15 Summer 2025 altogether. This exodus made it easier for local officials to ignore restitution claims, classify Jewish properties as “abandoned,” and redistribute these assets for nonJewish purposes. Similar patterns occurred in Czechoslovakia and Hungary, where earlier communityowned properties were reallocated for uses that excluded Jewish communities. Hungary had the largest number of Jewish Holocaust survivors — between 200,000 and 250,000 — largely due to the fact that after the deportation of rural Jews, the systematic deportation of Jews from Budapest was not carried out. According to a 1938 valuation, the property owned by Hungarian Jews amounted at the time to at least $1.6 billion. Following the German occupation in March 1944, the complete looting of Jewish property began: nearly 100,000 houses and apartments and tens of thousands of businesses were nationalized, while works of art, personal belongings, and other movable goods were confiscated, inventoried, and stored. Initially, these “abandoned” assets were intended to be distributed by local authorities to individuals who applied for them. However, a state-controlled distribution of Jewish property was largely ineffective in many areas. In particular, during the establishment of ghettos, the deportation of Jews, and the October Arrow Cross takeover, the local population simply looted sealed-off houses and warehouses. After the war, the newly established government — like those in other countries in the region — immediately abolished anti-Jewish laws and decrees. By the following year, except for Latifundia, the government recognized the legitimacy of full restitution and established legal frameworks for the restitution process. Individuals who had acquired Jewish property were required to report this to the relevant authorities. A 1946 law called for setting up a committee to oversee unclaimed Jewish property and ensure it was used to benefit the Jewish community and other legitimate claimants. This committee, however, never functioned as intended. It received only a small fraction of the property to which it was entitled and was disbanded a few years later, after the Communist Party came to power. Much of the unclaimed Jewish property had already been placed under the authority of the Government Commissariat for Abandoned Property, a state agency established in 1945. But this agency was not exclusively concerned with Jewish property; it also managed the assets of aristocrats, military officers, and even war criminals who fled to the West or disappeared during the war. Nevertheless, its activities often amounted to the arbitrary redistribution of property — frequently to Communist Party officials — rather than fulfilling its official mandate. Since Hungary had been an ally of Nazi Germany, the post-war government was required to sign a peace treaty with the Allied powers. The peace treaty signed in early 1947 in Paris required the government to return property confiscated after September 1, 1939, to its original owners on the grounds of their religion or origin or to provide them with compensation. However, after the Communist takeover, these provisions also remained on paper. In Hungary, therefore, although the legal conditions were in place, restitution was also not achieved. In the absence of a state-implemented restitution program, between 1945 and 1948 it was up to the goodwill of local authorities to decide whether the applications of restitution claimants were accepted or not. There were some settlements where this was done. Still, in many cases, it was not implemented because of bureaucratic difficulties, but again mainly because of fear of anger and resistance from the beneficiaries of Jewish property. The decisions of local authorities and courts were mainly motivated by political reasons. Before the war, Communist parties across Central and Eastern Europe were minor political players with little support, particularly in Poland, Hungary, and Slovakia. However, after 1945 they gained a decisive influence on political decisions with the forceful backing of the Soviet Union. Since in the first post-war elections, in none of these countries could they receive the majority of the votes (in Hungary the party received 17%, while the Smallholders party received 57%), their efforts to assert dominance were marked by a desperate search for popular support. To navigate these challenges, Communist leaders sought to align their rhetoric and policies with what they perceived to be the majority's expectations. Among the tools they used to garner support were deeply rooted societal antisemitism and the lingering traditions and rhetoric of the old “Jewish Question.” They were keenly aware that antisemitic attitudes remained widespread and that many had materially benefited from the anti-Jewish discrimination and persecution of the war years. As a result, Communist parties frequently adjusted their positions on critical post-war issues to reflect the prevailing sentiments of society. Despite their professed antifascist stance, this often meant ignoring and dismissing legitimate demands of persecuted Jews for compensation and neglecting calls for justice. In some instances, Communist parties even formed temporary or lasting alliances with known antisemites or made concessions to antisemitic sentiments to strengthen their political support.
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