washington (jta) | After four years of battling the U.S. government over reparations, Hungarian Holocaust survivors are settling for an apology and extra care for the more destitute among them.
Plaintiffs in the “Gold Train” case settled last week for $25.5 million, the bulk of which will go to welfare programs for Hungarian survivors in need.
The key for plaintiffs in settling the case was the U.S. Justice Department’s pledge to acknowledge wrongdoing, said Alex Moskovic, one of the plaintiffs in the class-action lawsuit.
“We expected much more, but we needed closure,” said, Moskovic, a retired ABC sports editor who now lives in Hobe Sound, Fla. “The funds are not as important as closure and an apology from the U.S. government that it was wrong.”
In October 1945, U.S. forces seized 24 boxcars of Hungarian Jewish property that had been looted by the Nazis. Almost none was returned to its owners. Some went to governments, some apparently went to the wrong people and some was requisitioned by high-ranking U.S. troops.
The fate of the Gold Train property was uncovered in a 1999 report issued by the Presidential Advisory Commission on Holocaust Assets in the United States.
According to attorneys for the plaintiffs, there was evidence suggesting that earlier estimates of the property were exaggerated. The Nazis had removed some of the most valuable items before U.S. troops got the train, experts for both sides said.