The world-renowned Jewish property developer Paul Reichmann has died aged 83.

Mr Reichmann was born in 1930 in Vienna and escaped the Nazi occupation of Austria in 1939 by fleeing to Paris with his family.

The family was forced to move for a second time when Germany invaded France, and eventually settled in Morocco.

After the war, Mr Reichmann left home to study religion in Britain and then Israel, where he became a rabbi.

In 1953 he returned to Morocco and married his wife Lea Feldman. The couple emigrated to Canada in 1956 where he started what was to become one of the largest commercial property companies in the world.

Olympia and York was responsible for building the World Financial Centre in New York, Canada’s tallest building First Canadian Palace and the Canary Wharf development in London’s East End.

Throughout his life he remained very private and devoted to his Jewish beliefs.

The Board of Deputies president Vivian Wineman said: “He was a remarkable man combining an exciting vision of urban renewal and the future of London with an absolute loyalty to the strictest Jewish principles.”