by Evans, Mike
“No need to mention it. I hope she has a lovely time in South America.”
I wanted to run and shout and scream, but I forced myself to walk calmly to the corner. As I reached the curb, Wiesenthal came by with car and I got in the front seat. “Veronika ran off to South America,” I said triumphantly. “She married a man who lives there named Ricardo Klement.”
Wiesenthal looked at me in disbelief. “She told you that?” “Yes.”
“How? How did you get her to do it?” “I asked.”
“You asked?” He had a look of surprise. “That’s it?” “I asked, she told me.”
A sly smile came to his face. “You think it’s true?” “I think it is.”
“Hah! We’ve got him.” He beat his hands against the steering wheel with excitement. “You must return to Jerusalem and tell Metzger at once.
He should be able to confirm that information rather easily.”
“Yes,” I said with a suddenly downcast voice. “You’re right. I should return at once and tell him.”
“What’s wrong? Are you not excited?”
“Yes,” I nodded. “I’m excited. But I had hoped to go to Vienna before leaving.”
“What’s in Vienna?”
“Nothing really.” I was thinking of the boardinghouse, all those documents in the wall, and wondering if they still were there. “Just more of the past,” I sighed.
“It would take all day to get there by train. I know you want to go, but you should get this information to Metzger right away and I don’t think you should trust it to the telephone.”
“No,” I said reluctantly. “You’re right. I shall go on the first flight tomorrow.”
* * *
I returned to Jerusalem the following day and went straight to the office. Metzger was standing in the hallway when I arrived. He looked up as I entered. “Good news?”
“Yes,” I grinned. “Come into my office.” He followed me up the hall, and when we were alone I closed the door and turned to him. “Eichmann is living in Buenos Aires under the name of Ricardo Klement.”
“You’re sure?”
“Positive.” I set the briefcase on my desk and took out the documents I received from Wiesenthal. “This is a statement from an official at the Vatican. During the war he was an assistant to one of their bishops.” I handed the document to Metzger. “He says that after the war, Eichmann appeared in Rome and asked for their help. He and the bishop gave Eichmann documents that were then used by the Red Cross to issue a passport. It was issued under a name other than Eichmann, but he says the two are one and the same.”
“This helps, but it isn’t enough by itself.”
I handed him the second document. “This is a letter from Wiesenthal’s friend who lives in Argentina. In it he says he spotted someone he’s certain is Eichmann, living in Buenos Aires.”
“I know this man,” Metzger pointed to the name on the letter. “Why didn’t we get this sooner?”
“Wiesenthal sent it to the World Jewish Congress, but they gave him the runaround. I’m not sure who else got a copy.”
“Okay,” he sighed. “This is all very good, but it doesn’t give us the name. How did you find that out?”
“Wiesenthal wanted to show me where Eichmann’s mother-in-law lived, so we went out for a drive. As we rode past the house, she was on the porch.”
“The wife?”
“No. The wife’s mother. I convinced Wiesenthal to let me talk to her. Posed as an old friend of Veronika.”
“The wife.”
“Right,” I nodded. “Got her to talk and she told me Veronika had run off to South America with Ricardo Klement.”
That brought a grin to Metzger’s face. “We need to get someone in Argentina to confirm his identity.”
“How would we do that without raising his suspicions?”
“If they went there intending to one day return rather than become citizens of Argentina, they might have registered with the embassy.” He leaned against the wall in a thoughtful pose. “The question is, which one?
“Austrian, I suppose. That’s where they lived.”
“They were living in Austria, but no doubt they thought of themselves as Germans.”
“Many Austrians did and still do. The national boundaries are more arbitrary than a true demarcation of Germanic people.”
“Eichmann was a German citizen. When he became a soldier he claimed German citizenship. Friedman has a copy of his identification card at the center in Haifa. They showed you those things?”
“Yes. But which Germany? East or West?” “Good point,” he nodded.
“Can’t we ask of both?”
“I suppose.” Metzger stood up straight. “I will make inquiries.” He opened the door and glanced back at me. “Good work. Now go home and see your family. I’m sure they’ve missed you.”
* * *
A few days later, Metzger came to my office. He stepped inside and closed the door behind him. “We have a report from the East German Embassy in Argentina,” he was barely able to suppress the smile on his face. “All three of the Eichmann children are registered there under their own names. Registered by their mother, with an address in Buenos Aires.”
“It’s him.”
“Yes. It would appear we’ve located him.” “What now?”
“Operations is taking over.” “Operations?”
“Yes. We’re part of Mossad, remember.” “Right.”
“They’ll locate the house and put him under observation. Find a way to confirm his identity. Once they have done that, they’ll move forward with rendition.”
“Bringing him here?”
“Yes. As I told you before, once we have him in our custody we will put him on trial in Jerusalem.”
“So, until then, we wait?”
“We wait. And while we wait, you get to work on documenting everything you’ve learned. We need original documents if we can get them, especially for official documents. Certified copies will work if we can’t find the originals. And we need to start lining up witnesses.”
“People who knew him?”
“People who knew him at the death camps. Survivors. We need survivors. I don’t want this to be merely a document-intensive trial. We’ll have to use plenty of documents. Hopefully it will turn out to be an official, substantiated, unquestionable record of what the Nazis did to us. Not exhaustive, but complete. But I don’t want to use documents alone. I want the details to come from the mouths of those who survived, people who can speak for themselves and for all those whose remains are scattered across the European countryside. I want the world and our own people to hear what really happened. So begin working on a list of people who could testify.”
“What topics do you want them to address?”
“Just begin at the beginning and work your way forward, telling the story through the stories of people who were there. You’ve studied this extensively. And you’ve lived it. Arrange them as you see fit to make the story as complete as possible. We’ll review your work later.”
With Metzger’s instructions to guide me, and his confidence to motivate me, I returned to the center in Haifa and asked Tuviah Friedman for help sorting through the many survivor statements in his files. I did this under the guise of searching for people who might have information about Eichmann and avoided telling him what we already knew. He and his assistants helped me prepare lists of people who either mentioned Eichmann by name, or who might have seen him or had interactions with him.
While preparing those lists, I immersed myself in the accounts of people who were interred at the camps, made photo-static copies of their statements, and descended into the emotional gloom that plagued my earlier life. Because of the emotional toll, I made the added effort of returning home each evening to David, Eli, and the serenity of our life together in Jerusalem. The two-hour drive was long, but the joy of being with my family with their love and support put my mind at ease and cleansed my soul of the evil that seeme
d to be conjured up by images from those files.
As I read the accounts I learned that, like the ghetto in Vienna where we lived, most other ghettos had their own Council of Elders—the Judenrat. German officials required it of every location. Many of the written accounts talked of decisions made by the council, which, in effect, decided who among them lived and who died. I knew that councils were used at most locations, but seeing their activity from the perspective of others put the issue in a different light than I had considered before and brought me once again face-to-face with the question of Jewish collaboration, an issue raised by Haim Rotschild when we talked years earlier. Each ghetto had a Judenrat. There was no way to avoid it. However, some were more diligent than others in fulfilling the duties assigned by the Nazis. As I considered what that meant and the effect it had, I thought of Papa and Uncle Alois, and I wondered how faithfully they discharged their duties. Were they faithful to the Nazis, or to us?
Late one afternoon I found Friedman at his desk and posed the question to him. He leaned back in his chair and ran his hand over his forehead. “The Nazis,” he began slowly, “put all of us in an untenable position.”
“But is that just an excuse we make to appease our conscience?” “For some perhaps, but not for men like your father and uncle.
Good men can withstand honest scrutiny.”
“I wonder what I would find if I really looked.”
“Think of what they faced,” he suggested. “No doubt they knew that if they refused, the Nazis would find others who would serve in their place. Perhaps far less scrupulous men. Not serving meant closing their eyes to all that happened around them. Serving forced them to walk the line between good and evil. It was a tough position, but merely serving on the council was not wrong.”
“But were there any who did not use their position to their own advantage?”
“Not to defend those who did, it depends on where you draw the line.”
“That sounds like we’re mincing words.”
“Not exactly. I suspect that your family received some benefit from your father’s service, without you being aware of it. Perhaps without him being aware of it, either.”
I felt my forehead wrinkle in a frown. “How so?” “You were in the Vienna ghetto?”
“Yes.”
“Which part were you in? Where was your apartment? On the river side, or the canal side?”
“We were by the river. One block over from the fence that ran along the riverbank.”
Friedman nodded. “That was the best location they had to offer.” He rested his hands in his lap. “Third floor?”
“Yes. Why?”
“On the inside, or on a corner?”
“In the middle. We had a window that looked out on the street, but we were in the center of the building.”
“Window looking out the front?” “Yes.”
“This was one of the best apartments in the building.”
I scowled in disbelief. “It was filthy and we had no furniture.”
“But you were on the third floor, which meant the floors below you insulated you from most of the noise, and in winter they insulated you from the cold. Heat rises, so whatever heat was generated on the two floors below you rose up to help keep you warm. The floor above you meant you weren’t exposed to the winter cold from any direction except the one wall along the front. And you were on the inside, rather than a corner, which meant there was no draft.”
The frown on my brow turned to a questioning look. “You think someone did that intentionally?”
“Absolutely,” he nodded. “Absolutely.”
“Papa did not request it,” I countered. “We were assigned to the apartment before they asked him to serve.”
“You were assigned that apartment because they knew your father would serve.”
“They didn’t know that. What could have possibly made them so sure?”
He had a satisfied smile. “They sent your Uncle Alois and the rabbi to ask him.”
I was struck by the realization that what he said was true, and by the awareness that I had never thought of that as a possibility. Now I wondered what other things I’d missed.
“The bad ones,” he continued. “The ones I find reprehensible were the ones who went over to the evil side and tried to take advantage of the situation for their own benefit. Choosing only their family members for work permits, only their families for travel documents, only their family members for extra food rations. And if anyone else wanted those privileges, they charged double.” His eyes brightened. “What did your father do with his extra ration? I know he received one. That was standard procedure. What did he do with it?”
“He gave it to a woman who had small children. It was a condition of his acceptance, that he could give it to anyone he chose.”
Friedman’s eyes grew moist and full. “He was a man of God. A true Jew, in whom no one could find fault.” He paused a moment and we sat there in silence. Then he cleared his throat and continued quietly, “Those people who used their position only for themselves were no longer Jewish at heart. They became Nazis themselves and should be tried as criminals.” His eyes had a far-off look, and the way he said it sounded more like a prayer than simply a statement.
“Will they?”
He looked up at me. “Will they what?” “Will they be tried as war criminals?”
“I do not think so.” He shook his head slowly. “Not now.” Then he sat up straight. “Your Uncle Alois…what was his full name?”
“Alois Kuffner.”
“Wait here. I will be right back.”
Friedman came from behind his desk and disappeared out the door. He returned a few minutes later with a file. “Here he is.” He began reading as he entered the office. “Died at Mauthausen in 1943. They listed him as dying of natural causes, but someone who knew him says he was shot for not giving up the name of a prisoner who took an extra slice of bread from the meal rations.” He tipped the file so I could see a handwritten statement, then he moved to the chair behind the desk and began reading. “He was on the prison council. One of the many groups that were formed to run the camp.” He paused to look up at me and explained, “They also had a barracks manager in each building. Most of them were crooks and should be shot on sight. The councils tried to do a better job, mostly.” Then he glanced down at the file and began again. “The officer in charge of the kitchen, which could hardly be called a kitchen, reported that a slice of bread was missing. The guards called everyone out to formation and demanded to know who took it. No one would answer. After an hour or two they grabbed Alois Kuffner and demanded that he give them the name or they would shoot him instead. Alois stood silent, so they shot him and the two men on either side of him. He was a member of the council, but he was an honorable man.” Tears welled up in my eyes. Friedman leaned back in his chair. “Mere participation does not count as collaboration. There has to be more, otherwise we were all collaborators. We carried the stone from their quarries. We washed their clothes. Those were terrible times. There are no simple answers. But men like your father and Alois Kuffner were an example to us all.” I turned away to wipe my eyes. Friedman put aside the file and changed the subject. “How are you coming with the lists?”
“Making progress,” I caught my breath as I spoke.
“What is all this about anyway? Why the sudden interest in names and statements?”
“It is part of our investigation.” I didn’t want to say more. His eyes narrowed. “You’re getting close to Eichmann?” “We are making progress.”
“And Mengele?” He arched an eyebrow. “Making any progress on him?”
“We have researchers working on all the names that have been unaccounted for. I am focused right now on Eichmann. Retracing every step, looking at every detail, waiting for a break.” It was true, I was waiting, and if the information we’d compiled proved accurate, it would produce a huge break.
* * *
After a week at the center in Haif
a, I returned to work at the office in Jerusalem and began sorting through the lists and notes I had amassed from the statements in Friedman’s files. Once again, Metzger’s instructions guided me as I arranged the statements into groups based on the subject matter of each witness’s experiences. Then I began the tedious task of locating addresses and telephone numbers for the ones who lived in Israel. I started with them because they seemed readily accessible. The more people we could use who lived nearby, the less expense we would incur in interviewing them and preparing them for trial.
Two days later, I went for my first appointment, a meeting with Nadia Yogev, a woman of fifty who was born in Poland. Her family was relocated from the countryside to the ghetto in Warsaw. She came to Israel during our fight for freedom. I met her at her home and we sat together in the living room.
“At first,” she began, “it wasn’t so bad. The buildings were filthy and the stone that paved the streets had been removed, so when it rained the streets were rivers of mud. But it was manageable, except for the food. We were always hungry. Then they came for the children.” Her eyes filled with tears. “I held on to my younger brother to keep them from taking him, but a Nazi soldier snatched him from my arms, swung him by his legs, and smashed his head against the wall,” she sobbed. “His little skull exploded and his brains spattered my dress.”
We paused a moment while she collected herself, then I showed her an array of photographs. “Did you see any of these men in the ghetto? Either during that selection or at some other time.”
She glanced at them and tapped a picture of Eichmann with her finger. “Him.”
“He was there?” “Yes.”
“You are certain of it?”
“Positive. He was there when we arrived and at each of the selections.” “Do you know his name?”
“Eichmann,” she nodded with resolve. “Adolf Eichmann.”
“So, you were in the ghetto and they came for the children. What happened after that?”
“Not long after they took the children—maybe two or three weeks— the soldiers returned for the women. They forced them into the back of the trucks and hauled them away.”
