Jewish leaders in Thessaloniki, once home to the world’s largest Sephardic community, are backing the Greek government in increasing calls for compensation of a forced wartime “loan” that stripped Greek reserves in 1942.

Parallel to Greek state claims, the Jewish community is considering its own rights in reclaiming rail fares that Jews had to pay in order to be deported to death camps in occupied Poland. The bill for the 58,585 Jews sent to Auschwitz and other camps was more than 2 million Reichsmark (25 million euros) in today’s money. They not only want Germany to pay back the fares of shame, but also believe there should be seven decades worth of interest added to the return.

“We will study the law and do our best to claim,” said the Jewish community President David Saltiel in an interview with the Associated Press. Historians disagree as to whether the train fares that the Reichsbahn received for transporting Jews were paid directly by the displaced or a special Nazi fund established with money snatched from Jewish victims. What is certain, however, is that the money came from Holocaust victims adding “salt to the wounds” of war that decimated Jewish communities in occupied countries.

Furthermore, the Jewish community paid some 1.9 billion drachmas (50 mln euros in today’s money) in 1942 as ransom in return for 10,000 Jewish men held as slave laborers. Indeed, the Nazis made good on releasing the men from the slave labor regime, only to send them to concentration camps the following year.