Search JTA's historical archive dating back to 1923

German Press Analyzes Eichmann Trial; Prosecutor Criticized

April 17, 1961
See Original Daily Bulletin From This Date
Advertisement

Israel’s Attorney General Gideon Hausner, chief prosecutor in the Adolf Eichmann trial in Jerusalem, is “deliberately” avoiding mention of various facts in presenting his case to the special Eichmann court in Jerusalem, it was charged here today by the mass circulation magazine, Der Spiegel.

Among the facts which, allegedly, Mr, Hausner is “to touch at most only on the periphery, ” Der Spiegel alleges, are: Attempts by German friends of Jews “to save at least a limited number of Jews” from annihilation; the claim that Eichmann was “only a bureaucrat of murder” and “not the inventor of the final solution of the Jewish problem which was invented by others”; the claim that Eichmann’s murder schemes had “Jewish collaboration”; and the contention that “European aid was given to Eichmann’s Murder Incorporated.”

All these matters, Der Spiegel asserts, are being ignored by Mr. Hausner or touched upon only lightly because Mr. Hausner has allegedly been instructed to avoid “blurring German guilt by naming accomplices. “

The Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung and the Rundschau of Frankfurt, discuss the implications of the Eichmann case in regard to contemporary Germany, and approve of Israel’s action in trying Eichmann. The feelings of victims of Nazis in Israel, states the Allgemeine Zeitung, is “similar to that experienced in a city when the police have captured a murderer of children. ” The Rundschau declares: “We cannot simply draw a line between ourselves and Eichmann, because his crimes were committed in connection with a political ideology which has become part of our German historical being, “

Recommended from JTA

Advertisement