Israel / Jewish Holocaust

In Israel, Some Holocaust Survivors Face Hard Times
By Edmund Sanders
The Los Angeles Times, July 6, 2010
"Tucked into the hillside of this ancient port city is a sight few Israelis ever imagined they'd see in the Jewish state. It's a simple, small housing shelter, converted from an old office building and not unlike ones for the homeless, drug addicts or battered women. This facility, however, has a different clientele: Holocaust survivors. The dozen or so residents are among those who more than six decades ago survived concentration camps or spent years as refugees fleeing Nazi persecution during World War II. In Israel, many built prosperous, productive lives. But in old age, they've ended up broke, alone, sick or homeless, facing a painful choice between buying medicine or paying rent. Most have no remaining family; others have relatives unable or unwilling to help. It's a pleasant enough shelter, with sunny rooms, free medical care, hot meals and plenty of smiling volunteers. Funded by the Helping Hands to Friends charity, it's the first of its kind in Israel, and a new 80-bed wing, currently under construction, has a waiting list of 1,800. Despite the gratitude of those living here, there's also a sense of bitterness and betrayal. Residents ask how a nation established in part on their suffering could turn its back on them now. 'We helped found the state of Israel and built it,' said Miryam Kremin, 88, who escaped a Polish ghetto as a teenager, leaving behind parents whom she never saw again. 'They should make our final years better.'
Kremin did not apply for Holocaust reparations until recently because she and her husband, an engineer, didn't need the money. But after he died, Kremin said she depleted most of her savings on rent and prescriptions. ... Poverty among Holocaust victims in Israel is something of a dirty little secret. An estimated 70,000 survivors -- one-third of those living in Israel -- don't have enough money to make ends meet, victims support groups say. The survivors show up in soup kitchens or government welfare agencies. ... The problem, according to [Shimon] Sabag and others, is that many survivors fall through the cracks or receive insufficient aid from Holocaust compensation programs, which are largely funded by $60 billion in German reparations and administered by the Israeli government and New York-based Conference on Jewish Material Claims Against Germany. [...]"