Nazi Looting The Plunder of Dutch Jewry during the Second World War

The Nazi looting machine was notoriously efficient during the Second World War. In the Netherlands, 8.5 million citizens suffered losses estimated at 3.6 billion guilders. Approximately one-third of these losses were borne by Jews, who comprised only 1.6% of the total population. In today's terms, the German occupiers stripped the Jewish population of assets worth $7 billion.


Nazi Looting offers a comprehensive history of the Dutch experience and demonstrates how reputable indigenous institutions acted as willing collaborators. Beginning with a survey of international law and various definitions of 'looting', the author shows how the Germans systematically robbed Dutch Jewry through a variety of means that gave the outward appearance of 'honest' trading. Forced to sell under duress and at unreasonably low prices, few dared refuse the German on the doorstep when threatened with prison or incarceration in a camp.


The plundering was total and systematic. In May 1940, a team of highly trained art historians, linguists, musicologists and literary experts arrived immediately behind the victorious German troops to catalogue the vast collections for Hitler. From 1942, Jews were compelled to deposit all their money into a bank called 'Lippmann, Rosenthal & Co.' The name of the bank itself was a cynical ploy since it was taken from a respected, Jewish-owned Amsterdam bank and presented as a new branch. This bank, however, simply channelled money into the Third Reich with the help of the Amsterdam Stock Exchange, insurance brokers and other well-established Dutch banks. Once the Jews were deported, their houses were emptied and the contents used to re-furnish bombed out areas of the Reich.


In common with many other formerly Nazi-occupied countries in Europe, the Netherlands has been unable to retrieve many of its pre-war assets. More than fifty years after the war's end, 20% of its most important pre-war museum exhibits and approximately 80% of the less important works remain untraced. Painstakingly researched, Nazi Looting exposes a chillingly calculating and brutally destructive process that reverberates to this day.

'Nazi Looting provides the first in-depth and accessible study of the multiplicity of ways in which the Nazis stole Jewish property in the wartime Netherlands. Gerard Aalders' meticulous and exhaustive research brings out all the political and economic facets of this contentious and topical subject. Essential reading for a true understanding of Nazi policies in occupied Western Europe.'
Bob Moore, University of Sheffield