New details about the life of Adolf Eichmann in Argentina reveal government complicity and Jewish solidarity

Argentina has been a land of promise and refuge for thousands of Jews - and for thousands of Nazis as well, as the late-June release of documents released by the Holocaust Museum of Buenos Aires, the only Holocaust museum in South America, proves once again.

After sneaking out of defeated Germany, Holocaust mastermind Adolf Eichmann entered Argentina - as did countless other Nazis - thanks to official Argentinean procedures. On June 1, 1950, the delegation of International Committee of the Red Cross presented a certain "Ricardo Klement" with an official passport, indicating that he was a "technician born in Bolzano, Italy, and apolide (without nationality). As Gabriel Valladares, legal adviser to the Red Cross, made clear at the ceremony opening the exhibit, this in itself was not unusual - since, following the havoc of war, the Red Cross often provides individuals with temporary travel documents, based on their own testimonies, often without additional documentation. He also emphasized that such documents are intended to permit temporary travel - but not to serve as a confirmation of the bearer's identity.

Nevertheless, despite these reservations and the missing information, the Argentinean General Consulate in Geneva issued the passport on July 14, 1950 and this authorization of entry was subsequently further approved by Vice Consul Pedro Solari Capurro, also in Geneva.

Until it was put on display last month, this passport used by Eichmann to enter Argentina had been neatly - and, for the Argentinean authorities, most conveniently - tucked away, collecting bureaucratic and judicial dust, for 47 years, since then-prime minister David Ben-Gurion announced that Eichmann had been brought to Israel and would soon be tried. The passport is widely seen as confirmation of the existence of an organized network that permitted Nazis to enter Argentina.

Over 200 people showed up at the Holocaust Museum for the presentation, including the Ambassador of Austria Gudrun Graf, and delegates from U.S. Embassy and German Embassy. Security was tight as the passport was displayed on a large screen. The Eichmann permanent exhibit now occupies a central space in a corner of the main museum hall.

The documents were originally revealed by Eichmann's wife, Veronica Catalina Liebel, who presented herself to the Argentinean Federal Court on July 12, 1960, two months after Eichmann was abducted. By denouncing the kidnapping, Liebel hoped that she could benefit from the conflict unleashed between Argentina and Israel when it became known that Eichmann had been taken without due process, and thus expedite her husband's return to Argentina. Although for many years, Israel confidently declared that this operation to capture criminal Nazis had been carried out by "volunteers," it was widely known that this claim was aimed to pacify the Argentinean protests. (The Mossad did not officially acknowledge that it had carried out the operation until February, 2005, in confirmation of a news article published by the Hebrew daily, Maariv.)

In her complaint to the court, Liebel first identified herself and then her husband - who until then had used the alias Ricardo Klement - by their respective real names. Her statement, also recently brought to light, states, "On May 21 of 1935, I married Otto Adolf Eichmann, as it states on my marriage certificate. On July 28 1952, I entered the country where my husband had been since 1950. He entered with a passport given to him by the International Red Cross. My husband worked and carried out his life under the name Ricardo Klement as his passport indicates. I understand that with this declaration I am undeniably admitting that Ricardo Klement is Adolf Eichmann. For the record, let it be known that he does not deny his name and he will confront his responsibility as I have assumed mine by bringing the knowledge of the occurrences to the courts."

"According to [Argentinean] law, Eichmann can only be tried in the place where he committed the supposed crimes or by the international court, which tried similar cases following the victory of the Allied Forces," claimed Eichmann's wife, condemning the "undeserved wrongdoing against the national sovereignty of Argentina."

Liebel brought this passport to the courts. By the end of 1962, the Argentinean judge that received this complaint closed the case because they were unable to find the kidnappers. "The efforts of the court to find the individual people responsible for this episode have been sterile," wrote Justice Leopoldo Isaurralde.

The documents were set aside, forgotten by almost all, until recently recovered by Maria Galvan, a student at the University of San Martin, who, as part of her graduate research, looked for Liebel's testimony and incidentally found the passport as well. Galvan delivered the documents to Judge Maria Servini de Cubria who forwarded them on to the Holocaust Museum in Argentina.

"Judge Servini de Cubria made a notable decision," Mario Feferbaum, president of the Holocaust Museum, tells The Report. "She was dealing with direct evidence that people entered the country under false names with passports distributed by international agencies. The passport says he was born in Italy. This also shows the hypocrisy of the officials, specifically, of the Argentinean Consulate in Geneva, because this man was not even partly Italian. Nazis and Fascists entered this country, while the Jews could not. We hope that these finds will serve to uncover what remains hidden."

This evidence has come at a key moment in Argentinean politics. The discovery of the passport made Eichmann and Nazi collaboration front-page news and silencing, at least for now, voices of Holocaust denial that were becoming increasingly vocal in Argentina. Furthermore, the current government is headed by the Peronismo party, which was created by Nazi-sympathizer, Juan Peron, president from 1946 to 1955 (and subsequently from 1973 to 1974). Peronismo has invested great efforts in distancing itself from its pro-Nazi past. Last week, President Nestor Kirchner endorsed his wife, Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner as candidate for next president. She is one of the few Peronist politicians who has visited the Yad Vashem Holocaust museum in Jerusalem and the Holocaust Museum in the United States and is quite likely to be elected, according to current polls.

In call-in radio programs discussing the recent release of the passport, numerous callers continue to complain that the kidnapping violated Argentine national sovereignty. But at the same time, one of Argentina's most respected authors, Ernesto S?bato, usually considered to be both nationalist and progressive, wrote in the newspaper El Mundo de Buenos Aires on June 17 that he approved of those "valiant men who risked their lives searching the world for a war criminal and that they showed their restraint upon capturing him and gently handing him over to the Israeli authorities to be tried instead of immediately executing him."

While researchers have long known that Nazis could not have escaped into Argentina without the aid of the government, the papers on display at the museum are some of the most concrete pieces of evidence to be found to date, revealing just how extensive and organized that aid was and the extent of Peron's sympathy for the Nazis.

Arriving in Argentina, Eichmann lived for about three years in San Fernando, a quiet town near the bustling Buenos Aires. He worked in a metal factory until he was offered a job at the Capri firm in the province of Tucuman, over 600 miles from Buenos Aires. Capri was an engineering company to which Peron gave many state contracts, ostensibly because the company was to modernize the water administration throughout the province.

It is widely believed that the company recruited German technicians, providing them with refuge and jobs. The company was founded in 1910 by Horst Alberto Carlos Faulkner, who was born in Argentina but whose parents were German. He went to Germany in 1922 and by World War II had become a captain in the SS and a spy for Heinrich Himmler. Subsequently, between 1947 and 1948, Faulkner helped other Nazi war criminals enter Argentina.

Eichmann's wife, Veronica arrived in Argentina with their two children in mid-1952 and proceeded to accompany Eichmann to Tucuman. The children were registered under the name of Eichmann at a German elementary school, one of a series of schools that promoted anti- Semitic and pro-Nazi ideology. Furthermore, since the children used their real names, this was yet another instance in which the government turned a blind eye and even abetted Nazis and their families as they settled in Argentina.

Evita Peron's death in 1952 precipitated a government crisis that lead to the end of these lucrative state contracts. Capri was forced to declare bankruptcy. In April of 1953, Eichmann returned to Buenos Aires and worked for various companies. In March, 1959, he was hired by Mercedes Benz, a factory created and managed by Peron's close friend, Jorge Antonio, who publicly admitted a few years ago, before this death, that he worked closely with Germans and former Nazis. At Mercedes Benz, Eichmann continued to use the false name, Ricardo Klement.

David Filch, a prominent community leader and former treasurer of AMIA, the Argentine Jewish community's umbrella organization, worked alongside Eichmann in this factory, never knowing who the German electrician really was. Eichmann was apprehended by Israeli agents as he was leaving the factory on May 11, 1960.

In the days following the abduction, Eichmann's family and groups of Peron-supporting youths pulled together to search for him. Eichmann was taken to Jerusalem on the first El Al flight out of Argentina, nine days later. According to researcher and author Uki Goni, Nazi sympathizers proposed several acts of revenge, including kidnapping the Israeli ambassador and bombing the Israeli Embassy, although they did not carry this through. On August 17, the young Nazis that formed part of the "Huaraches" group attacked Jewish students in the Legions National Pimientos and fired a shot that wounded a 15-year-old, Edgardo Vilnius, during a public celebration. Others threw tar bombs at the doors of synagogues and Jewish schools. In June 1962, 21 days after Eichmann was executed, nationalist extremists kidnapped a 19-year-old Jewish girl, tortured her and scarred her with Swastika signs.

The Jewish community wanted to receive David Ben-Gurion as a hero in Buenos Aires. The Argentinean government protested to the U.N.; the nationalist right pressured the government to sever diplomatic ties with Israel; and Israeli Ambassador Arie Levant was expelled briefly. Within four months, the diplomatic crisis had settled down and relations between the countries returned to normal. (Ben-Gurion did visit Argentina, nine years later.)

Although they have yet to tell their stories, still fearing anti- Semitic reprisals, it is known that members of the Jewish community provided crucial help to the Israelis. In an interview with a former senior official of a Jewish school in Buenos Aires, who still prefers to remain anonymous, The Report has learned that one of the houses used by the Mossad was provided by a member of the Jewish community. She tells The Report: "People from the Israeli Embassy went to see the president of the Jewish school where I was the director, with a very clear message. They needed one of his numerous properties. It was a request from the Embassy and they could not give him more details." The president, she recalls, turned pale and seemed nervous. She remembers that, in an attempt to calm him, she said, "I am sure they don't need it to play poker. They are asking for it because it is in Israel's interest. Give them the keys."

The house, used by the family as a weekend vacation home, was located approximately 40 minutes from the center of Buenos Aires, in Ramos Mejia - then a quiet residential zone (today it is a busy urban area). When Ben-Gurion announced that Eichmann was in Israel, the president understood the reason that the house was used; he never returned to the house and sold it soon after.

Copyright (c) 2007. The Jerusalem Report)