A Jewish Kapo in Auschwitz
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A Jewish Kapo in Auschwitz Friling - Jewish Kapo.indb 1 4/11/2014 2:48:54 PM Friling - Jewish Kapo.indb 2 4/11/2014 2:48:54 PM The Schusterman SerieS Editors in iSrael STudieS S. Ilan Troen Jehuda Reinharz Sylvia Fuks Fried The Schusterman Series in Israel Studies publishes original scholarship of exceptional significance on the history of Zionism and the State of Israel. It draws on disciplines across the academy, from anthropology, sociology, political science, and international relations to the arts, history, and literature. It seeks to further an understanding of Israel within the context of the modern Middle East and the modern Jewish experience. There is special interest in developing publications that enrich the university curriculum and enlighten the public at large. The series is published under the auspices of the Schusterman Center for Israel Studies at Brandeis University. For a complete list of books in this series, please see www.upne.com. Tuvia Friling A Jewish Kapo in Auschwitz: History, Memory, and the Politics of Survival moTTi golani Palestine between Politics and Terror, 1945–1947 ilana Szobel A Poetics of Trauma: The Work of Dahlia Ravikovitch aniTa Shapira Israel: A History oriT rozin The Rise of the Individual in 1950s Israel: A Challenge to Collectivism boaz neumann Land and Desire in Early Zionism anaT helman Young Tel Aviv: A Tale of Two Cities nili ScharF gold Yehuda Amichai: The Making of Israel’s National Poet iTamar rabinovich and Jehuda reinharz, ediTorS Israel in the Middle East: Documents and Readings on Society, Politics, and Foreign Relations, Pre-1948 to the Present Friling - Jewish Kapo.indb 3 4/11/2014 2:48:54 PM Friling - Jewish Kapo.indb 4 4/11/2014 2:48:55 PM tuvia friling A Jewish Kain po Auschwitz History, Memory, and the Politics of Survival Translated by Haim Watzman Published with the support of the Israel Science Foundation Brandeis u niversity Press Waltham, m assachusetts Friling - Jewish Kapo.indb 5 4/11/2014 2:48:55 PM Brandeis University Press An imprint of University Press of New England www.upne.com © 2014 Brandeis University All rights reserved Manufactured in the United States of America Designed by Eric M. Brooks Typeset in Skolar by Passumpsic Publishing University Press of New England is a member of the Green Press Initiative. The paper used in this book meets their minimum requirement for recycled paper. For permission to reproduce any of the material in this book, contact Permissions, University Press of New England, One Court Street, Suite 250, Lebanon NH 03766; or visit www.upne.com Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Friling, Tuvia, author. [Mi atah Le’on Berz’eh? English] A Jewish kapo in Auschwitz: history, memory, and the politics of survival / Tuvia Friling; translated by Haim Watzman. pages cm.—(The Schusterman series in Israel studies) Includes bibliographical references and index. iSbn 978-1-61168-576-3 (cloth: alk. paper)— iSbn 978-1-61168-587-9 (pbk.: alk. paper)— iSbn 978-1-61168-577-0 (ebook) 1. Grinboim, Eli’ezer, 1908–1948. 2. Holocaust, Jewish (1939–1945)— Poland—Biography. 3. World War, 1939–1945—Collaborationists— Poland—Biography. 4. Auschwitz (Concentration camp). I. Title. dS134.72.g75F7513 2014 940.53'18092—dc23 2013049171 5 4 3 2 1 Friling - Jewish Kapo.indb 6 4/11/2014 2:48:55 PM With love, for Dina, my wife and companion Friling - Jewish Kapo.indb 7 4/11/2014 2:48:55 PM Friling - Jewish Kapo.indb 8 4/11/2014 2:48:55 PM ConTenTS Acknowledgments xi 1 Jerusalem, May 22, 1948, Morning 1 2 Poland, Lancicia, District Prison, 1929 3 3 Paris, Fifth Arrondissement, 5 Rue Linné, 1931 11 4 Spain, March 1938–1939 15 5 Saint-Cyprien, Paris, Les Tourelles, Beaune-la-Rolande, France, 1939–1942 24 6 Auschwitz, Auschwitz-Birkenau, July 1942–March/April 1944 31 7 Jawischowitz, March 1944–January 1945 51 8 Buchenwald, January–June 1945 66 9 Warsaw–Paris, Paris–Warsaw, June–September 1945 74 10 Paris, June 1945–May 1946 133 11 Jerusalem, May 1946–May 1948 170 12 Ramat Rachel, May 21–22, 1948 187 13 Postmortem: Israel, the First Decades 200 14 History, Politics, and Memory 227 Research Notes: From Clio’s Elusive World 263 Eliezer Gruenbaum: Chronology 265 Notes 267 Bibliography 295 Index 315 Friling - Jewish Kapo.indb 9 4/11/2014 2:48:55 PM Friling - Jewish Kapo.indb 10 4/11/2014 2:48:55 PM AcknowledgmenTS ThiS book began To run Through my mind as I was writ- ing my previous study, Arrows in the Dark: David Ben-Gurion, the Yishuv Lead- ership, and Rescue Attempts during the Holocaust. That work offers an extensive account of the labors of the father of the subject of this book. Yitzhak Gruen- baum, a leader of the Jewish community under the British Mandate and for- merly the most prominent and influential Jewish politician in Poland, was assigned major roles in the Yishuv’s efforts to aid Europe’s beleaguered and endangered Jews and bring as many of them as possible to Palestine. My work on that earlier history also taught me the great importance of documentation residing outside Israel, in particular that from Polish and French sources. Such evidence is critical for the re-creation, analysis, and evaluation of the convoluted story of Yitzhak’s son Eliezer, the subject of the current work. This book is the story of Eliezer Gruenbaum and his time, but also a narrative of the tortuous path I and my research assistants trod to collect the necessary evidence. That search took years. I would like to express my gratitude to the staff of the Polish Central Archives of Modern Records, and to Neli Oren, who served as my liaison to the archive. I also want to thank the staff of the archive of the Auschwitz- Birkenau National Museum, in particular the former deputy director, Teresa Swiebocka. In addition, I am grateful to those people and organizations that generously granted me access to an important French collection of documents. Further thanks go to Henry Meyer, director of the archive at the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, as well as to Michlean Amir and Vincent Slat of his staff, all three of whom provided me with gracious and professional assistance. Galia Glasner-Heled, Eran Turbiner, and Jeannine (Levana) Frenk, Israeli scholars who have researched and written about the Holocaust, all kindly made available to me their private collections of documents and notes that were critical in piecing together Eliezer Gruenbaum’s story. xi Friling - Jewish Kapo.indb 11 4/11/2014 2:48:55 PM Two translators—Shmuel Katz, from the Polish, and Doron Modan, from the French—helped me delve into documents and sources in these languages. Their professionalism and patience deserve special recognition. My colleague Shmuel Trigano of the University of Paris at Nanterre– Sorbonne, also provided me with invaluable assistance. Special thanks go to Irena Steinfeldt, now the head of Yad Vashem’s Righ- teous among the Nations department. She collected for me documents from different places around the world, helped translate, and offered her services as a careful reader of manuscripts. Her comments, clarifications, wide-ranging assistance, and especially her profound friendship were critical to my work. It goes without saying that I alone am responsible for everything written in the book. But I benefited greatly from the comments and suggestions of a number of colleagues and friends who read my Hebrew manuscript. I list them in alphabetical order: Shlomo Aronson, the late Dan Bar-On, Uri Bialer, Hadas Blum, Kimmy Caplan, Galia Glasner-Heled, Daniel Gutwein, Yehoshua Porath, Smadar Rothman, Hanna Yablonka, and Lisa Yavnai. Re’ut Ben-Horin was my associate through a large part of the research and writing of the expanded Hebrew edition. I thank her for her wonderful, ded- icated, and careful work, as well as for her patience and friendship. Hadas Blum, my excellent research assistant, helped me swim through the sea of details on which the book sails, assisted in drafting the Hebrew edition, and provided essential editorial assistance for this English edition. The book was written during my tenure as a research fellow at the Center for Advanced Holocaust Studies at the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum in Washington, D.C. I would like to thank Paul Shapiro, Lisa Yavnai, Rado Ioanid, and the rest of the center’s staff and fellows for being gracious hosts and pro- viding an enriching environment in which I learned a great deal. This English version of the book is published by the Schusterman Center for Israel Studies at Brandeis University in Waltham, Massachusetts. Ilan Troen, Jehuda Reinharz, and Sylvia Fuks Fried deserve my gratitude for their confidence, assistance, and support. I am also grateful to Phyllis Deutsch, editor-in-chief of the University Press of New England, and the members of her staff for their important contribution to the process of publication. Further thanks go to Rivka Carmi, president of Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, and Avigad Vonshak, director of the Ben-Gurion Research Institute for the Study of Israel and Zionism, for their kind support. I owe special thanks to the Israel Science Foundation for its generous support for the translation of the book into English. My sincere thanks to Avi Katzman for his important part in preparing the Hebrew manuscript for translation. I also owe a great deal to the book’s xii ||| Acknowledgments Friling - Jewish Kapo.indb 12 4/11/2014 2:48:55 PM English translator, Haim Watzman, for his professionalism, fortitude, talent, and precision—all in the name of making the telling of Eliezer Gruenbaum’s complex and intricate story more fluent, flowing, and clear.