Eichmann Trial -- Sessions 25 and 26 -- Testimony of Z. Lubetkin, Y. Zuckerman, A. Berman, R. Kuper

Zivia (Celina) Lubetkin, born in 1914 in Byten, Poland. She was a member of the leadership of the Dror youth movement, among the organizers of the pioneering underground in occupied Poland, among the founders of the Jewish Fighting Organization and a member of its Headquarters, a representative of her movement to the Jewish National Committee and the underground's Coordination Committee of the Warsaw ghetto. At the age of 16, Zivia joined the Freiheit youth movement in her city and took an active part in various seminary activities. She was one of the initiators of unification with the He - Chaluts ha - Tsair youth movement, and once the unified movement was established, she moved to Warsaw and became one of its central figures. With the German invasion of Poland, she moved with her friends eastward to Kovel, in the area under Soviet authority, where she worked to create suitable conditions for absorbing members of the movement's central and training communes who were migrating eastward from all over Poland.After the Red Army's invasion of the territory of Eastern Poland, from Sept. 17, 1939, she and some additional comrades took on the mission of going to the Romanian border to check out ways of passage for emigration to Palestine. On Dec. 31, 1939, Zivia participated in the clandestine congress of the Dror movement held in Lvov, where she accepted the movement's decision that she go to German - occupied Warsaw and join Frumka Plotnicka there in working to rehabilitate the movement. In Warsaw, Zivia dealt with aid and rescue activities for many people. She correctly assessed the first news of the planned extermination, and was one of the initiators of the Jewish Fighting Organization (Zydowska Organizacja Bojowa; "ZOB"). During the Warsaw ghetto uprising in April 1943, she was among the central figures directing the ZOB headquarters. When the Uprising faded out, she escaped with other fighters on May 10, 1943 through the sewers to the "Aryan side" of Warsaw. She was among the ZOB members who fought in the Polish uprising of August 1944, and with its suppression by the Germans, she went into hiding until the arrival of the Red Army. She survived and immigrated to Palestine. On Dec. 31, 1939, Zivia participated in the clandestine congress of the Dror movement held in Lvov, where she accepted the movement's decision that she go to German - occupied Warsaw and join Frumka Plotnicka there in working to rehabilitate the movement. In Warsaw, Zivia dealt with aid and rescue activities for many people. She correctly assessed the first news of the planned extermination, and was one of the initiators of the Jewish Fighting Organization (Zydowska Organizacja Bojowa; "ZOB"). During the Warsaw ghetto uprising in April 1943, she was among the central figures directing the ZOB headquarters. When the Uprising faded out, she escaped with other fighters on May 10, 1943 through the sewers to the "Aryan side" of Warsaw. She was among the ZOB members who fought in the Polish uprising of August 1944, and with its suppression by the Germans, she went into hiding until the arrival of the Red Army. She survived and immigrated to Palestine. In 1946, she testified at the Congress of Ha - Kibbutz ha - Me'uchad at Yagur and captured the audience's attention outside the conference hall as well. She married Yitzhak Zuckerman and was among the founders of Kibbutz Lohamei Hagetaot of which she was a member until her death. She was among the initiators of the Ghetto Fighters' House Holocaust and Resistance Heritage Museum in the name of Itzhak Katznelson, and among its founders. She died in 1978. **Courtesy of The Ghetto Fighters' House: Holocaust and Jewish Resistance Heritage Museum, Israel. Emil Knebel was a cinematographer known for Andante (2010), Adam (1973), and Wild Is My Love (1963). He was one of the cameramen who recorded daily coverage of the Eichmann trial in Jerusalem (produced by Capital Cities Broadcasting Corp and later held academic positions in Israel and New York teaching filmmaking at universities. Refer to CV in file. Prior to WWII, Dr. Adolf Avraham Berman, doctor of psychology was the director of the head office of the Jewish psychological and psychotechnical institutions in Poland (CENTOS). After September 8, 1939, children in Warsaw suffered horrible treatment at the hands of the Nazis. Berman attended to thousands of Jewish children in Warsaw who needed food, housing, and emotional support. He helped establish thirty orphanages and dormitories, approximately twenty day shelters, twenty food kitchens, and thirty children's and youth clubs within the Warsaw Ghetto. Furthermore, Berman helped to maintain an education system despite it being forbidden. However, in 1942 SS actions liquidated and destroyed the majority of these institutions in a matter of weeks. Berman became one of the commanders of the Jewish underground in the Warsaw Ghetto. After the war ended, Berman went to visit Treblinka concentration camp. During his visit, he encountered piles of possessions including thousands of children's shoes. This sight significantly affected him, and he took a pair of shoes, which he still has in his possession. In 1961, Berman lived in Tel Aviv, Israel. Born in 1920, Rivka Kuper, previously Rivka Liebeskind resided in Krakow, Poland at the outbreak of WWII. After a series of prosecutions and deportations, Krakow Jews were pushed into a ghetto in March 1941. Kuper was a member of Akiva, a Jewish-Zionist youth movement, and her husband, Adolf (Dolek) Liebeskind was the leader of the Hebrew underground in Krakow. She helped to organize youth programs, and study groups to maintain Jewish traditions and beliefs. Kuper also participated in warning operations by advising Jews with gathered information about the Nazis; Akiva established connections in Bochina, Czestochowa, Tarnow, Rudnik, Radom, and Tomaszow Mazowiecki. She attempted to supply forged papers that allowed Jews to leave the ghetto system and/or move to another ghetto to be with family members. Her efforts helped to preserve Hebrew worship, and allowed many individuals to escape the ghetto. The Gestapo arrested Kuper in November 1942. She was severely beaten, and then transferred to Auschwitz on January 18, 1943. Kuper worked in drainage operations; all day she stood in water up to her hips and dug canals. While in Auschwitz, Kuper continued to observe Jewish traditions. She lit Sabbath candles, fasted on Yom Kippur, and did not eat bread on Passover. Kuper also maintained communication with the Jewish underground; she was caught passing information out of the camp, and transferred to the Auschwitz Strafkommando (penal detachment). Conditions in this unit were especially bad; Kuper barely slept, received less food than other prisoners, and was forced to endure hard labor in pouring rain and snow. While in prison, Kuper learned her husband died in an underground operation to acquire arms. After being discovered by the Gestapo, Dolek and another resistance fighter committed suicide. Eventually her friends smuggled her onto a train headed for Berchenbach. In 1961, Kuper was a member of Kibbutz Maayan Zvi in Israel. Born in Vilna, Lithuania, in 1915, Yitzhak Zuckerman became a member of the Zionist youth movement He-Chalutz Ha-Tsa'ir. In 1936, he joined the movement headquarters and became one of its two Secretaries General. When the war broke out in September 1939, he left Warsaw and traveled east. In April, 1940, following the movement's instructions, he crossed back over the border and returned to Nazi-occupied territories, settlingin Warsaw and acting as a local and national youth movement leader. "Antek", as he was called, set up underground networks throughout Poland, organized educational activities, and regularly visited the various ghettos. During his work he met a fellow activist, Zivia Lubetkin, who later became his wife. After the German invasion of the USSR in the autumn, 1941, news of Jewish massacres spread. Antek knew that resistance had to be organized. He joined the Antifascist Bloc and attended the founding meetings of the ZOB, in July, 1942, calling for Jewish resistance. On December 22, 1942, he was wounded in Krakow during a German military action against the local Jewish organization. He managed to return to Warsaw, and helped lead the preparations of the April, 1943, uprising as the commander of one of the three sectors of the ghetto. As a representative of the ZOB, Antek was sent to the Polish side of the city, to secure contacts with the Polish underground fighting organizations, a mission which probably saved his life. While he was away, the final liquidation of the Warsaw Ghetto, and the uprising occurred. After the fall of the ghetto, Antek helped the survivors, hidden on the Aryan side, and kept in touch with partisans and Jewish labor camp inmates. He headed the Jewish Fighters Unite of the Polish uprising of August, 1944. After the war he was active in social and welfare activities with survivors, in the rebirth of the He-Chalutz movement, and in the organization of the exodus of the remnants of Polish Jewry to Israel in 1946-47. Zuckerman, together with his wife, Zivia Lubetkin, left Poland in 1947. They were among the founders of Kibbutz Lohamei Haghetaot and the Museum Beit Lohamei Haghetaot. Yitzhak Zuckerman died in 1981, on his kibbutz, at the age of 66. **Courtesy of The Ghetto Fighters' House: Holocaust and Jewish Resistance Heritage Museum, Israel. Sessions 25 and 26. Eichmann sitting in his booth. The Judges open Session 25 and present Decision 14. This decision notes the appeal of witness interrogation abroad as certain witnesses would be arrested under the Nazi Collaborators Punishment Law of 1950, should they appear in Israel. Presiding Judge, Moshe Landau refers to Decision 11, which states that foreign courts may acquire testimony from restricted witnesses for the purpose of the Eichmann trial. There is a blip at 00:07:08. Hausner questions Zivia Lubetkin Zuckerman, a resistance fighter in the Warsaw Ghetto about the conditions in the ghetto, as well as the activities of the Jewish fighting force. Lubetkin describes a Warsaw ghetto revolt: "The Great German heros withdrew in tremendous panic in the face of handmade Jewish hand-grenades and bombs." Following another blip at 00:20:32, Hausner asks Lubetkin about her assumptions concerning the end of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising. There is a blip at 00:21:51. Witness Yitzhak Zuckerman, a resistance fighter in the Warsaw Ghetto and husband to Zivia Lubetkin Zuckerman, recounts the day he learned about the horrible conditions in Vilna: "They were putting to death Jews of Vilna in Ponary which had been a scene of my childhood. I merely wanted... to explain the terrible shock that overtook me." Zuckerman continues to describe his memories of Jewish death and Nazi actions. Court is out of session following a blip at 00:27:04. There is much background noise, and Eichmann is absent from his glass booth. After another blip at 00:30.39, Zuckerman answers questions about a suggested resistance action to set fire to the Warsaw Ghetto and be burned alive within. Blip at 00:30:39. Hausner questions witness Dr. Adolf Avraham Berman, former director of the head office of the Jewish Psychological and Psychotechnical Institution in Poland (CENTOS). Berman states: "We wanted to make the melancholy, and terrible life of tens of thousands of children easier... our watchword was naturally to save our children from hunger and death. We did not save them." Berman describes Nazi actions against Jewish children. He recounts Janusz Korczak, a beloved teacher and orphanage director in the Warsaw ghetto, leading the children in his care to Nazi trucks. Korczak refused to leave the children, and accompanied them in transport. Berman states: "100,000 children of the Warsaw Ghetto were killed by the Nazi murderers. More than 100,000 children met their bitter deaths in the gas chambers." He describes his participation with the Jewish underground movement, as well as his efforts with the Jewish children. Berman presents a pair of children's shoes he took from Treblinka, when he visited the camp after the war. Following a blip at 00:43:48, Judge Halevi asks Berman about possible help received during the Holocaust. Berman acknowledges that several Polish and Catholic institutions provided assistance to Jewish children, and slight support to the Jewish resistance. [Note: Poor film quality] Halevi questions Berman on smuggling efforts within the ghetto. Blip at 00:47:19. Witness Rivka Kuper, an Auschwitz survivor and widow of Dolek Liebeskind (leader of the Hebrew underground in Cracow), describes Jewish efforts in Auschwitz to maintain religious practices despite persecution: "We kindled the candles and began to quietly sing Sabbath songs... we heard the sound of stifling crying... Jewish women... collected together around us... and listened to the singing." (432). Landau asks Kuper about Akiva, a Jewish Zionist youth movement. Following another blip at 00:51:02, Kuper describes the overwhelming anger among Akiva members, and their decision to revolt: "The first thing we did... was to carry out warning operations among all Jews." There is a blip at 00:53:08. Hausner questions Kuper about her arrest, transfer to Auschwitz, and participation in the underground movement at Auschwitz. Kuper recounts learning of her husband's death.