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Adolph Eichmann

Operation Finale – Capturing a War Criminal

August 29, 2018 by Darrel Manson Leave a Comment

“We’re all animals fighting for scraps on the Serengeti.”

One of the most celebrated trials of the twentieth century was when Israel put Adolph Eichmann on trial. Eichmann headed the SS Office for Jewish Affairs and was one of the key architects of the Holocaust. But before they could put him on trial, they had to find him and get him to Israel. Operation Finale is the Mission Impossible style account his capture.

In 1960, Eichmann (Sir Ben Kingsley) is living with his family under an assumed name in Argentina. There is a community of Nazi supporters there, including many in the Catholic Church. When a young Jewish girl connects that this person is Eichmann, word gets to Israel. In the past Israel has looked for Eichmann to assassinate him, but now the government wants him captured to be put on trial for his crimes. A select group of Mossad (intelligence) and Shin Bet (security) agents develop a daring and dangerous plan to capture him and smuggle him out of the country on a special El Al plane.

Among the Israelis on this team is Peter Malkin (Oscar Issac). Malkin had taken part in an earlier assassination attempt that targeted the wrong man. As the plan develops, Malkin is the man who actually grabs Eichamnn just a few yards from his house. But after the capture things get complicated. The team is now told that they must get Eichmann to sign a document saying he agrees to be tried in Israel. At the same time, the right-wing Argentine security forces begin the hunt to rescue Eichmann.

As the time for the getaway draws near, Eichmann is understandably reluctant to cooperate. He says he should be tried in Germany. He says he could never get a fair trial in Israel. Only one person on the team was to negotiate with Eichmann, but when no progress was made, Malkin offered a different approach. Over a period of days Malkin and Eichmann discuss the realities of war, of nationalism, of human nature. Finally, Eichmann agrees, but they must still get him out of the country before being found.

Much of the film is a thriller—both the plan to capture Eichmann and the cat-and-mouse game between the Israelis and Argentinians. But what elevates this over other such films is the near philosophical discussion between Malkin and Eichmann. Both men have agendas that they bring to this dialogue, but in their back-and-forth they move each other to deeper levels of understanding. Eichmann strives to manipulate Malkin by pushing him on a personal level.

That seems to be a major difference between the two men. For Malkin (and the other Israelis) this is something that touches their lives. All had lost people in the Holocaust. For Eichmann it is about massive numbers. There is a sense in which 6 million Jews may overwhelm us, but there is more power in the knowledge of a single person we know. Eichmann did not know those whose death he oversaw. They were annoyances to be exterminated.

The actual trial of Eichmann is something of an anti-climax in the film. It is shown briefly, but the real testimony of the film is in these scenes of speaking about victims, justification, and our common human nature.

While the film doesn’t accept Eichmann’s rationalizations for his crimes, it does show him to be a man who cared for his family and his country, just as Malkin and the other Israelis cared for their families and nation. It is this humanizing factor that serves to point out the basis for all of Eichmann’s sins in the Holocaust—the failure to see that humanity in others.

Photos courtesy of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures

Filed Under: Film, Reviews Tagged With: Adolph Eichmann, Argentina, Ben Kingsley, Chris Weitz, Holocaust, Israel, Lior Raz, Oscar Isaac, thriller

Bringing Evil to Justice – 1on1 with Lior Raz (Operation Finale)

August 21, 2018 by Darrel Manson Leave a Comment

I recently had the opportunity to talk by phone with Lior Raz, who plays Isser Harel in Operation Finale, the story of the 1960 Israeli covert mission to capture Adolph Eichmann in Argentina. Since Lior is an Israeli, I focused on the importance of this story in Israel today.

How much does the story of the Eichmann capture and trial still resonates in Israel?

In Israel, it is a story that every kid knows. Because we are learning about the Holocaust since we are very young. We are learning about what happened there, and what Israel did, and about the Eichmann trial, and all the evidence. So I was very familiar with this story of Adolph Eichmann and the capture of him.

So does that bring a special meaning for you to be in a film like this?

Of course. I think it’s a very important movie now. And I think it’s important because in those days we had genocide, we had racism,  we had antisemitism all over the world. I think this movie comes out and shows the world: don’t forget what happened and we don’t want history to repeat itself. We need to stop it. We can’t stand outside and just watch horrible things happening. So being an Israeli, and a Jew, and a man with a family, it’s very important that these values go to everyone in the world.

Lior Raz stars as Isser Harel in OPERATION FINALE, written by Matthew Orton and directed by Chris Weitz, a Metro Goldwyn Mayer Pictures film.
Credit: Valeria Florini / Metro Goldwyn Mayer Pictures © 2018 Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures Inc.  All Rights Reserved.

The film plays out as a thriller. I’m not sure how much was added to enhance that aspect, but it is true that they were trying to get Eichmann out of the country while Argentine forces were trying to find them, right?

That’s true. It happened. Those people in the Mossad, what happened to them was very dangerous for them and the people who helped them. All the agents risked their lives in order to bring someone to justice in Israel, and not just kill them over there to revenge. And still those Mossad people do crazy stuff every day that we don’t know, but it was amazing what they did then.

It was interesting that Israel made the decision that they wanted Eichmann brought back to Israel for trial, not just to assassinate him.

Because it is very easy to assassinate. The decision was a very hard decision. It was Israel’s decision to bring him to justice and not to kill him over there. This decision is about morality. It’s about real justice. I think in those days in Israel all the Holocaust survivors wanted another way of revenge. It was to hear everything that happened and to be heard. So the trial was well published and it was on television every day. And it was a big thing in those days in Israel, people just wanted to be there and to understand what happened. To see this mastermind, master of evil, come to justice in a Jewish state.

I think that was an important decision, and as it plays out in the movie it was hard for those taking part in the capture because it was personal for them.

Yes, it is. But one thing, as you know, you have to be better than him. It was the easy way to assassinate him. But although all of them had been hurt by the Holocaust in a way, they were very professional, and just wanted to bring him back to Israel.

Filed Under: Film, Interviews Tagged With: Adolph Eichmann, Holocaust, Israel, Lior Raz

Vita Activa: The Spirit of Hannah Arendt

April 23, 2016 by Darrel Manson Leave a Comment

We often think of philosophers as those who sit in ivory towers unaffected by the actual world. They think their thoughts about the nature of things without really understanding what matters. But often philosophy comes out of profound experiences. Vita Activa: The Spirit of Hannah Arendt is a documentary about a German-Jewish philosopher who created a controversy when she covered the Adolph Eichmann trial for The New Yorker magazine and spoke of “the banality of evil.” The 2012 narrative film Hannah Arendt garnered significant critical praise.

The film follows the outline of her life—growing up in the First World War, the rise of Nazism, her education (including an affair with her teacher Martin Heidegger, who provided philosophical prestige for the Nazi regime), her eventual escape first to France then to America. This is a film made up mostly of Arendt’s own words—sometimes in archival footage of interviews, but often through readings of parts of her works or her correspondence with her mentor and friend Karl Jaspers. There are no “bumper sticker” quotes in all of this. Arendt’s experiences gave her a grounding with which to approach meaningful aspects of human life—especially the nature of evil and how totalitarianism comes to be.

arendt2

For Arendt evil is not a demonic force, but the result of people—even people who are trying to be good within their framework of understanding—who fail to engage in critical thinking. It is not that people do not recognize that something is wrong, but that they find ways to justify doing that wrong as though it were right. At the Eichmann trial Arendt did not see a monster in the dock, but rather a mild-mannered bureaucrat. He was doing his job (which just happened to be overseeing the Holocaust). He claimed to not even be an anti-Semite. But he was also, in his mind, a good German.

It is difficult to judge what passion Arendt may have had for the topic based on an actress reading her works and letters. At times the film comes across as a very dispassionate discussion about something that deeply affected millions of people. I suspect, though, that in her works she does stand back a bit to strive for a detached voice. That may be part of what led to the backlash to her ideas of the banality of evil.

Evil is a difficult subject to come to terms with. Theologians and philosophers struggle to understand its very nature. This film provides some insight that can help us look at some of the questions around evil. It is not an easy film. I enjoyed classes in philosophy, but this required my attention throughout to keep up. It is one of the most cerebral films that I’ve encountered in a long time. (And I don’t think cerebral is a put down.)

Photos from Hannah Arendt Personal Archive and Zeitgeist Films

Filed Under: Film, Reviews Tagged With: Adolph Eichmann, banality of evil, cerebral, documentary, evil, Hannah Arendt, Holocaust, Nazi, philosophy, totalitarianism

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