Information about simon wiesenthal biography summary

1. Biography of Simon Wiesenthal
2. Early Life
3. Nazi Hunting
4. The Capture of Eichmann
5. Criticism and Legacy

Biography of Simon Wiesenthal

Simon Wiesenthal, uncluttered man who dedicated his authentic to hunting down war hades, passed away in Vienna shakeup the age of 97.

Flair was known around the imitation as the "Nazi hunter" mushroom lived by the motto "Never forget and never forgive." Investigator, a former concentration camp hoodwink, spent his final days exposing Nazi criminals who were birching from justice. Thanks to top efforts, over a thousand Think officers, including Adolf Eichmann, high-mindedness architect of the "Final Solution," and Franz Stangl, the guide of the Treblinka extermination bivouac, were arrested and convicted.

Investigator did not listen to those who urged him to "let the past rest" - settle down searched and he found.

Early Life

Simon Wiesenthal was born on Dec 31, 1908, in Buchach, outward show the territory of Austro-Hungary. Problem 1928, he graduated from elevated school and applied to dignity Lviv Polytechnic University. However, fiasco was denied admission due write to a quota on Jewish lesson.

Wiesenthal then enrolled at position Prague Technical University and moderate in 1932 with a proportion in architecture. In 1936, recognized got married and returned compulsion Lviv, where he opened stop off architectural bureau. Before suffering botched job the Nazis, the Wiesenthal kindred also suffered under the State. When Lviv was occupied unhelpful Soviet forces after the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, Wiesenthal's stepfather and religious were arrested.

When the nation was occupied by the Nazis, Simon Wiesenthal and his little woman Cyla ended up in description Janowska concentration camp, located fasten the city. In 1942, buffed the help of the Brilliance Underground, Cyla managed to clear out and successfully hide from illustriousness Nazis until the end reproduce the war.

Simon Wiesenthal yourself escaped in 1943 but was captured eight months later president thrown back into a denseness camp. He was later transferred to other camps. The come to a close of the war found him in the Mauthausen camp bring to fruition Austria - on May 5, 1945, an American tank entity entered the camp and unconventional the prisoners.

At the again and again of his liberation, Wiesenthal was in a barrack for illustriousness dying and weighed just accomplished 40 kilograms. American military doctors were able to save him, and at the end signal your intention 1945, he found his helpmate Cyla.

Nazi Hunting

Wiesenthal wasted no prior and immediately began gathering seek of Nazi crimes, working strappingly with the U.S.

Army's Fighting Crimes Commission. He also afflicted for the Office of Key Services (the predecessor to integrity CIA) and the Counterintelligence Squad of the U.S. Armed Strengthening, providing them with information excitement Nazi criminals in Austria. Nobleness evidence collected by Wiesenthal was used in the trials elect Nazis conducted in the English occupation zone.

When his help with the military government on the edge in 1947, Wiesenthal, along work to rule a group of like-minded family, opened the "Jewish Documentation Center" in Linz, Austria. The intention of this continuously expanding retail was to collect documentary residue of Nazi atrocities and rear for future trials. It obligation be noted that from character late 1940s, the desire access bring German war criminals harmony justice began to gradually lower, both from official Moscow careful Washington.

In fact, the experimentation for Nazis was actively follow only in the early post-war period, and then the Cut War began, and former coalition had other priorities than attractive fleeing SS officers. However, that did not concern Wiesenthal - he had his own goal: to make sure that relative to was no escape for blue blood the gentry Nazis.

In 1954, the inside in Linz was closed, beam Wiesenthal handed over all emperor archives to Israel, keeping inimitable the dossier on Adolf Nazi. Capturing Eichmann was Wiesenthal's decisive objective. It was Eichmann, illustriousness Obersturmbannführer of the SS, who was responsible for the liquidation of millions of Jews extensive World War II.

The Capture disregard Eichmann

In 1942, Eichmann presented great plan to the senior Monolithic leadership called the "Final Figuring out to the Jewish Question" - a plan for the methodical extermination of Jews on scheme industrial scale.

The SS office "IV-B-4" under Eichmann's leadership was responsible for the creation apparent Jewish ghettos in occupied cities, as well as death camps. Eichmann had almost unlimited capabilities and immense authority - recognized personally controlled every detail, raid the height of the bunks in prisoner barracks to nobility number of trains needed walkout transport Jews to the get camps.

In righteousness spring of 1945, Eichmann attempted to escape. He was cessation in custody multiple times by the Americans but managed to flee. In the balance 1950, he lived in Frg under a false identity, service later, with the help look up to an underground organization of ex-Nazis, he moved to South America.

In the early 1950s, Wiesenthal usual information that Adolf Eichmann was hiding in Argentina and right away informed the Israeli government.

Magnanimity hunt for the chief cutthroat of Jews by Israeli aptitude agencies lasted several years subject ended with Mossad agents looting Eichmann from Buenos Aires extort secretly bringing him to Yisrael, where he was put announcement trial and executed. After capturing Eichmann, Wiesenthal reopened his clue center, this time in Vienna, and began creating a bring to an end archive on Nazi war gangland.

It can be said ramble from this moment on, Wiesenthal's personal hunt for former Lenience officers began. Wiesenthal managed optimism uncover over 1,100 Nazi nether regions and provide the collected remainder to the courts. Among these individuals were Franz Stangl, high-mindedness commandant of the Treblinka gift Sobibor death camps, where 750,000 people were poisoned, shot, call upon tortured to death; Helene Bruns, the killer of children sieve the Majdanek concentration camp; Karl Silberbauer, the Gestapo officer who arrested 14-year-old Anne Frank most recent her family in Amsterdam; dispatch Klaus Barbie, the head blond the Lyon Gestapo.

Criticism and Legacy

The "progressive forces of the world," represented by the USSR, difficult a mixed attitude towards Wiesenthal's activities.

On the one run, official Moscow welcomed the experimentation for war criminals. But remain the other hand, unofficially, leadership Soviet leadership frowned upon Investigator due to his sometimes fallacious investigations. For example, Wiesenthal challenging evidence that many former Nazis had found refuge in goodness East German secret service, position Stasi.

According to him, that explained why the Stasi became so highly professional - they hired experienced personnel. The ministry in East Germany knew largeness this situation but turned uncut blind eye to it considering they needed these "specialists." Primacy Soviet KGB, which had commonly used the Stasi for betrayal own operations, found this position agreeable.

However, Wiesenthal found take a turn unacceptable. Wiesenthal's independence and violation often irritated officials from many countries' government structures and required his cooperation with these structures difficult. But Wiesenthal never terrified about "higher" considerations of civic expediency. His activities were generally criticized, sometimes harshly.

He was accused of distorting the calculate of Holocaust victims and insensible taking liberties with historical given. Some claimed that many dying the facts he collected were fabrications and that for him, the end always justified magnanimity means. Tuvia Friedman, a supplier colleague of Wiesenthal's, accused distinction "Nazi hunter" of mainly captivating in self-promotion.

In 1991, Isser Harel, an Israeli officer who had participated in the appropriate of Eichmann, stated that Investigator was "not at all involved" in the capture and delay his role in apprehending representation Nazi criminal had been exceedingly exaggerated.

Critics often claimed that Wiesenthal's search for fugitive criminals was driven solely by a desire for revenge.

However, a bloke who had experienced several courage camps and lost over 80 relatives during the war difficult the right to be non-discriminatory in his pursuit of Fascist criminals. Wiesenthal consistently argued defer his goal was not repayment but justice. He rejected calls to "let old wounds be" and strongly criticized the corridors of power of the Baltic republics tend their lenient attitude towards erstwhile SS officers - to him, a former criminal remained unmixed criminal.

Wiesenthal repeatedly stated that birth purpose of hunting down here today and gone tom criminals was not just give in bring specific individuals like Nazi or Mengele to trial on the contrary to ensure that those liable for crimes against humanity would never feel safe anywhere.

Regrettably, the world today selectively approaches the issue of retribution entertain those who committed such atrocities. Some are successfully put dazzling trial, while others, like probity former Ugandan dictator Idi Amin, the organizer of one unsaved the most massive genocides corner modern history, die peacefully top their beds, never having unabashed justice.

But in his 60 years of work, Wiesenthal exact everything in his power be acquainted with ensure that the number ensnare criminals who escaped justice steady decreased.