The World Jewish Congress lawsuit against Swiss banks was launched in 1995 to retrieve deposits made into Swiss banks by victims of Nazi persecution during and prior to World War II. Initiated as WJC negotiations with both the Government of Switzerland and its banks over burdensome proof-of-ownership requirements for accounts, strong support from United States politicians and leaked documents from a bank guard pressured a settlement in 1998 in a U.S. court for multiple classes of people affected by government and banking practices. As of 2015, US$1.28 billion has been disbursed for 457,100 claimants. Negotiations Starting in 1995, the World Jewish Congress (WJC) began negotiations on behalf of various Jewish organizations with Swiss banks and the Swiss government over dormant Jewish World War II bank accounts. Led by Edgar Bronfman, the heir to the Seagram's fortune, the WJC entered a class-action in Brooklyn, New York City combining several established suits in New York, California, and the District of Columbia. The original suits arose from grievances of Holocaust survivors and their heirs against Swiss banks. They alleged improper difficulties in accessing these accounts because of requirements such as death certificates (typically non-existent for Holocaust victims), along with deliberate efforts on the part of some Swiss banks to retain the balances indefinitely. The causes for claims eventually expanded to include the value of art works purported to have been stolen, damages to persons denied admission to Switzerland on the strength of refugee applications, and the value or cost of labor performed by persons being maintained at Swiss government expense in displaced-person camps during the Holocaust, along with interest on such claims from the time of loss. Plaintiffs included all Holocaust victims, not just Jews. Hearings The WJC was able to marshal the unprecedented support of U.S. government officials including senator Alfonse D'Amato R-NY, who held hearings of the Senate Banking Committee in which he claimed to possess "recently declassified documents that shed new light" on the Swiss role in the war. He also claimed that "hundreds of millions of dollars" of war-era Jewish assets remained in Swiss banks. At the behest of President Bill Clinton, Undersecretary of Commerce Stuart Eizenstat testified at these hearings and commissioned a report which accused Switzerland of being "Nazi Germany's banker." The report relied exclusively on U.S. government archives. It contained no new historical information on Nazi victims' deposits into Swiss banks, and criticized the decisions of