With the release of hundreds of damaging documents, a dark side of Switzerland's democracy has been unveiled. Switzerland is now seen as a nation of greedy bankers, collaborators with the Nazis, and robbers of the wealth of the victims of the Holocaust. Swiss Banks and Jewish Souls is a powerfully enlightening account of how a small and determined group of people from divergent backgrounds humbled the legendary Swiss financial empire to achieve a measure of justice for Holocaust survivors and their heirs, while shattering the myth of Swiss wartime neutrality. Rickman tells how a small group of people, none of them professional historians, pieced together a puzzle of unknown proportions and proceeded to dismantle the myth of Swiss innocence and victimization at the hands of the Nazis, and expose a fifty-year cover-up. Untold numbers of European Jews and others placed their funds in Swiss banks because they believed they offered a safe haven for funds which the Nazis were trying to control. What better place to put their money than in Switzerland? Swiss Banks and Jewish Souls discusses how investigative groups proved that Switzerland stole the money of the Jews and helped the Nazis to do the same. No one began with evidence and no one had a source of knowledge upon which to fall back. All they shared was a feeling that something was terribly wrong and that a great injustice had occurred. Propelled by this instinct, a U.S. Senator, the World Jewish Congress, a British Parliamentarian, the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum, and a handful of Holocaust survivors accomplished what the U.S., British, and French governments and a group of feuding Jewish organizations could not or would not do. As a result of this effort, how the world views Switzerland and how Switzerland views itself has been redefined. Most importantly, those who survived the Nazi horrors, only to be victimized again by the Swiss bankers, have now achieved some measure of justice, or at least financial compensation after more than fifty years.

Praise for Nazi Gold "A compelling book on one of the greatest robberies of all time." --Rabbi Marvin Heir, dean, Simon Wesenthal Center "Nazi Gold [is] a compelling, outraged, carefully researched book. . . Tom Bower, one of the finest investigative journalists in the English-speaking world over the past generation. . .is the ideal chronicler for this story. Over the past 20 years he has built up a track record second to none in documenting crimes and conspiracies that the Nazis and their collaborators were able to cover up or escape from in the decades after 1945. . .Riveting, outstanding." --Martin Sieff, Washington Times "Nazi Gold is an important book that uncovers much new material." --Saul Friendlunder, author of Nazi Germany and the Jews "Compelling reading." --Chicago Jewish Star "[A] sensational expose. . .Impressively revealing." --Dade Jewish Star Some Revelations form Nazi Gold In 1942 thousands of Jewish refugees fleeing a Nazi roundup of Jews in occupied France crossed the border into Switzerland seeking asylum but where forcibly pushed back to the waiting Gestapo by the Swiss police. Virtually all of them were immediately shipped to concentration camps. During the war thousands of Swiss willingly worked undercover for the German secret service and the Nazis. The Swiss accepted for deposit without question gold bullion looted by German from the treasuries of Austria, Czechoslovakia, Poland, Denmark, and Holland'countries they had conquered. The Swedes and the Portuguese, also neutrals, refused to accept the looted gold.

In 1951, an ad hoc consortium of Jewish organizations received, together with the State of Israel, an invitation to negotiate with West Germany for "moral and material amends" for Nazi-era damages. The consortium became the Conference on Jewish Material Claims against Germany, known as the Claims Conference. Over a half-century, the Conference's vigorous pursuit of claims against Germany led to compensation for hundreds of thousands of victims of Nazism. The activities of the Conference expanded from support of individual victims to allocations to special goals, including support for Righteous Gentiles, commemoration of the Holocaust, study and research, etc. Dwells on problems faced by the Conference in dealing with the governments of East Germany and Austria, which before the 1990s did not recognize their countries as successors of the Nazi state, as well as with big companies in West Germany, which did not recognize their responsibility for their part in the Nazi program of "annihilation through work", and thus did not want to compensate their former workers.

In 1951, an ad hoc consortium of Jewish organizations received, together with the State of Israel, an invitation to negotiate with West Germany for "moral and material amends" for Nazi-era damages. The consortium became the Conference on Jewish Material Claims against Germany, known as the Claims Conference. Over a half-century, the Conference's vigorous pursuit of claims against Germany led to compensation for hundreds of thousands of victims of Nazism. The activities of the Conference expanded from support of individual victims to allocations to special goals, including support for Righteous Gentiles, commemoration of the Holocaust, study and research, etc. Dwells on problems faced by the Conference in dealing with the governments of East Germany and Austria, which before the 1990s did not recognize their countries as successors of the Nazi state, as well as with big companies in West Germany, which did not recognize their responsibility for their part in the Nazi program of "annihilation through work", and thus did not want to compensate their former workers.