WJC files $6 million libel suit against Isi Leibler
I would have expected that the damning report of the New York Attorney General, Eliot Spitzer, would be the end of the story and lead to closure on the painfully distressing WJC imbroglio. But rather than moving forward, the embittered WJC leaders are demonstrating that old habits die hard.
The bizarre $6 million libel suit served against me � one of the highest libel suits ever filed in Israel - is not merely vindictive but is also a crude effort to intensify the long standing efforts by the WJC to intimidate journalists and others who were critical of the WJC.
Stephen Herbits was particularly vicious against Jewish activists and organizations who crossed the WJC path. You may recollect that after an interview last year with New York Magazine, he was forced to apologize after he had warned that if other Jewish organizations caused problems for the WJC in the media "this organization [the WJC] ain't going down by itself". He then accused other unnamed Jewish organizations of filing false IRS returns, misuse of funds, providing "outlandish" benefit packages, and lying to the government.
Just last week, in an interview with the London Jewish Chronicle, Herbits was quoted saying that "He [Leibler] can say he's vindicated until he's blue in the face or six feet under. It doesn't bother me. I have no interest in settling."
It is also clear that despite their bitter recent experience, the WJC has yet to appreciate the sanctity of public funds. The mere filing of such a flamboyant law suit incurs court costs of $150,000, excluding legal fees and other associated expenses. I trust that in the spirit of a new regime of financial transparency, the WJC will disclose such expenses to future potential donors who mistakenly believe that their contributions are being used to combat anti-Semitism.
This libel suit is especially grotesque having regard to the fact that the Attorney General's report went far beyond the concerns relating to governance and financial transparency which I and other critics had raised when we called for an independent audit.
Amongst the findings in the report were assessments that Israel Singer had received various forms of compensation and benefits not authorized or approved by any organ of the WJC. And to this day, due to information being withheld from the Attorney General, unresolved questions remain relating to the $1.2 million transferred to Singer's "pension" accounts. The purpose of the transfer of this money was described in the report as being unauthorized and not documented with "no records that would have reflected the creation or maintenance of a pension fund in the Geneva office".
In fact the Attorney General condemned Singer for having "violated the obligation to properly administer charitable assets". He directed him to personally repay over $300,000 in respect of "inappropriate disbursements". He also took the unprecedented step of explicitly prohibiting Singer from retaining any financial management or oversight role in the WJC or its affiliated entities, forcing him to step down as chairman of the Governing Board. It is noteworthy that despite these dramatic findings, the principal publication catering to American charity and philanthropic organizations questioned if the penalties imposed were overly lenient due to political and other considerations.
It is of course now painfully obvious that had the WJC acceded to our call for an independent audit, all these issues could have been resolved internally without the devastating public exposure and expenditure of millions of dollars of public funds incurred by the massive legal fees and futile cover-up efforts.
Yet despite this adverse report, the publicly funded WJC controlled by Messrs Bronfman, Herbits and their acolytes, are still determined to maintain a high profile for Singer in the organization. In fact, immediately following the release of the report by the Attorney General, in an interview with Herbits in the Jewish Chronicle, Singer was described as being "wholly in charge of the organization's policy". If that is correct, it would seem that they have actually endorsed lower standards of fiduciary responsibilities from their senior public figures than those commonly regarded as mandatory for officers of a public corporation. This is a matter of credibility of the WJC.
But the real question facing the Jewish organizational world is whether such standards should also apply to the Claims Conference, the largest repository of funds for the Jewish people? Can a body controlling billions of dollars of Holocaust restitution funds morally continue to retain as its President, a man found by the Attorney General of the State of New York to have "violated his fiduciary duties as a trustee of charitable assets"?
It is of course self-evident that most Jews are unhappy with this ongoing public ventilation of scandals. However the vindictive publicly funded libel suit pursued against me by the Bronfman-Singer-Herbits troika in the name of the WJC, obliges me to respond and will impel me to disclose additional information relating to the financial irregularities and improprieties which occurred before Singer was removed from his post. This will of course reinvigorate the media fest which for over two years has been centered on this once venerable international Jewish organization.
A recent example is an article by Daniel Ganzfried and Sebastian Heft which was featured on the cover of the February 9 issue of the reputable Swiss journal "Weltwoche". A translation of the article can be found at the author's web site: English - Hebrew. The original article in German. This article is said to be a "literary" forerunner to a major investigative book Ganzfried is allegedly researching relating to the WJC and Restitution.
Ganzfried is a highly regarded Swiss Jewish writer whose novels and essays have earned him the respect of the literary world. He became an international literary celebrity when he exposed as a fraud, the best selling purported Holocaust memoir by Wilkominski. He had also written critical pieces earlier about the WJC in another Swiss periodical, FACTS.
Regrettably, the article goes beyond the WJC imbroglio and raises questions with respect to the entire restitution process. I emphasize that I do not share Ganzfried's broader views relating to the Swiss banks and restitution. By and large, despite errors, the restitution process was an historical imperative. If indeed the Swiss paid more than they were obliged, this was largely a consequence of their initially evasive and arrogant approach to the entire issue. If any criticism is to be leveled, it is that many aging Holocaust survivors have not received their entitlement to restitution funds whilst lawyers and bureaucrats have profited from these proceeds in an unseemly, even obscene, manner.
However, Ganzfried's critical article is likely to be followed by many more. It is inevitable that journalists will question the propriety of a person whom an Attorney General has described as having "violated his fiduciary duties as a trustee of charitable assets" continuing to hold the office of President of a public fund controlling billions of dollars of restitution funds. If Singer himself does not retire graciously, ultimately the Board of the Claims Conference may be obliged to bite the bullet and request his resignation.
I conclude by reiterating my belief that after the report of the AG, the matter should have been laid to rest and the WJC should have moved forward. Nevertheless I trust it is clearly understood that being at the brunt of a vicious $ 6 million libel suit, I am not being vindictive when I am obliged to expose the behavior and motivations of those initiating this unseemly libel suit, even if it provides additional grist for the media mills. Needless to say, it will be the Attorney General's report which will provide the core of my response to the WJC's flamboyant and vindictive effort, utilizing public funds, to extract retribution for the outcome of the disastrous external governmental intervention which they inflicted upon themselves.
Filed under WJC.UPDATED: 4/25/06
posted by Tzemach Atlas at 6:28 PM
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