Short Story – Avengers (I have never killed a Jew)
Photo credit: earl53 from morguefile.com
Our God is the God of vengeance. He has put us on this trial. Adonai has covered his face. Now, in this period of suffering, when the evil reigns, I recall the story of Job. Israel keeps suffering. My nation is bleeding, chased, hunted, killed in gas chambers, and burnt. Will our fate change like Job’s? Shall we ever witness freedom?
My eight year old daughter Ruth was killed a week ago. Ten brave German soldiers and a dog were needed to assassinate a child. No one could bury her. Mordecai, my son, age twelve, was executed on a street with other inhabitants of the ghetto. Accidentally met German patrol killed them in the beginning of the Warsaw Uprising. And Sarah, my wife… taken to Auschwitz half a year ago, died in a gas chamber.
The ghetto keeps fighting. Yet, Yahweh Sabbaoth, the Lord of Hosts, isn’t going to send His Heavenly army. Not now, but I believe in His name. The Avenger will give me my chance.
Yahweh Nissi, the Lord is my Banner. I’m holding a bottle with gasoline. I’ve got matches in my pocket. My clothes are soaked with gasoline too. The irritating smell is somehow pleasant. It’s the smell of revenge.
I’m waiting for Germans. El Shaddai, the God Almighty! Let me break the bottle on German heads. I’ll burn them like they burnt my family and other fellow Jews. And then let the flames take me. To Sheol!
Isser finished reading aloud and put the sheet with the Jewish freedom fighter’s diary into his pocket. It was 3rd May, 1960 and the era of Holocaust was over together with WW2. But his boys were just about to start another period. It was payback time.
“The tragedy of Holocaust has proven we must have our own country to make us feel safe,” he said to his commandos. His words sounded clearly in a room under a ship deck. The huge freighter, carrying secret agents as an extra cargo, approached Argentina. All Mossad agents carefully listened to every Isser’s word.
“We must be cruel, since we fight for our existence! Establishing the state of Israel among Arabic nations was only the first step. Now it’s time for justice. It’s time for revenge! Let the words of the anonymous Polish Jew, the fighter from Warsaw ghetto, be always in your minds!”
Isser handed a photograph to each Mossad commando. It showed a middle aged man and was signed Ricardo Klement. He was their goal.
His home in the suburbs of Buenos Aires had been observed for weeks. Isser Harel, the chief of Mossad, found 11th May a good day for the operation. He decided to go to Argentine himself to watch the abduction of Ricardo Klement. The intelligence gathered enough evidence to prove he was the great mass murderer and Klement wasn’t his real name.
***
Loai was in the assault group. Together with two other Mossad agents, he drove a limousine towards his target’s house. The car stopped in front of a fence and two agents left it.
“Take your time with that engine,” said Loai. “He returns from work at eight. He’ll be here in about twenty minutes.”
Loai was aware his men knew all the details well. Yet, it was always good to remind them.
Everything went according to plan. At five past eight a bus from San Fernando arrived and the agents recognized their target getting out of the vehicle. The commandos ceased pretending they were repairing a car engine.
“SS-Obersturmbannführer Eichmann!” said Loai calmly, when Klement/Eichmann was passing their car. “In the name of the state of Israel, you are under arrest!”
Eichmann put his hand in his pocket, but it was too late. The agents brought him down and took into the car. He was quickly transported to the “secure house”, the hideout of Mossad.
***
“I confirm his identity,” said a Mossad doctor after examining the prisoner. “The scar of his left arm confirms Ricardo Klement is in fact Adolf Eichmann, the architect of Holocaust!”
Eichmann didn’t hide his identity anymore and agreed to be judged in Jerusalem.
“I am not guilty! The court will find me innocent!” he said.
A week later a civilian airplane arrived from Israel with another agent aboard. He was supposed to be replaced by Eichmann in the returning way.
*****
“Just hold him well, guys!” said the airport staff worker with a grin smile.
Two men in Israeli Airlines suits passed him, holding the third guy. One of them smiled.
“Our pal has drunk too much,” he said.
The whole situation looked very normal. Two workers took their drunk friend to an airplane.
Fifteen minutes later the aircraft with Eichmann was in the air and headed to Israel
The trial in Jerusalem started soon.
“You have no right to judge me! This court is illegal and I’m not guilty,” said Eichmann on the opening of the trial.
“ I have never killed a single Jewish person!” he testified.
This was actually true. He was the master organizer of the Holocaust. He planned transports to death camps and built a network of concentration camps, but personally he had never killed any Jew with his hands.
To prove his innocence, Eichmann cooperated with the prosecutor and fully described his doing. Everyone in the court was surprised that the Nazi mas murderer was proud of his achievements. Indeed, his organization skills were above average.
The sentence could be only one. Eichmann’s ashes were scattered over the sea, so that future Nazi supporters would not venerate his tomb.
After the verdict, the judge could give an interview.
“Before the trial, I thought I would have to judge the wildest beast, the most depraved, corrupted man in the world. But now… No, Eichmann was not a monster. The truth is surprising. He was an idiot, an imbecile unable to understand the vast suffering he brought to people, to my nation. He would have never realized what he had done. I asked him what he would tell to the families of the Holocaust victims. He answered he had just been taking orders. He was brought up in German discipline, taught to listen to orders, not to think. The banality of evil in his case is terrifying.”
***
Even though Isser Harel was an official person, he hadn’t attended the court hall to watch the trial. Sitting in his living room with a glass of kosher wine in his hand, he held the latest edition of “Jerusalem Post” in another hand.
Except for the main article about Eichmann’s execution, there was also a small mention about Argentine. Its government protested strongly against the violation of the sovereignty of Argentine. No foreign country could abduct anyone without cooperating with their police. Yet, it was only a natural, diplomatic intervention without further consequences. In fact, no one took care for a Nazi mass murderer.
Isser tasted the wine, but put the glass back on a table. He approached the window. It was evening and the sun was just disappearing behind the Zion mount to set soon. He recalled the diary of the Jewish rebel from Warsaw ghetto.
Adonai covered His face during the war, but now a new age has started, he thought.
Again, He is Yahweh Sabbaoth, The Lord of Hosts and Mossad is the God’s army. Israel has been reborn and I won’t let other nations, either German or Arabic, hurt my fellow countrymen. People in the world will probably say we have no right to revenge all the time. But who are they to judge us? Christians? They claim they believe our God, but no! He is not merciful and loving father. He is Avenger and Mossad is His angel. The Angel of Death!
__END__
