Soon, Zvi Aharoni joins Harel. The two men can barely hear each other over the terminal noise. Harel finds a seat with a group of hungry Argentine soldiers who are too busy eating to pay any attention to the Jewish agents. Aharoni’s information is simple: the roads from Tira are clear. Despite the heavy airport security and many flights arriving for the 150th anniversary celebration, there are no signs of roadblocks. Also, much to both men’s satisfaction, there is nothing in this afternoon’s Buenos Aires papers about Eichmann.
“Execute plan Number One,” Harel instructs Aharoni, sending him back to Tira. With that, the fallback plan of waiting a month to depart by sea is set aside. Aharoni breathes a sigh of relief, knowing that his fellow Mossad agents will be very glad to hear this news.
Plan Number One also means that the specially designed crate will not be necessary, because Eichmann will actually walk onto the plane.
At 8:30 p.m., the El Al pilots depart their hotel in downtown Buenos Aires. They are driven to the remote corner of the airport where the Britannia is parked and begin preflight planning.
At the same moment, Zvi Aharoni steps inside Adolf Eichmann’s cell in Tira. The Nazi has not had food or drink since lunch. His hair is dyed gray and thick makeup has been applied to his face to make him appear much older. He wears a false mustache. Eichmann is dressed in the same crisp white shirt, blue tie, and pressed blue pants of the El Al crew members. Perched atop his head is a matching hat, bearing the emblem once worn by Eichmann’s millions of victims: the Star of David.
The two men have spent hours together since the kidnapping. Aharoni has extracted a great deal of damning information from Eichmann. The Israeli has always been professional, though never overly friendly. Earlier in the day, before meeting with Isser Harel, Aharoni had informed Eichmann that this is the night they would depart for Israel, where he will stand trial for his crimes. The Nazi has known this day is coming and has even signed a document stating that he is complying willfully with his extraction.
“Remember your promise,” Aharoni reminds Eichmann.
“You have nothing to fear,” says the mass murderer, still wearing his goggles covered in tape. “I am going with you voluntarily, and I will keep my promise.”
Eichmann seems comfortable wearing the same uniform as the Jews. In fact, he even asks for a matching uniform jacket, but his request is denied.
“The doctor had to be able to reach his arm and a vein at any time,” Aharoni will write. The team doctor is among the best anesthesiologists in Tel Aviv and will soon return to that profession, never to give his name as a member of Operation Eichmann. “He would inject his patient with a certain amount of medication and then leave the needle sticking into the vein. In that way, he could increase the dose at any time. The shirt would hide the needle but not hamper the doctor. This would be much harder with a jacket.”
The injection is administered at 9:00 p.m.
“We are ready to travel,” announces the doctor, as the drugs take hold. Eichmann is incapable of coherent speech but still able to walk. His goggles are removed. Two Mossad agents also dressed as flight crew members walk him into the garage, where the Nazi is once again placed in the backseat. The sedan has been fitted with diplomatic license plates to guarantee it will not be searched.
Once again, Zvi Aharoni is the driver. He knows the roads to the airport better than anyone, as well as side streets should the need arise for a secondary route. It is 9:30 as he engages the clutch and drives away from Tira for the last time.
* * *
At the same moment, outside the Hotel Internacional in the heart of Buenos Aires, the pursers and stewardesses comprising the remainder of El Al’s flight crew board a small bus. Their arrival at the airport must coincide perfectly with that of the vehicle containing Eichmann. It is only just this morning that the cabin crew was informed that a special passenger wearing an El Al uniform would be joining them this evening. They were not told his name, only that the individual in question was a man of “paramount national importance.” The crew was “flabbergasted,” in the words of Isser Harel, but not completely surprised. Too many curious incidents have accompanied the planning of this flight.
The return journey, for instance, will not be going through the Brazilian town of Recife, as on the inbound. Instead, the route will immediately swing across the Atlantic heading to the city of Dakar in Senegal, even though the distance is slightly beyond the Britannia’s fuel capacity. The pilots will need the assistance of favorable following winds to make the crossing without incident.
The veteran El Al staff have been doing their jobs long enough to spot these little irregularities.
* * *
Isser Harel remains in the employee cafeteria. He spies the two leaders of the Josef Mengele search party making their way through the crowd. Many of Harel’s men thought that trying to grab the Angel of Death so late in Operation Eichmann was overly ambitious. “When I have a bird in my hand, I don’t start looking for the bird in the bush,” one agent has warned Harel. “I’ll take the bird in my hand, put it in a cage, and then deal with the one in the bush.”
But the Mossad director is certain that if Eichmann is successfully transported back to Israel, a panicked Mengele will go back into hiding. It is an amazing coincidence that the Nazi doctor has returned to Buenos Aires at the same time the Mossad has arrived to grab Eichmann. Better to take advantage of this moment, than to let it pass—the chance to grab Mengele might not ever happen again.
But as the two agents take a seat at the small table where Harel has held covert meetings throughout the evening, he immediately senses that something is wrong. Both men are hours late. The spark of excitement they might display if the operation were proceeding smoothly is nonexistent. Instead, they look tired and defeated. Earlier, the agents approached Mengele’s known residence in two separate acts of deception: one time as a parcel delivery man and the other in the guise of handyman seeking to gain entry for the purpose of fixing the water heater.
Both agents report the same outcome to their gambit: a woman answered the door.
She spoke English with no discernible German accent. In fact, she spoke no other language, not even Spanish. The woman freely gave her name, explaining to the Mossad agents that she had just moved to Buenos Aires, the house was a recent rental, and she had no knowledge of where the previous owner might have gone. Furthermore, she insisted that there was nothing wrong with her water heater, and thus no reason to let them inside.
The agents persisted, asking leading questions to verify the truth of her story. In the end, both men decided that the woman was telling the truth.
The Mossad agents now tell Isser Harel that the Angel of Death has vanished. There will be no double kidnapping on this operation.
* * *
Klaus Eichmann and his little brother, Dieter, are still prowling the streets of Buenos Aires, searching for their father’s abductors. Their Tacuara allies are keeping a close watch on the train stations, ports, and the airport but have grown restless. The Tacuara have proposed a radical plan to kidnap the Israeli ambassador to Argentina and hold him hostage until Adolf Eichmann is returned.
The Eichmann boys find that option extreme at this point in time, but in the end they may have no other choice.
* * *
Zvi Aharoni drives slowly, knowing that any abrupt turns or stops will cause the needle to be yanked from his prisoner’s arm. He takes back roads. The main autoroutes are filled with police and other security for the many visiting dignitaries, for while Argentinean officials have little problem harboring Nazi war criminals, they fear that their national reputation will be tarnished should the sesquicentennial celebrations be interrupted by violence of any kind. Already, terrorist groups seeking the return of Juan Perón to power have attempted to blow up the national telephone company. The likelihood of a suspicious vehicle being stopped and searched to find the bombers is high.
Aharoni’s caution pays off—the Mossad sedan arriv
es at Ezeiza Airport without incident. Security officials wave the vehicle through the gate without so much as a stop, thanks to the diplomatic plates. The guards do not pay any attention to the three men sitting side by side in the rear seat. They will leave such scrutiny to customs officials during passport control.
As Aharoni steers across the tarmac, the crew bus looms out of the darkness on schedule, falling in behind his car. The El Al departure will be the last flight of the night, so there is little activity in the Aerolineas Argentineas hangar area where the Britannia is parked.
Aharoni comes to a stop at the base of the gangway. A crew member appears in the door at the top of the steps, giving the thumbs-up signal. Immediately, the rear doors of Aharoni’s sedan are opened and Eichmann is guided up the steps into the aircraft. The doctor is at one side, a Mossad agent on the other.
To maintain the appearance that this is standard employee boarding procedure, the remainder of the crew pile out of their airport minibus and follow Eichmann up the ramp. “Form a circle around us and follow us up the steps,” commands agent Rafi Eitan.
The seven pursers, radio operators, and stewardesses obey orders.
Suddenly, an airport security guard shines a floodlight on the stairway, giving the group a start. But no one approaches to question the odd behavior of the man who cannot stand on his own two feet or the crowd milling around him. The crew can only hope that the guard assumes one of them has had too much to drink.
The gangway is too short for the Britannia. Eichmann must be lifted and pushed the last step up into the fuselage.
The Nazi is immediately lowered into an aisle seat in the front row of first class. A blanket is placed across his body. There is an empty seat next to him, but the Mossad doctor has no intention of spending the entire flight home seated next to a Nazi war criminal. Instead, he sits directly behind Eichmann, prepared to administer another dose of sedative, should it be required.
“You should try to get a bit of sleep,” Aharoni tells Eichmann. Unable to speak, the prisoner complies.
The El Al crew settles into the remaining six seats in first class. The lights in the forward cabin are off. A curtain is drawn. Everyone is told to pretend they are sleeping, just in case Argentinean officials demand to come on board.
Thus far, every aspect of Operation Eichmann has gone according to plan.
Now the Mossad and their prisoner must clear passport control—but the Argentinean customs authorities who will usually board a plane are nowhere to be seen.
The Britannia’s engines roar to life. The plane taxis toward the main terminal, there to pick up passengers. Isser Harel is among those in the terminal, but he has not decided whether it would be best to immediately board the flight or wait until the last minute. Should the operation fall apart, it will be crucial that he escape. Harel knows far too many secrets to be arrested by foreign officials.
Just before midnight, a bearded Argentinean passport officer finally steps into the passenger lounge. He is embarrassed for being late due to a scheduling mistake. “Please excuse me. I am sorry!” he says, quickly stamping everyone’s passport. Zvi Aharoni is among them. There is no attempt by the official to board the flight and check the crew’s documents. The intense forgeries and deceptions required to get Eichmann out of the country have become unnecessary. The deception of the Israeli tourist giving up his passport and enduring a stay in the hospital was also unnecessary. But Aharoni knows it is always better to err on the side of taking every precaution possible.
“Bon Viaje,” the Argentine says warmly, nodding toward the flight.
It’s time. Isser Harel hands his passport to the bearded customs agent, hears the resounding thump as it is stamped, then steps out onto the tarmac to board the flight home.
* * *
In the cockpit, pilot Zvi Tohar makes a mental checklist of what to do in event of emergency. Nicknamed the “Tall Captain with the Well-Kept Mustache,” for his dapper good looks, the German-born Tohar was a fighter pilot in the Royal Air Force during the war and has been instrumental in bringing aviation to Israel. Should Argentinean fighter planes be scrambled to shoot down the El Al flight, he plans to drop to treetop level and evade the attack until he can get out over the ocean.
Tohar radios the tower. “El Al is ready to taxi.”
“El Al, proceed to runway,” comes the reply.
Tohar releases the brakes. The Britannia begins a gentle roll across the tarmac.
Zvi Tobar, whose cool behavior under pressure prevented catastrophe during the Eichmann operation
But then, a shock—the tower issues another command.
“El Al, hold your position. There is an irregularity in the flight plan.”
Isser Harel’s stomach lurches as the airplane brakes to an abrupt halt. Without a hesitation, he gets out of his seat and steps into the cockpit. Harel is certain that Vera Eichmann and her sons have guessed that their patriarch is on board the one and only Israeli aircraft leaving Argentina and have finally alerted the police. The Mossad director orders Zvi Tohar to ignore the tower and take off.
Throughout his long career, Tohar has earned a reputation for being cool under pressure. Now, despite Harel’s command, the pilot refuses the order.
“There’s still one more option,” he tells Harel. “Before having the Argentinean air force put on our tail, we should check and see if they really know Eichmann is on board. Let’s not create a problem that doesn’t exist.”
Stairs are wheeled to the plane. Navigator Shaul Shaul steps outside and walks to the tower. Harel has given him precisely ten minutes to ascertain the situation. If he does not return in that time, Zvi Tohar will have no choice but to take off—and face whatever consequences may come.
Shaul is thirty-two. He has two children. There is nothing he would rather do than return home safely. But as he climbs the steps to the control tower, Shaul wonders if a set of handcuffs awaits him. “What is the problem?” he asks, searching out the air traffic controller.
“There is a signature missing,” says the controller, pointing to the flight plan.
Not wasting any time, Shaul politely signs the document and says his good-byes.
Back at the El Al Britannia, Shaul climbs the steps and settles back into the cockpit.
“Everything’s OK,” Shaul tells Zvi Tohar.
The pilot radios the tower. “This is El Al, may we proceed?”
“Affirmative.”
Zvi Aharoni will remember that moment the rest of his life. “I was still unable to relax. Then the aircraft began to move. The runway was clear. At the end of the runway, the Britannia lifted off. It was four minutes past midnight.”
Retribution is in the air.
15
APRIL 11, 1961
JERUSALEM, ISRAEL
9:00 A.M.
The noose is getting closer for Adolf Eichmann.
It is Tuesday. Passover has just ended. After ten months in captivity, and hundreds of hours of interrogation, Eichmann stands trial. He sits surrounded on three sides by bulletproof glass. Since his arrival in Israel, Eichmann has been guarded around the clock, with a police officer stationed inside his cell, another seated outside, and a third sentinel standing by to make sure that no one communicates with the prisoner. Now, that vigilance continues. Two unarmed sentries stand on either side of Eichmann within his protective glass dock. For good measure, two more guards stand just inches away. In the name of judicial impartiality, they have all been specially chosen, not just for their strength or skills but because none has lost a family member in the Holocaust.
The trial spectators clamor loudly, awaiting the arrival of the judges. The room is brightly lit and the air-conditioning too strong, but few complain. Such is the demand for seating that Eichmann’s trial is not taking place in a normal courtroom but in the cavernous new Israeli cultural center of Beit Ha’am. Workers were still rushing to complete construction last night. It is the only building in Jerusalem capable of holding the hundred
s of international journalists and Holocaust survivors here to witness evil on display. In a year that has seen the world stunned by great headlines, no news story can match that of Eichmann’s capture.1 The trial is such an international sensation that even this great auditorium is not big enough. In addition to the journalists in the courtroom, hundreds more will watch on closed-circuit TV in two other nearby locations. Television cameras stand ready to beam the trial live to the people of Israel. The transmission will also be sent to the United States each day, where it will be aired on national television.
Adolf Eichmann in the exercise area outside his cell in Israel, awaiting trial
Awaiting testimony, the crowd cannot help but stare at Eichmann. They struggle to reconcile that this thin elderly man dressed in a cheap suit, constantly sucking on his dentures and blowing his nose into a large white handkerchief, is the same leader of Sondereinsatz-Kommando Eichmann who zealously oversaw the death of millions.2
“The normal reaction to a man alone, in trouble, is pity,” journalist Martha Gellhorn writes in her notebook.3 “Yet this man in the dock arouses no such feeling, not once, not for an instant.”
“His voice is ugly, with a hard R, a sound that makes one think of a hammer and a knife. Neither by voice, accent, nor vocabulary is he an educated men,” writes Gellhorn, covering the trial for the Atlantic Monthly. “Eichmann’s voice sharpened: the cold snarl, the bark that many of the eyewitnesses remembered, was there.… From the first day of his testimony, we could imagine Eichmann clearly as an old Hungarian Jewish aristocrat had described him: ‘an officer in boots, with one hand on his pistol, in all the pride of his race.’”
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