Eichmann diaries are window to his inner world

By Tom Segev
Ha'aretz Correspondent

Adolph Eichmann's journals, made public yesterday by the Israel State Archives, contain a detailed description of the annihilation of European Jewry, and Eichmann writes that the genocide program was carried out under explicit orders given by Adolph Hitler.

After being kept under wraps for 28 years, the Eichmann journals were released yesterday under dramatic circumstances, their public presentation being recorded by half a dozen television film crews from leading world networks.

Earlier, a copy of the journals was delivered to the defense in the defamation suit brought in a London court by British historian David Irving against American historian Deborah Lipstadt, who has accused Irving of being a Holocaust denier. Among other controversial claims, Irving insists that Hitler was not cognizant of the systematic murder of the Jews.

Eichmann describes the Holocaust in his prison memoir as the "worst crime in the history of humanity." The thrust of his journals is to minimize his own role in the atrocities.

Describing his response to the use of the first gas chambers, at Lublin, Eichmann claims that he needed large quantities of cigarettes and red wine to steady his nerves. He adds that during this period he "didn't take seriously" the idea of using gas for genocide, believing that the plan would be canceled.

Eichmann's prison memoir does not reveal new information about the Holocaust, nor does it contain any data that could be construed as compromising the Zionist movement. Eichmann consciously omits the name of a Jewish resident of mandatory Palestine who met with him in Berlin, and briefed him about the progress of Zionist projects.

Despite its self-serving intents and deliberate deletions, the newly released journals provide an unprecedented window into Eichmann's inner world, and thus provide clues important to fathoming the magnitude of his crimes. Awaiting the trial's verdict in his prison cell, Eichmann professes that he is not an anti-Semite, and adds that his step-mother had Jewish relations and that he even once kissed a half-Jewish cousin.

His best friend from his schoolboy days, he recalls, was Jewish - Eichmann says that he subsequently had a drink with this old friend while he wore a Nazi uniform, and that "he didn't care that I was a Nazi, and I didn't care that he was a Jew."

Eichmann left meticulous instructions as to the fate of these prison journals, covering details such as the color of their jacket cover and the delivery of copies to his wife, in the event of publication. In the event of their non-publication, he asked his attorney to supervise their destruction. Instructions he delivered concerning the fate of the manuscript suggest that at the time he composed it, Eichmann did not expect to receive a death.