specific moment, which in many ways is very much the kind of the closing chapter of the Holocaust or kind of a very important post Holocaust moment, is totally marginalized from our memory and commemoration of the Holocaust. So I decided to kind of do research mainly on these two questions. And in this process, a lot of other kind of topics arose. And basically the book revolves around these two aspects.

[A]

And of course we're not going to be able to answer them in our conversation here in the same amount of detail that you do in the book. But I think that that structure of kind of how did this happen? And then how is it forgotten? Is a useful framework to guide our discussion. So obviously, before we get to anyone signing anything, there has to, at the very beginning, at least be an idea that, like, this is a conversation that could be had right before anyone talks to anyone. The idea has to be there. So if we look at the German side first, what sorts of ideas are we seeing that go into this sort of like, oh, wait, there is a conversation maybe that needs to be had?

[B]

Well, it's, it's a bit kind of. I mean, I would actually start. I mean, I can. We can start with the German. I mean, the idea of reparation was floating there all the time. There's also kind of a language issue because you weren't allowed to say reparation in, in German because it kind of, because of the First World War and it reminded a lot of people the outcome of the First World War and the Versailles Treaty when Germany was forced to pay reparation payments to the Allies. But the idea of paying reparations immediately popped up at the end of the war. But there, there was actually a decision of the Allies this time not to repeat the errors of the Versailles and not demand reparations from Germany. So and then of course the question is, and that's why when the Germans, when this idea start floating in Germany again, they used a very different type of, you know, they needed also to use a different language to describe what they're about to do or what is going on. And the term that they chose was or making good again. And the idea basically was there again because there were other demands. So there's a history to that, there's a history for such demands. And probably the most interesting case that we don't know much about is of course the case where one of them, because the Israelis were very keen to learn about this incident, is that when Germans were kicked out or expelled from Eastern Europe at the end of the war, some of them got stuck in Denmark. And when the war ended, these people could not return to Germany from 94 to 1949 because the British who occupied North Germany did not allow them to return to Germany. So Denmark basically claimed reparations from Germany to keep these people in camps for almost four years. So these ideas kind of wear around. But the main origin of this idea of pain reparations or compensations for Jews came from the Jewish side and it already was discussed during the war. So the Germans were very much aware of that kind of discourse and the demand among Jewish organizations that Germany should pay different types of reparations, paid reparations, of course, restitution, give back the property that they robbed, but also pay reparations or compensation for individual victims to help them basically rehabilitate or re establish their lives of the survivors. So these ideas of pain, reparation, pain, these kind of pain for the absorption of refugees returning or paying restitution was already there and basically originate mainly from the Jewish side. And Germans accepted that, especially the West Germans. But I think it very much has to do with the dynamics, the post kind of damao of the post kind of atrocity dynamics between the perpetrators and the victims. So it's usually the case that the victims will have this kind of, will make the claim and will have the demands. And the question is just as to whether the, the perpetrator or the perpetrator side agreed to, to accept that in this case they for different reasons. And we can of course, you know, discuss why the Germans were so open to discuss this notion of, of paying the Jewish sides, the Jewish side reparation. Now at McDonald's, a McDouble is 250, so you can get your gym gains

[C]

on or just get lunch for only $2.50. Get more value on the under $3 menu. Limited time only. Prices and participation may vary. Prices may be higher for delivery. There's a new way to Sweet Green Meat wraps Handheld, hearty and made for life on the move. With fold chef crafted flavors, fresh ingredients and over 40 grams of protein, they're

[B]

built to satisfy without slowing you down.

[C]

Try wraps today in the app [e-mail] available at all participating locations. Hey NBN listeners. We're running our 2026 New Books Network Audience Survey and we'd love just a few minutes of your time. NBN has been bringing you in depth conversations with authors and scholars for over 15 years. We haven't done a comprehensive audience survey since 2022, and a lot has changed since then. It's time to hear from you again. Here's why we're asking. We want to understand who's listening, what subjects and podcasts you love most, and where you'd like to see us grow. Your responses help us tell NBN's story to the publishers, libraries and institutions we partner with. When we can show that our listeners are serious readers, lifelong learners, and heavy library users. It opens doors to new partnerships, better resources, and ultimately a stronger NBN for everyone. And one more thing, if you leave your email address at the end of the survey, you'll be entered to win a $100 gift card to bookshop.org, a chance to stock up on books while supporting independent bookstores at the same time. The survey takes just five minutes. Your answers are confidential and your email will never be shared. Head to new books network.com to take the survey today. We really appreciate your support. Now go take the survey.

[A]

Yeah, I mean, I think there's a bunch of things from what you've just explained there that we want to talk about in more detail. Let's pick that one up first. Right? Why the German West German side was sort of willing to have these discussions.

[B]

Yeah, so I think the best way to kind of explain that is to basically, you know, use two terms is that's. Well, in German you say realpolitik. I think you said that also in English, a moral politic. And here we have, I think. I don't know if it's rare, but a very interesting moment where the two collide and the two basically work together. So Germany and Israel for that matter. Two post war states that were established one in 1948 the other in 1949, both had a very problematic short history. The Germans, of course, we all know about that, but also the Israeli state came out of the conflict in a very divided world where there's a evolving Cold War and they need to basically claim their place and establish themselves as both of them had the claim to be a democratic nation states. And this notion of, at least from the German side, of accepting responsibility for what happened was very much, I think, motivated from the kind of realpolitik point of view, by the idea that we German, or we the new. We are a new German state and we want to reintegrate ourselves in the family of nations. And in order to do that, we need to acknowledge that something happened which was not in the ordinary. And they also used the. And consistently used the term crime. So if a crime happens, something needs to kind of needs to be. To be corrected to. You can call it a sort of a punishment. But the idea was that since a crime happened, you need to address and redress it. So from the German side, it very much was a signal to the world that Germany is claiming response or assuming responsibility for what happened. Not necessarily guilt, but responsibility, because, I mean, this kind of a fine difference between responsibility and guilt, because Germany also had this aspiration that it's a new chapter. And again, it has this kind of symbolic means to it that if you pay your former. If you acknowledge responsibility and pay your former victims, you start something anew. And I think this is also, and I assume that we'll return to this. The very nature of a reparation agreement is exactly that. It looks at the past, it acknowledge responsibility for the past, but in the sake of opening a new chapter for the future, of having a new beginning. And I think for the Israelis, interestingly enough, it was very similar. It was a kind of a raison d' etat that we as a state, you know, basically, you know, after what happened. And Israel very much concept, you know, conceived that as a kind of a war, you know, after a normal state for there's a war. And after the war, you sign a peace agreement with your former enemy. And this is basically how they try to conceptualize this type of agreement. But of course, here again, it wasn't just kind of moral politic. It wasn't just a demand to correct or redress an evil or injustice that happened in the past. Israel also had very much pragmatic reasons for demanding this support. Israel just was just founded, just start recovering from a war, from the 1948 war. It was a very young State failing economy, and it needed this support. So that very much motivated Israel to approach Germany and basically create or pressure Germany or West Germany in this case, but actually also East Germany to pay some sort of reparations. So you have these two kind of different interests, but also a very moral approach to what happened. But maybe it's interesting also to kind of understand what is that, that Israel in this case, and Israel was the powerhouse behind this whole move. What was actually that Israel demanded or claimed for?

[A]

Because exactly, that's where I'd like us to go next. What exactly were they ask for?

[B]

Exactly? Because there's always the kind of, I think, misconception that, you know, Germany paid, you know, operations for the Holocaust. So indirectly it is the case, but only indirectly. So and there, I mean, I don't want to go into too many details because, you know, it's. It's quite, you know, in a way it's an interesting story because how you conceptualize such a demand. So according to international law, Israel didn't have any case. It was a very interesting case where basically Israel did not exist during the time of the injustice. There was no Israel there. So Israel didn't have any kind of legitimate standing to claim anything in the name of the victims. Jews as a body, actually, according to international law, don't form any kind of legal entity as well. So there was no claim that you can come into the Germans and say, you slaughtered us, you killed us, now you have to pay. It's, I mean, from a moral point of view you can do that, or from political point of view, you can do that, but you don't have any legal basis for that beyond that. There was a clear decision among the Allies, including the Soviets, at least officially, not to claim any type of reparations from Germany. So in this regard as well, there was no kind of legal basis that Israel could join another claim and say also wrongdoing was made against us and we need to be paid. So eventually what happened is that Israel conceptualized its claim and built a claim around this notion that from 1933 already. And that's also kind of interesting when actually the Holocaust or the injustice starts. So for the point of view of Israel, it starts in January 1933 until the end of the war, because of Nazi persecution of Jews, a lot of Jews had to flee Europe and they ended up back then in Palestine and then the state of Israel and Israel demanded basically reparation for the costs of absorbing half a million refugees. That was eventually the claim. And there were precedents for that in international law and international relations, and including Germany itself, that kind of had its own refugee problem and was very much aware of the financial burden of absorbing refugees. So at the end of the day, there were never. And Israel also was. Or the Jewish side was very much aware that you cannot ask compensation or any type of redress for dead people. I mean, how can you. What kind of price you can put on a life. But absorbing a refugee is something very different. So this is how Israel eventually kind of conceptualized its. Its claim. And so it's about very much the money that eventually Israel received was for absorbing this half a million refugees. And they had this kind of calculation of how much that would cost. And they eventually kind of formulate that as a demand. And this was what, after all the negotiations until. But that was what was discussed in the negotiation, the direct negotiations between Israel, Germany and the Claims Conference. Now there was this. What makes things again, a little bit more difficult because it was negotiations not between two parties, but between three parties and the third parties. And this is the Jewish Claims Conference, which was organization of Jewish Organization organizations. It had around 23, at the beginning, 21, then 23 Jewish organization from all over the world. And they basically represented kind of Jews outside of Israel or Diaspora Jews, and they negotiate alongside Israel with the Germans, but they negotiated two deals. So Israel negotiated basically what they called back then a global compensation. So this is just the compensation for absorbing this half a million refugees. And the Claims Conference kind of had two points to discuss with the Germans. One is also a global agreement saying that also Diaspora Jews had costs for absorbing refugees, which the Germans should pay for them. But then there was another issue that was much more important for the Claims Conference and that was reparations or compensation for individual persecution of Jews. And this was based on legislation that was already in Germany. Legislation that started in the American occupation zone in 1947 and then also other occupation zones, mainly the French and the British adopted some of this legislation. When Germany was founded in 1949, it adopted this legislation. So this legislation to say it simply allowed victims of Nazi persecution to either to claim different. To claim for damages that was made to them during the war, mainly for property, but also for bodily harm, for limiting their liberty, namely for putting them in concentration camps. So the Claims Conference basically asked the German government to expand this specific legislation and to allow all victims of Nazi persecution to claim such compensation, which the Germans agreed. And this was again a huge thing and quite novel also in the. At that time, I don't think that there's Any, you know, very, you know, similar example of such legislation in other cases.

[A]

Yeah. And of course it was novel for a number of reasons, but one that you kind of very briefly mentioned a moment ago that I want to kind of not lose because I think it is really important to this is that the Allies were not doing something similar. Right. So like, what was their response to this? I mean, you've talked a bit about kind of West Germany's response, but like the us, the uk, France, like, were they supporting the Claims Conference? What was their sort of perspective on all of this? Especially this is also the moment, right, when West Germany is a really important part of the Cold War. Like, how does that all influence what's going on?

[B]

Well, this is a very interesting kind of aspect. So first of all, let's divide. I mean, the, the claim that Israel is making initially is for Germany, not West Germany, not East Germany. There are actually three Germanies or three successor German state, that's West Germany, East Germany and Austria. Austria is a very different story. There was never kind of a similar claim against Austria and it kind of deserve a different book. But the two Germanies, Israel approached the two Germans. We're talking also about a period where Israel had very good relations with the Soviet Union. So the Soviet Union was part of this ask, and also East Germany. So when Israel approached. So first of all, Israel approached. Everything was done through the Allies because officially Israel did not have any official diplomatic relations with any of the German states. They were considered for the Israeli state at that period as pariah states. And Israel knew because first of all, it was first an occupation zone and then it was very much, both German states were very much under the influence of the Allies still. And they knew that everything that happens in Germany needs to go first through the Allies. So that's why the first kind of attempts was to approach the Allies and see what they think about this idea and if they're going to support and not support. So the idea was to get first of all their support. So about the Soviet reactions, the reaction, we don't know actually, we don't know much. We just know that they ignored Israel or that is at least according to the Israeli sources, that the East Germans and especially the Soviet Union simply ignored that. But the three other allies and especially the US did not ignore that. And their position was actually very pragmatic. They thought that they weren't against Germany paying reparations to Jewish victims or to victims, but they didn't want to pay for it and they wanted, if Israel insisted to Go ahead with this program or this demand. They wanted Israel to negotiate that directly with the Germans, which again from the point of view of the Allies, as he said, it's the height of the Cold War, is that you take two basically countries that are, has, you know, in many, both of them for different reasons are very central for the Cold War, but both of them are, you know, the allied had question marks about them. Israel from the point of view of the Allies was a socialist state. Although, you know, from, if you ask Israeli historians, they will always tell you that Israel, you know, Israel alliance to the, to the west and to especially to the Americans was never questioned. But from the point of view, if you look at the Americans, what they said, they looked at Israel and you know, saw the prominence of Israeli left wing parties at the time and you know, they weren't sure if Israel will be such a loyal kind of or is such a loyal country. And they were very concerned about the connection Israel had back then with Soviet Union and Germany. Of course, Germany was a big question mark still. So anything that will attach West Germany to the west and in that regard also Israel to the west was something that the Allies actually supported, but it was their kind of interest and they wanted not to impose an agreement but to kind of bring these two countries together to negotiate such an agreement. And again, the framework, and you're perfectly right, if anything at that period, if you look at any kind of history at that period, any story has to put in this context of the Cold War and especially this story, and I'm sure we're going to talk about that now, because if Israel basically claimed reparations for a refugee issue, and it was part of this idea that of using the power kind of structure of the Cold War, everybody, all the players, the Allies, the Israelis, the West Germans knew that there was another refugee question that basically was very much connected to the creation of the state of Israel and that is the Palestinian refugees, there are issues there.

[A]

This is exactly the other thing I wanted to pull out is, hang on a second. If we're talking about reparations for harms suffered right by people who are still alive, those kinds of reparations, but we're also talking about reparations in terms of taking in refugees, then yeah. Isn't the Palestinian refugee question like a huge part of this?

[B]

It is. And this is again, you know, if we began at the beginning of, you know, why is this, you know, one of the questions that really kind of concerned me and why is this story was forgotten? And this is also One of the major aspects of the story that were forgotten, repressed, marginalized. It is very much part of the story because again, at least for this part of the story, there are kind of two parts. The part until the agreement was signed in September 1952 and then ratified by the German Bundestag in March 1953, and the part afterwards, so the period before Israel, each time that Israel had dealings, especially with the Allies, with all three of them, the Americans, the French and the British, and Israel always asked them, they kind of. Israel lobbied that they should pressure West Germany to first of all enter negotiations and then pay these reparations. Israel always emphasized that if Germany won't acknowledge its responsibility for these refugees coming to Israel, then Israel will also not be able to take responsibility for the Palestinian refugees or the Palestinians fleeing Israel and become refugees after the 1948 war. So it was the Israelis themselves that created this connection. After the signing, Israel still remained by this kind of idea. And from their point of view and from the Israeli point of view, the kind of pain reparations or pain compensation for the absorption of Palestinian refugees in Arab countries was basically the way forward, the way to solve this question. So in many ways they adopted the model that they basically that was kind of. They came up to get reparations from Germany, namely that Germany pays reparations for the absorption of half a million refugees in Israel and also in the diaspora. And they basically said, this is also what we offer to our neighbors in the Arab countries. And we are happy to. They even agreed to divert funding that was supposed to come to Israel from Germany to that particular purpose. But of course, there's again another. You know, the question is, of course, why did. That did not happen? So one of the major issues here. And again, it's a very interesting to see the connection between what I call the German Jewish settlement and the agreement that did not happen between Israel and its Arab neighbors or Israel and the Palestinians, is that there was a embedded, unspoken assumption in the German Jewish settlement, and that is that Germany basically is paying for the rehabilitation, the absorption and the rehabilitation of Jewish refugees or Jewish victims of National Socialism outside of Germany. So these people, even if they were Germans, are actually, it wasn't. I mean, are not expected to come back. And in a way, this kind of corresponds to a very. I mean, I'm saying that it could be very controversial to a lot of people, but this is something that I really kind of willing to defend. But after the war, among all the Allies as well, there was an agreement that there's no place for Jews in Europe. And if you want to save Jews and have the Jews need to find a place outside of Europe. This of course totally corresponds with the Zionist narrative. But there was an agreement at that time that this is basically the best solution for the so called Jewish problem in Europe. So this was the kind of the framework that Israelis came with when they thought about the Palestinian question. And they as well said very similarly, we're going to pay for the absorption and the loss that Palestinians or we are willing to pay for the absorption and the loss that Palestinian refugees suffered, but were not willing to accept the principle of the right of return. And that was basically eventually the end of that, of that idea in the context of the Israeli Palestinian conflict.

[C]

Ryan Reynolds here from Mint Mobile. I don't know if you knew this, but anyone can get the same Premium Wireless for $15 a month plan that I've been enjoying. It's not just for celebrities. So do like I did and have one of your assistant's assistants switch you to Mint Mobile today. I'm told it's super easy to [e-mail]

[A]

Switch upfront payment of $45 for 3 month plan equivalent to $15 per intro rate. First 3 months only, then full price plan options available, taxes and fees extra. See full [e-mail] it's springtime, which means

[C]

that Princeton University Press is having its annual 50% off spring sale from May 4 through June 9. You can get 50% off nearly every single print, ebook and audiobook from Princeton University Press. Just go to Press Princeton. Eduardo to get 50% off incredible books like Disneyland and the Rise of Automation and Beyond Belief, How Evidence Shows what really Works. There are so many fantastic books that you can get an incredible deal on. Go to press.princetonedu and use the code spring50. That's S P R I N G50 at Press Princeton. Eduardo the sale only lasts for a month, so go and get some books.

[A]

Really interesting to see how those things are all intertwined here. A lot of this discussion then has been about key ideas, key politics, kind of internally, externally, the interweaving of lots of things. What about the more practical side? Can we maybe take a moment to like literally go into some of these sort of negotiation rooms? Like how did the logistics work, how did the translation work? What kind of workload and environment are we talking about? These are not the nicest of conditions to be figuring all this out in, if I understand correctly from the book. Right.

[B]

Yeah. So again, here maybe one should kind of differentiate between Kind of two aspects. First of all, the aspects of the negotiation, negotiation themselves, and then the aspect of the implementation, which I don't deal much with that. So I'll concentrate on the first part. So again, there's a misconception for the people at least, who know about this history, about the kind of resistance towards the agreements and towards the idea that Germany should pay reparations to Israel, to Jewish victims and all that. But this, again, is a misconception. There was actually a wide agreement that Germany should pay back what they robbed and of course, compensate those who survived. But where, at least in the Jewish side, there was a huge debate and a huge disagreement was how to reach this agreement. So there was a lot of resentment towards this idea that Germans and Jews will speak directly to each other. You know, it's amazing that for us today, it sounds weird, but back in the time, it was physically difficult. And when, I mean physically, you know, we have evidence of, you know, people try going, you know, journalists going to Germany and kind of reporting about the Germans, Israeli journalists, Jewish journalists. And you see in these reports sometimes that they feel sick after, you know, you know, having meetings with these people, with these Germans. So there was a lot of resentments in the Jewish world and especially in Israel. And until very recently, this kind of. When the idea came and Israel as a state decided, and took Israel quite a long time to make this decision for direct negotiations. But what once this happened, there was very violent demonstrations. There was kind of a feeling that the Israeli state and the rule of Mapai, that's the ruling party under Ben Gurion and Moshe Sharet, who was the Foreign Ministry, are basically, their legitimacy is undermined. And it was very much from the Israeli point of view, a kind of a test for the rule of law. And eventually the Israeli parliament, again, it took time but decided that because mapai, the ruling party, had the majority, but eventually they managed to kind of get a majority and Israel officially could enter direct negotiations with the Germans. But then also other kind of very interesting kind of practical question arose. So for instance, who you send for such a negotiation? What kind of people can negotiate with the Germans? So Israel, eventually, and again, I don't want to go into too many details, decided to send a delegation composed by German Jews, basically. So in a way, this. A different way to say that this meeting that eventually took place in a place called Vassanar near the Hague in the Netherlands, there were six negotiators in the room. All of them actually were Germans. But interestingly enough, because of the sensitivity the Israeli. Once they kind of, before the delegation was sent to the Netherlands, they were giving kind of instructions of what to do or not to do during the negotiation. So, for instance, no small talk, just meet them around the table and that it. And that it. Nothing beyond that. And then, for instance, they were strictly instructed to speak only English and not speak Germans with their counterparts. So once, for instance, I mean, once the meeting started, and it started with a kind of, you know, a more ceremony part where, you know, one delegation, the Israeli delegation was in the room, the German delegation came in, the Israeli delegation. There were handshakes and there were speeches. So we have a very nice depiction of that encounter. And, you know, both sides were very much. I mean, this whole kind of ceremony very much was very moving for both sides. But then one of the Israeli delegates who wrote about that later said that, you know, he gave the speech and everything that they said was immediately translated to the Germans. So it took a long time for them. You know, the whole process took a long time. And he, because he spoke English, he didn't feel that his, you know, very powerful speech that they worked for days to have this, you know, to come. Come about with his speech didn't really have any effect. And this whole process was, you know, very tiring and took much longer than they thought. So eventually, after two days, this whole thing exploded and they start talking German to each other. And two of them even realized that they went to the same school. So you had this kind of very weird kind of moments of, you know, which I find really kind of interesting that, you know, how, you know, the making of such an agreement, but still each one of them, although there were a lot of things that were in common. And my kind of. I believe that from the Israeli point of view, they sent such a delegation because they wanted to close this deal quite quickly, as quick as possible. And they thought that having people who know the language and know the mentality will help them. But very soon they realized that actually the Germans came to the negotiations, but actually they didn't come to negotiate. So this whole process took much longer than they anticipated, and it involved a lot of compromises from both sides. So the Germans enter these negotiations thinking, yes, they want to pay some sort of reparations. They are willing to help the Israeli side and the Jewish side, but actually they don't want to pay much because, I mean, they also have their own difficulties. They also had other responsibilities and nobody likes to pay. And the Israelis from their side also had their red lines. And eventually also going on this Whole process of negotiation took approximately half a year with crisis in the middle where the delegation broke and each went back to their countries for compensation. And that was also where especially the Americans intervene and made sure that once this whole process started, it will also come to an end. And they wanted that to happen. But once they resumed the negotiation, then the Germans came actually to make a deal. So they came with a very different delegation which the Israelis could not really compare because Israel didn't have even enough money to send people there. But then came all kinds of interesting demands. Like Germany had property in Israel, so the Israelis were forced to pay back money for that property and all kinds of things that eventually there was, you know, a lot of criticism against them. But the point is that after this half a year they reached an agreement which nobody actually believed that it could happen.

[A]

Yeah, so what were reactions to it? Like, I mean, this is, as you've explained, like pretty unprecedented. So kind of what did people think on the various sides in the sort of when it was announced and in the immediate implementation aftermath?

[B]

Yeah, so this is also kind of interesting in terms of, you know, the kind of. Sometimes we have these gaps between, between politics and popular opinion. So in Israel and the Jewish world, popular opinion was very much against, as I said before, against direct negotiation. And eventually once the agreement was reached, people were against it anyway, were very much criticized for different reasons. Mainly that Israel did not Israel, from the point of view of Israel, you know, they thought, or the Jewish world, they thought that Germany came cheap from the negotiation and Israel could have. Or the Jewish side could have reached a much better outcome. From the German side, it was exactly the opposite. So those who were opposed to. And they were interesting enough in the German side, at least politically, most opposition came from the coalition, not from the opposition. In that time, the opposition was the socialist German party, which was very much in favor of this agreement. So this whole kind of scheme from both sides, and again, this is kind of remind us a lot of what's happening today in politics was very much depicted. They didn't use these concept, of course, as a kind of a scheme of the deep state in both sides that you have all these people sitting these offices and thinking what is their kind of in their interest? And there are all kinds of interests that don't really correspond with the popular views of the people. And eventually, because they have much more power, they manage to reach this agreement. So if you look immediately after the agreement was signed, both sides really celebrated the agreement. The politicians celebrated the agreement as a huge achievement. But Very, very quickly thereafter, again, both sides, but much more prominent in the Israeli side and the Jewish side. This whole thing is being kind of ignored, swept under the carpet. And people try to kind of, in many ways forget that this whole thing happened. And this also kind of has a lot to do also with the implementation aspect of it, because in the Jewish side and in Israel, it basically made Germany much more visible in Israel, and people still resented that. So just to kind of give you an idea of how this thing was, was implemented, so Germany did not directly pay Israel or the claims conference, anything. So basically, Israel opened a bank account in Germany, and Germany paid money into that account. And then Israel formed a delegation, which they called literally a purchasing delegation. And they sat in the city of Cologne, and according to Israeli kind of demands or Israeli priorities, they went and they bought things, bought all kinds of things with that money and exported that to Israel. And then these things kind of helped Israel recover its economy. It was mainly infrastructure kind of goods. And from the personal kind of point of view, because now Germany had new legislation that kind of gave the opportunity to every Holocaust survivor or victim of National Socialism persecution to claim some type of compensation. People started to claim compensation, which again, created this type of resentments, because it basically promoted a feeling of shame that people are making money out of their suffering, which is another layer of complexity of why this agreement was eventually also forgotten and repressed in our collective memory. This kind of aspect of shame.

[A]

Yeah, I mean, that's obviously a very powerful reason that things are forgotten. Are there any other factors that cause this to have been sort of marginalized that we haven't discussed yet that we want to add in?

[B]

I mean, there is also, I think the other kind of is kind of. I would call it the kind of the boomerang effect of the agreement. So in the period when this agreement was in the making and immediately after it was signed, there was. And I think it goes maybe back to what we started with about the nature, the very nature of such an agreement. I always explained that as a kind of, you have an insurance claim, you had an accident and some kind of incident. Well, you have to pay insurance, or your insurance company is paying or covering damage that you did to a different person. So this whole thing is based on this idea that, I know I smashed your car. I'm responsible for it now. I am paying for that. And that's it. We're moving on. Right? I mean, we write off our debt. So there is this very strong feeling among. Especially among the victims or the survivors. And the Jewish world, that this will be the same here, that once Germany agreed to pay reparations, once Germany started paying, paying that, and there was a deadline also how long they're going to pay. This will be basically there will be a closure. That's it. This history is gone now. We move on. So the reaction for that was to, in a very kind of the slogans of that period was never forget, never forgive. And so you have as a reaction for that in both sides, interestingly enough, but even more so in Israel, although it took a long time for that really to kind of become more prominent. But there was much more emphasis on commemoration and memory. And, you know, you can't understand, for instance, the establishment of an institution like Yad Vashem, the Holocaust Commemoration Museum in Israel, or all kinds of legislation in Israel and commemoration work around the world and in Germany itself, because one of the kind of understanding or aspects of the agreement was that Germany will fight antisemitism and introduce education system that will teach about Nazi persecution. And I think that the boomerang effect, this kind of notion that actually this agreement is not a closure, is that the Holocaust became a certain type of a memory of the Holocaust became much more prominent than it was before. And if, again, if you look at commemoration, especially in the early years, in the 50s and beginning until, you know, the Eichmann trial is always considered as a kind of a turning point, but it's already actually happening before, you know, this emphasis on resistance also in Germany, on German resistance, on those who didn't collaborate, very much change and the Holocaust. For us, it's very normal that Holocaust memory and Holocaust commemoration is focused almost solely on the suffering of the victims. But that was not always the case. And I believe that this fixation with the suffering of the victims is very much connected to this agreement and this fear that a closure will mean that we're going to forget this tragic chapter in our history. But I'm asking myself, and this is also more or less how also I closed the book, what will happen to Holocaust commemoration, Holocaust memory, if we will not only focus on the suffering, which of course is very important, but we will also add to that that after seven years after the Holocaust, the two sides sat together and signed a reparation agreement and starting a reconciliation process?

[A]

Yeah, it's very interesting indeed. Lots of questions raised by all of this. So thank you for taking us through the history, obviously in less detail than the book. There's loads more there for anyone who wants it. But while people might be reading the book what will you be working on? Anything you want to give us a sneak preview of?

[B]

Oh, yeah. I'm currently writing with a colleague of mine, Daniel Siemens, a book which very much actually deals with the kind of the outcomes or the implications of this agreement. We are working on a Jewish aid organization called United Restitution Organization, and that was the aid organization of lawyers that were founded actually already in 1948, but really became a global organization after the signing of the agreement. 952. And this organization of lawyers simply helped people to claim personal compensation from Germany. And this organization produced a huge archive, which some of it is in Jerusalem, some of it is in Canada, in the US in different places. It was a global organization. And these are this archive contains basically the most, the first and the most systematic. For instance, I'm just giving you an idea of Holocaust testimony ever collected. And we are writing the history of this again, another forgotten aspect of this history.

[A]

Well, forgotten history is always fascinating. So best of luck with the project and thank you for joining me here to tell us about your book just published by Cornell University Press in 2026, titled the Great Emotions, Memory and the German Jewish Settlement after the Holocaust. Gideon, thank you so much for having joined me.

[B]

Thank you, Miranda, for. Sa.