Exodus 3 presents God's call to Moshe to become the redeemer of Israel. He foretells the course Moshe will have to follow in his approach to Pharaoh and what actions/declarations will be needed to liberate Israel.
(18) They will listen to you; then you shall go with the elders of Israel to the king of Egypt and you shall say to him, ‘The LORD, the God of the Hebrews, manifested Himself to us. Now therefore, let us go a distance of three days into the wilderness to sacrifice to the LORD our God.’ (19) Yet I know that the king of Egypt will let you go only because of a greater might. (20) So I will stretch out My hand and smite Egypt with various wonders which I will work upon them; after that he shall let you go. (21) And I will dispose the Egyptians favorably toward this people, so that when you go, you will not go away empty-handed. (22) Each woman shall borrow from her neighbor and the lodger in her house objects of silver and gold, and clothing, and you shall put these on your sons and daughters, thus stripping the Egyptians.”
Chananel ben Chushiel (Rabbeinu Chananel; d. 1055) was a North African rabbi and talmudist. He is considered one of the first Rishonim and studied under the last of the Geonim. His family was from Italy and migrated to Kairowan, where he ultimately attained great renown. He served as rosh yeshiva in Kairowan after the passing of his father. He maintained a lively correspondence with the heads of the great yeshivot in Babylonia. He was also successful in business and attained great wealth. His is the earliest comprehensive commentary on the Talmud. (From Sefaria)
(א) ושאלה אשה משכנתה. חס ושלום שיתיר הקב"ה לגנוב דעת הבריות שישאלו מהם כלי כסף וכלי זהב. ולא ישיבו להם. אבל לשון ושאלה הוא שתתן לה במתנה. שכן מצינו בגדעון (שופטים ח').... וכן מצינו בבת שבע (מ"א ב').... הרי מתנה שנקראת בלשון שאלה.
(1) ושאלה אשה משכנתה, there can be no question that G’d would condone deceiving people into thinking that one borrows from them while not intending to return the “borrowed” objects. The meaning of the word ושאלה is not “she shall borrow,” but “she shall request as a gift.” We find the root שאל used in that sense in Judges 8,24 ....
We also find the word שאל used as a request for a gift when Bat Shva relates this request to her son King Solomon in the name of Adoniah, Solomon’s half brother in Kings I 2,20-21.
(א) ושאלה אשה משכנתה - במתנה גמורה וחלוטה. שהרי כתוב: ונתתי את חן העם - כמו: שאל ממני ואתנה גוים נחלתך. זהו עיקר פשוטו ותשובה לאפיקורסים.
(1) ושאלה אשה משכנתה, as an outright gift. After all, G’d had encouraged the people to ask for these gifts, the Torah telling us in verse 21 that G’d would make the people favourably disposed towards the Israelites so that they would not refuse such requests. The expression שאל in the same sense as here occurs also in Psalms 2,8 שאל ממני ואתנה גוים נחלתך, “Ask it of me, and I will make the nations your domain.” This is the principal meaning of the verse and it effectively silences the heretics who speak of the Jews borrowing and not giving back these trinkets.
(א) וישאלום. אַף מַה שֶּׁלֹּא הָיוּ שׁוֹאֲלִים מֵהֶם הָיוּ נוֹתְנִים לָהֶם, אַתָּה אוֹמֵר אֶחָד? טֹל שְׁנַיִם וָלֵךְ. (ב) וינצלו. וְרוֹקִינוּ:
(1) וישאלום lit., AND THEY HANDED THEM OVER — Even what they did not ask of them did they give to them: “You say “one” — take “two”, but only go!” (Mekhilta d'Rabbi Yishmael 12:35). (2) וינצלו The Targum translates this by ורוקינו, AND THEY EMPTIED OUT.
The Talmud debates the nature of the gift/loan of objects by the Egyptians.
It considers two motivations but is not sure who is moved by this motivation, the Egyptians or the Israelites?
Josephus
(6) 6.....Whence it is that we do still offer this sacrifice in like manner to this day, and call this festival Pascha which signifies the feast of the passover; because on that day God passed us over, and sent the plague upon the Egyptians; for the destruction of the first-born came upon the Egyptians that night, so that many of the Egyptians who lived near the king's palace, persuaded Pharaoh to let the Hebrews go. Accordingly he called for Moses, and bid them be gone; as supposing, that if once the Hebrews were gone out of the country, Egypt should be freed from its miseries. They also honored the Hebrews with gifts; (27) some, in order to get them to depart quickly, and others on account of their neighborhood, and the friendship they had with them.
Two other justifications for the Egyptian gifts.
Fulfillment of God's promise to Avraham regarding the future wealth of his descendents.
(13) And He said to Abram, “Know well that your offspring shall be strangers in a land not theirs, and they shall be enslaved and oppressed four hundred years; (14) but I will execute judgment on the nation they shall serve, and in the end they shall go free with great wealth.
Namely, the "great wealth" which the Israelites will amass is in compensation for the services they were forced to render the Egyptians during their bondage. It is in fulfillment of the biblical notion - and modern concept; see below - of "measure for measure."
Another justification of the gift is based upon the biblical obligation to furnish an emancipated slave with items needed for immediate sustenance.
The acceptance of reparations is a complex moral issue.
When David Ben Gurion accepted reparations from Germany, Israelis debated the issue and almost caused a civil war.
Some in the African American and Black Lives Matter community claim reparations for slavery. The claim is being made even after centuries have passed, and from a sucesor government/nation.
The Israelites received objects from those who enslaved them and who benefitted from their labor.
Robert Alter first observes that it was the women who asked of her neighbor for goods, reflecting the fact that "women constitute the porous boundary between adjacent ethnic communities: borrowers of the proverbial cup of sugar, shares of gossip and women's lore." Yet, in the Egyptian narrative, Israel lived in a segregated area in Goshen.
Re the "act of exploitation recorded here.... The most common line of defense is that this is restitution for the unpaid labor exacted from the Hebrew slaves.
In any case, it seems wise not to view the story in terms of intergroup ethics. From beginning to end, it is a tale of Israelite triumphalism.
....simple farms and the relatively crude towns of Judea would have known about the imperial Egypt's fabulous luxuries, its exquisite jewelry, and the affluent among them would have enjoyed imported Egyptian linens and papyrus. It is easy to imagine how this tale of despoiling or stripping bare Egypt would have given pleasure to its early audiences.
In each of the three sister-wife stories in Genesis that adumbrate the Exodus narrative, the patriarch and his wife depart loaded with gifts: the presence of that motif suggests that the depoiling of Egypt was an essential part of the story of liberation from bondage in the early national traditions."