The Trial of Adolf Eichmann

Presiding Judge: The way it was asked, at any rate, it could be something else, let us hear it.

State Attorney Bach: I am entitled to ask this witness also in his capacity as a researcher also about conclusions, in particular as they are not his conclusions alone. It seems that both the literature and other researchers have reached the same results.

Presiding Judge: I would suggest, at any rate, to keep this as brief as possible.

Judge Halevi: In what year was this pogrom?

Witness Loewenstein: At the end of January 1941.

State Attorney Bach: How did Richter’s influence, or Richter’s arrival, make itself felt in practice? What was the change which you felt?

Witness Loewenstein: First of all, after the revolt of the Iron Guard, there came a new wave of laws against the Jews. Previously there had been no laws; now laws appeared, all kinds of laws, against the professions, against Jewish tradesmen, against Jewish officials, full Aryanization in all fields of economic and public life. Apart from this, the Jewish Centre.

Richter appeared there openly, and he was all the time in contact with the secretary general of the Centre.

Q. Dr. Loewenstein, before we continue describing the functions of the Jewish Centre, what can you tell us about the physical measures taken against the Jews in Romania in the broad sense, including the districts of Bessarabia, Bukovina, etc.?

A. After the pogrom in Bucharest in January 1941, there was the pogrom in Jassy following the outbreak of the War. Over ten thousand people were killed. We know this also from the trials of the war criminals held after the War.

The murderers were units of the German army, together with Romanian soldiers. But it must be assumed that the men of Einsatzgruppe D were also involved. This is where they crossed into Bessarabia.

Q. In addition to the pogrom in Jassy?

A. During the course of the conquest of Bessarabia and Northern Bukovina, an almost complete extermination took place. Only from Bessarabia do we have the reports of the Romanian local constabulary: From the beginning of June 1941 until September 1941, 160,000 persons were killed in Bessarabia. Then there followed a second wave in Bukovina.

Q. What was the nature of this second wave?

A. Those who remained alive were deported to Transnistria.

Q. Do you know about an operation in Czernowitz?

A. We know that in Czernowitz large-scale slaughter took place from the moment the Germans entered, and after that – the deportation.

Q. The deportation to Transnistria?

A. Yes, the deportation to Transnistria.

Q. What can you tell us about the deportation to Transnistria and about the life of the Jews in this district of Transnistria after the deportation?

A. Transnistria was Auschwitz for us, it was the grave of the Jews of Romania. Almost all the deportees, that is to say the majority of the deportees, were liquidated. I do not know how many local Jews there were, but there were Ukrainian Jews, too. Conditions were the very worst. There were camps, extermination camps, forced labour camps, and then there were camps such as Bogdanovka.

Q. Where was the Bogdanovka camp?

A. In Transnistria. In Bogdanovka animal fodder peas were given out as food, and all the people became paralysed. That was in the German sphere of influence. There were Germans, SS men, also on the other side of the Bug, the border. And we have reports from the constabulary – I know this also from witnesses who told me – that the Germans crossed the Bug, seized Jews and killed them. Many of the Jews were sent to the other side of the Bug to forced labour. They knew that there would be no choice, only death. Hardly anybody returned from the other side of the Bug.

Q. What were the living conditions of the Jews in Transnistria and the sanitary conditions?

A. There were epidemics all the time, there was no food, and only during the later period were the Jewish institutions able to send help, both medicines and money.

Presiding Judge: When was that?

Witness Loewenstein: In 1943, 1944.

Q. Where was this sent from, from Romania?

A. From Romania, yes.

State Attorney Bach: Dr. Loewenstein, I know that it is very difficult to talk of exact figures where such things are concerned, but can you give us an approximate estimate of the extent of the extermination of this Jewish community during that period, how many perished according to the estimates you have?

Witness Loewenstein: There are various estimates, but I can state that almost half the Jews of Romania perished during that period.

Q. What does this mean in figures – approximately?

A. Almost 300,000, not counting Northern Transylvania.

Q. Without Transylvania?

A. The part that was under Romanian rule. But these figures
do not include the local Ukrainian Jews in Transnistria.

Q. As far as you know, were there many Jews who managed to escape to USSR territory at the time of the deportation, for instance from Bessarabia?

A. There was no time. The deportation was carried out so fast that there was no time. And we know that there were those who returned. There were some thousands who returned from the other side of the Bug, from the other side of the Dniester, to Romania, to Bessarabia. The Germans caught them.

Q. Let us now return to the subject of the Jewish Centre. When was it actually established?

A. In January 1942.

Q. Who ordered it to be created, how was it set up, at whose initiative?

A. At the initiative of Radu Lecca. There was also a law which appeared in the official government gazette.

Q. Who was at the head of this Centre, and did you have any function within it?

A. At first Streitman, a well-known journalist, headed the Central Board, and later on the secretary-general was Dr. Gingold.

Q. Did you have any function in the Central Board of the Jews?

A. I held the post of director of the Department for Education and Culture, in accordance with a decision by the Zionist leadership in Romania, the Zionist Organization.

Q. Were you an active member of the Zionist movement in Romania?

A. Yes, I was also a member of the Zionist executive.

Q. Were you also on the executive of the Zionist movement in Romania?

A. Yes.

Q. And, in accordance with a decision by the executive, you were given this post on the Central Board of the Jews?

A. Yes.

Q. What was the nature of your function on the Central Board?

A. There were difficult problems at that time, because all Jewish students, from elementary school to university level, including the students at the university, were expelled from the official schools. So there was, first of all, the problem of organization. Then there was another important matter: In the course of time the Jewish population dwindled, and there were also fewer children.

We also dealt with assistance to the pupils; at that time we founded the Mother and Child Centre, which, after the War, became OSE in Romania, with soup kitchens, canteens, also a hostel for Jews, and all kinds of aid, such as clothing, etc.

Q. Did the Zionist movement also organize emigration to Palestine during that period?

A. Yes, and now I should like to tell you about all the activities of the Zionist Organization.

Q. Perhaps you will first answer the question I asked you: Did the movement actually deal with emigration to Palestine, and how? Perhaps you can say something about this in brief?

A. We sent about fifteen or eighteen ships. The interesting and important thing was that the Romanian government insisted on this policy of Aliyah from beginning to end. And finally, in 1944, the chairman of the Aliyah Committee also received official confirmation from the government.

Furthermore, at that time there was the most difficult problem of refugees from Poland and from Hungary. In May 1944 a law was promulgated by Ion Antonescu, the dictator Antonescu – the death penalty for every refugee from Poland or Hungary.

It was then that the chairman of the Aliyah Committee obtained the official confirmation from Mihai Antonescu. That same month he took part in two meetings of the government and was given permission to provide the refugees with identity papers from the Aliyah Committee, the Palestine Office, as it was called then.

Q. Do you know how Richter reacted to this matter of the Zionist movement and the emigration to Palestine, and what he did about it?

A. We always felt the involvement of Richter and of Lecca. In 1944 Lecca almost agreed, and there was some kind of consent that he should be given fifty per cent of the money received for the voyage. He said that this was for charitable works of Mrs. Antonescu.

Presiding Judge: I do not understand: What expenses for the voyage are you now talking about?

Witness Loewenstein: Not expenses for the voyage.

Q. This is what you said.

A. I made a mistake. I meant the receipts for the voyage. Everybody had to pay for his place…

Q. To whom?

A. To the Aliyah Committee.

State Attorney Bach: Did every Jew who wanted to leave the country pay?

Witness Loewenstein: Not every Jew, only those who had means.

Q. Did they pay this to the Aliyah Committee?

A. To the account of the Aliyah Committee.

Q. And Lecca demanded fifty per cent of these sums?

A. Yes.

Q. You said that Richter’s influence made itself felt. What was this influence which you felt, with regard to the Zionist movement in general, to the Zionist office in general, and especially with regard to Aliyah?

A. First of all, in the spring of 1941 Richter officially invited representatives of the Zionist Organization to the German embassy. Those who went were the chairman of the Zionist Organization, Advocate Misu Benvenisti, and Dr. Yancu Coronel, the chairman of Keren Hayessod in Romania and chairman of “Tarbut” (Cultural) Association for the Hebrew language.

At the German embassy Richter told them expressly: “The German Reich is opposed to emigration to Palestine, and we are also against the activities of the Zionist Organization in Romania.”

Following this, the Bukarester Tageblatt, the official organ of the German embassy, began to attack the Zionist Organization. I have it here [shows the paper].

And in August 1942 the Zionist Organization was dissolved. The Romanian Government dissolved the Zionist Organization.

Q. Did you think at that time that the liquidation of the Zionist Organization was initiated by the Romanian Government?

A. No. We read the German papers, and we knew what Richter’s position was. He told us, the Jewish representatives, quite explicitly.

Q. What was the Bukarester Tageblatt?

A. The Bukarester Tageblatt was the daily newspaper of the German embassy. In it there appeared certain articles in 1941, and especially in the summer and autumn of 1942. There is one article here about the programme.

Q. Please look at this newspaper and tell us whether you can identify it.

A. There is an article here, dated 8 August 1942: “Rumaenien wird judenrein” (Romania is being cleansed of Jews). It contains the complete programme of the deportation. One month later we came to feel it.

Q. In September 1942 you actually felt it. Just one more question about the Bukarester Tageblatt: What was the meaning for you of an article which appeared in the Bukarester Tageblatt, any article, not this one in particular?

A. We knew, when an article appeared in the Bukarester Tageblatt, we knew that unpleasant things would happen to us.

Q. I did not quite understand: When something was written in the Bukarester Tageblatt, when it said that something would happen, you knew that this particular thing was likely to happen to you?

A. Yes. This was 1942, when the Germans had not yet reached Stalingrad.

Q. How were these articles signed in the paper?

A. There was only the initial “R,” but everyone in Romania said that this was Gustav Richter personally. Once there also appeared an article signed “Gustav Richter.”

Presiding Judge: This will be marked T/1040.

State Attorney Bach: Dr. Loewenstein, you have told us about an article of August 1942 in the Bukarester Tageblatt which spoke of the deportation abroad of the Romanian Jews. By the way, did it say in that article where the Jews were going to be sent?

Witness Loewenstein: I don’t quite remember now – but to Poland.

Q. Were you actually aware of an intention to expel the Romanian Jews at that time or shortly thereafter?

A. Yes. In September, or at the end of August, we received several indications: Benvenisti, the chairman of the Zionist Organization, happened to be at a meeting with Radu Lecca when he overheard a telephone conversation about the deportation. After this Dr. Filderman also received some information and, in addition, a Jewish engineer who worked for the Romanian railways saw the detailed plans, stating that the deportation was to begin in western Romania in the towns of Timisoara, Arad and Turda.

Q. That is to say, southern Transylvania?

A. Southern Transylvania. (The information) reached the Jewish leaders, and steps against the deportation began immediately.

Q. Steps taken by whom?

A. By the Jewish leaders. Dr. Safran…

Q. Who is Dr. Safran?

A. Dr. Safran was the Chief Rabbi of Romania. He approached the Apostolic Nuncio, Monsignor Cassulo, and the Metropolitan of Transylvania, Nicolae Balan, that is the highest-ranking Romanian clergy. Nicolae Balan was an anti-Semite himself, but nevertheless he extended his help at that time.

Q. We shall perhaps submit further proof of this. So what you said is that Dr. Safran took active steps.

A. And also Dr. Filderman.

Previous | Index | Next

Q. Were there transports from the ghetto after you had appeared before the commission?

A. Yes, more transports left.

Q. For how many days did these transports continue after you had reported?

A. I cannot say this with certainty, but it was between 21,000 and 24,000 who were sent off; I am not certain today. I was more or less in the middle of those who were brought before the commission.

Q. Do you remember, from the lists of your friend Pollack, how many Jews were left in Theresienstadt after these deportations?

A. A little over 11,000.

State Attorney Bar-Or: Thank you.

Presiding Judge: Dr. Servatius, do you have any questions?

Dr. Servatius: I only wanted to make sure whether this selection was made in September 1944.

Witness Diamant: Yes.

Q. Did I understand you correctly to say that this selection extended over almost a month?

A. As I said, I cannot state exactly how long it was, but it lasted for about a month. It was in 1944, and one can look up in the calendar on what day Rosh Hashana fell that year, and this lasted for approximately one month.

Q. And was Eichmann always present?

A. I was there only once, but the people who went up to the commission said that he was there. But, of course, I do not know this.

Q. Do you stand by your testimony that it was certainly Eichmann, if you are told that Eichmann was in Hungary at that time?

A. He did not introduce himself, of course; people said so. Those who were upstairs at the commission told me that this was Eichmann.

Dr. Servatius: I have no further questions.

Witness Diamant: I wanted to talk about something else that happened in January and February 1945.

Presiding Judge: There is no need for this, if you were not asked.

Judge Halevi: Mr. Sever told you that you would live and that his two brothers would not live – if I understood you correctly?

Witness Diamant: Yes.

Q. And when did he tell you that the transports were going to Auschwitz?

A. This was no secret at all. Everybody knew this at the  time. And besides, I was in the workshop, wasn’t I. There was a young man there whom I had already known in the army. He told me that the trains were going to Auschwitz or to Birkenau. The people from the railway, who were not Jews, they told him that. And there, in Auschwitz, these people were to be killed by gassing – that was said.

May I add something more? I knew it because my mother-in-law and my father-in-law were sent to Auschwitz. And I still have the postcard which I received from my late father-in-law from Auschwitz, where he tells me that he arrived there. I did not get this postcard in the mail; the Germans used to bring these postcards to Theresienstadt and to distribute them there. This was in the summer of 1944.

Q. Did you say that there had already been deportations before?

A. I was there from 14 December 1941, and the first transport left Theresienstadt for the East, as it was called, on 9 January. I still remember this exactly, because I had a friend who told me. I do not remember the others exactly, but there were transports again and again.

Q. Was this on 9 January 1942?

A. Yes.

Q. When did you know that this went to Auschwitz?

A. Later on. This friend told me about it for the first  time. He was a Christian, a Czech nationalist, and he told me that the transports go to Lithuania and Latvia, and that there the people are shot. He had connections with the railway workers, and these railway workers were in touch with the other railway workers who were all against the Germans, and from them I heard about the matter.

And then, later – I do not remember exactly when – it was said that the transports were bound for Birkenau and Auschwitz, and that there the people were gassed, etc. I told this to the people who were with me, and they did not believe me. I also told it to the members of the Jewish Council of Elders, and they, too, did not believe me.

Q. But Sever was a member of the Council of Elders, and he told you that his two brothers were being sent to Auschwitz and that they would not live; if so, he did believe it, he knew.

A. That was in 1944. By that time it was already an open secret. By that time everybody knew it. Earlier on nobody knew this, we did not know a thing.

Q. What was the new procedure on the occasion when you reported. You said that this was new, that it happened for the first time. What was new about it?

A. Previously it had been the Camp Commander Rahm, before him Burger, and before him Seidl. They used to pass an order to the Jewish Council of Elders saying: 1,000 or 5,000 have to be made ready for transport, and then those were the ones who were sent off. That was without having to appear before somebody. A selection of this kind – that was new, that was the innovation. It was bad because, within one month more than 20,000 persons were sent off. That was by being brought before the commission.

Q. For the earlier transports, the persons to be deported were chosen not by the SS but by the Council of Elders, and this time they were chosen personally by the commission of the SS?

A. Yes. This time they appeared before this SS commission, and notes were taken, and the people were deported.

Q. And on the commission SS officers were sitting, and also members of the Council of Elders?

A. I knew only Sever from the Council of Elders. Apart from him, I do not know if there was anybody else. I do not think so.

Presiding Judge: You said that this selection – let us call it that – began two days before Rosh Hashana and continued for a month after that. Is this correct?

Witness Diamant: It began two days before Rosh Hashana and lasted a month. Whether it was 30 or 32 days – this I no longer know today.

Q. Do you see the Accused in front of you?

A. Yes.

Q. Can you identify him as the man about whom it was said at that time that he was Eichmann?

A. I would not recognize him any longer today; he was in uniform, he was young.

Presiding Judge: Thank you, Mr. Diamant, you have completed your evidence.

State Attorney Bar-Or: With your permission, I shall call Mr. Adolf Engelstein.

Presiding Judge: Do you speak Hebrew?

Witness Engelstein: Yes.

[The witness is sworn.]

Presiding Judge: What is your full name?

Witness: Adolf Engelstein.

State Attorney Bar-Or: Mr. Engelstein, you were born in
1903?

Witness Engelstein: Yes.

Q. In Czechoslovakia?

A. Yes. In Stonova, a town near Ostrava.

Q. You are an engineer by profession?

A. Yes.

Q. You now live in Herzlia?

A. Yes.

Q. Where were you living at the beginning of the War, from
1939 on?

A. In Moravia.

Q. What were you doing there?

A. I was a director, an engineer in the construction of a railway in Moravia.

Q. Until when did this work continue?

A. Until August 1942 I was employed there by the firm which had earlier belonged to a Jew, and which was later handed to the Germans in the course of the Aryanization.

Q. When did this work come to an end?

A. The work did not come to an end. In August 1942 they took me off this job…

Presiding Judge: Who are “they”?

Witness Engelstein: That is to say, the company…and I had to work as an unskilled labourer on various jobs in that
town.

State Attorney Bar-Or: In the end you came to Theresienstadt, did you not?

Witness Engelstein: Yes.

Q. When was that?

A. That was on 23 January 1943.

Q. You remained in Theresienstadt till when?

A. I remained in Theresienstadt until 1 March 1944.

Q. What work were you employed in during this period?

A. All kinds of jobs. First of all, as a new immigrant – this is what they used to say there – also I was employed on all kinds of unskilled jobs. I was an unskilled labourer in the Sanitation Department, I worked in sewerage and other jobs of this kind. After a while, I think it was three months later, I was transferred to the technical department and employed as an engineer. We did not do much building there, but I was occupied designing huts and various small projects.

Q. Within the Theresienstadt camp?

A. Yes, within the Theresienstadt camp.

Q. You remained in this job until 28 February 1944?

A. Yes.

Q. What happened on that day?

A. On that day it was my task to supervise the loading of building materials, huts, and all kinds of things, which were to be sent to Germany with some transport. This is what I heard. By ten o’clock at night I was feeling unwell outside, and I told my colleague that I was going to sleep, and that he should take over the job and supervise these things. At midnight, at 12 o’clock exactly, I received word from the secretary of the technical department that I was to come to his office.

Q. Who was this?

A. He was a man by the name of Sussmann. There I was told that I was to join a transport – they called it “Sossen” – of 200 people at 7.30 the next morning, going to a new job in Germany.

Presiding Judge: What does “Sossen” mean?

Witness Engelstein: That was a name. I do not know whether they called it Sossen with any particular purpose in mind, but later on I learned that this was some village in Germany, south of Berlin.

State Attorney Bar-Or: Close to which town? What is the nearest town?

Witness Engelstein: I do not know, we did not reach this Sossen, but all the time the transport, and the people on it, were called “Sossen.”

Q. Were you given more details about this project?

A. No. I objected at first, when I heard that they had prepared the transport several weeks in advance, while I was thrown in at the last moment. Because this is what had happened: They had taken off one person and supplied another Jew for the transport – and I was that victim. I had no other choice than to go, otherwise they would have told me: You can go to the East.

Q. Mr. Engelstein, we have now reached at 1 March 1944. What happened on that day?

A. In the morning we reported at the train. We sat in ordinary carriages. There were freight carriages also. I do not know how many. We took sixteen huts with us to Germany which we had dismantled in Theresienstadt. We left about 9 or 10 o’clock in the morning from Theresienstadt for Germany in the direction of Dresden and Frankfurt an der Oder.

Q. Were you accompanied?

A. I saw two SS officers in our carriages.

Q. Were there more SS men in the carriages?

A. Maybe, I do not remember. I saw two officers, who also talked to us and told us that we were going to good place of employment, and that we would be well off there.

Q. Did you recognize them, or any one of them?

A. I think I recognized one of the SS officers afterwards, when I came back to Theresienstadt; that was Bergel, the deputy of the camp commandant. The other one, I think, was Moes, a short officer, small.

Q. Not tall?

A. No, no. Before the last stop, as we learned later, the leader of the transport, or somebody else whom I do not remember today, shouted to us to get off the train; there was our transport commandant, the engineer Kosina, a technician named Kirschner, and myself. And facing us was an SS man; he either introduced himself, or maybe our foreman or one of the officers told us, at any rate we were told that facing us was the Accused. We entered a closed automobile, a large one.

Q. The three of you?

A. The three of us.

Q. What kind of automobile was this, a private car?

A. I do not know.

Q. Was it a lorry?

A. It was not a lorry, it was a private car. I thought you meant a military vehicle.

Q. No.

A. We entered the closed private car together with the Accused, and the three of us drove towards the forest. We arrived fifteen minutes later. There was still snow in the forest; this was on the 1st of March. He said to us: “This is your place of work, here you will work, you will be well-off here; this will not be for six weeks only” – as our commandant had told us – “it will take much longer, you will work, and you will still be here well into the summer. And it will be very good here.” Then he explained to us what he wanted us to do.

Q. What did he want you to do?

A. He wanted us to put up the huts we had brought with us, scattered in the forest, to unload the timber and to place the huts where we thought best; they were not to stand in a straight line, one next to the other, but to be dispersed in the forest. For ourselves we were to put up another hut, which we had also brought along on the freight train. Then we returned to the train, and there we remained all night.

Previous | Index | Next