The last Nuremberg prosecutor passes away

depending on witnesses, Ferencz mostly relied on official German documents to make his case.

All the defendants were convicted and more than a dozen were sentenced to death by hanging even though Ferencz hadn’t asked for the death penalty. “At the beginning of April 1948, when the long legal judgment was read, I felt vindicated,” he wrote. “Our pleas to protect humanity by the rule of law had been upheld.” items that had been confiscated from them by the Nazis.

He also later assisted in negotiations that would lead to compensation for the Nazi victims.

In later decades, Ferencz championed the creation of an international court that could prosecute any government’s leaders for war crimes. Those dreams were realised in 2002, with the establishment of the International Criminal Court in The Hague, though its

In December 2022, the U.S. Congress awarded him its highest honour, the Congressional Gold Medal.

“Ben Ferencz was a giant,” said WJC General Counsel and Associate Executive Vice President Menachem Rosensaft. “He devoted himself to the very end of his long and distinguished career to making sure that the lessons of Nuremberg would become engrained in both international law and the consciousness of society as a whole. He was also a fierce and tireless champion of providing at least a modicum of justice to Holocaust survivors.”

George Foster, President of The Australian Association of Jewish Holocaust Survivors & Descendants, told J-Wire: “His passing marks the end of an era, which saw the murder of six million Jews and, perhaps, also the era of prosecution of the perpetrators. He was a persuasive advocate of justice for victims of genocide stemming from his experience as a Nuremberg prosecutor and witnessing the horrific consequences of the genocide of European Jewry.

“Nuremberg taught me that creating a world of tolerance and compassion would be a long and arduous task,” he said. “And I also learned that if we did not devote ourselves to developing effective world law, the same cruel mentality that made the Holocaust possible might one day destroy the entire human race.”

With the war crimes trials winding down, Ferencz went to work for a consortium of Jewish charitable groups to help Holocaust survivors regain properties, homes, businesses, artworks, Torah scrolls and other Jewish religious effectiveness has been limited by the failure of countries like the United States to participate.

The World Jewish Congress said Ferencz played a key role in negotiating the watershed 1952 reparations agreements under which West Germany agreed to pay $822 million to the State of Israel and to groups representing Holocaust survivors.

A lifelong advocate for Holocaust remembrance and genocide prevention, he was the last remaining link with the post-war efforts to bring the leading Nazi war criminals to justice.

The Australian Association of Jewish Holocaust Survivors & Descendants and, indeed, all survivors and people of conscience, mourn the death of Ben Ferencz, an honest, caring and thoughtful man.

In noting Mr Ferencz’s passing, Sue Hampel, co-President of Melbourne’s Jewish Holocaust Centre, said: “He was a remarkable man who left an incredible legacy in his quest for justice for all victims of genocide.”

Ben Ferencz is survived by a son and three daughters. His wife died in 2019.