THEODORE ZEV WEISS ANNUAL LECTURE IN HOLOCAUST STUDIES

Each May, HEFNU invites a distinguished scholar in the field of Holocaust studies to deliver the annual Theodore “Zev” Weiss Lecture in Holocaust Studies. This lecture is named for HEF founder, Zev Weiss, a survivor of Auschwitz-Birkenau and several other Nazi camps. It honors his legacy of supporting innovative research and teaching in the field. The lecture also honors Zev’s family, many of whom were murdered in the Holocaust. The lecture takes place near the anniversary of the family’s deportation.

"Justice and Restitution: Reversing the Aryanization/Romanianization of Jewish Property in Post-Nazi Romania, 1944-1950" 

Featuring Ştefan Cristian Ionescu (Theodore Zev and Alice R. Weiss-Holocaust Educational Foundation Visiting Associate Professor, Northwestern University)

Tuesday, May 7
5:00 - 7:00 PM Central
Harris Hall, Room 108

 Please join us!
In-Person Only
Open to the Public
Reception to Follow

While Holocaust litigation campaigns became globally prominent in the 1990s, especially in the US courts, a significant litigation, though less spectacular and underreported by the international media, took place in the European courts during the first postwar years. For example, almost nothing is known about the massive Jewish litigation in the courts of Romania – the country that harbored the second largest Jewish community in postwar Europe (430 000 people in 1946) – which resulted in a significant success in the restitution of the Jewish properties (houses, businesses, and companies) that were transferred to gentiles during the pro-Nazi Antonescu dictatorship. This extensive property transfer was known as Aryanization or Romanianization. Ionescu will examine the reversal of Aryanization/Romanianization through court litigation and other methods in early post-Holocaust Romania (1944--1950).