44 pages • 1 hour read
Hannah ArendtEichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil
Nonfiction | Book | Adult | Published in 1963A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 13-15Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 13 Summary: “The Killing Centers in the East”
Testimony on the killing centers in the East is first to be presented by the prosecution and last to be judged, most likely because it is “the central scene of Jewish suffering” (206). Hausner wants the suffering of the Jewish people to be heard before finding specific blame for the accused, and Servatius objects, claiming that the Jewish judges will not be impartial to the proceedings. The judges assure the court they are professional and will rule as such. Four of Eichmann’s charges are in dispute: his participation in the mass slaughter in the East; the deportation of Jews from Polish ghettos to killing centers; his liability for the events of the extermination camps; and his responsibility for the living conditions and subsequent liquidation of the ghettos. On the first point, the judges conclude that the fact Eichmann is well informed as to what is happening “was sufficient to constitute proof of actual participation” (212). On the second point, testimony from a witness about Jews from Bialystok arriving at Auschwitz proves Eichmann’s involvement because Poland had been under his jurisdiction. On the third point, even though Eichmann knew the Jews he sent to these camps were being murdered, neither he nor his men select the individuals, since most of the deportees come from lists made by the Jewish councils, and thus Eichmann has “no authority to say who would die and who would live” (214). On the fourth point, although Eichmann had again been aware of the conditions of the ghettos, the creation and management of them has nothing to do with his job. Ultimately, the documents presented show that Eichmann has little to do with the events in the East. If the judges dismiss them entirely, however, and while Eichmann would hang, they would also destroy the prosecution’s case.
Chapter 14 Summary: “Evidence and Witnesses”
Countless documents are destroyed in the last weeks of the war, but what remains eighteen years later has not been combed through by “trained research assistants” so what knowledge Arendt has at the time comes from “the selection made for purposes of prosecution” over the years (221). Hausner and Servatius submit over 1,600 documents to the court as evidence, 1,500 from the prosecution and 110 documents from the defense. Also available for review is Eichmann’s detailed interview with the Israeli police examiner, along with the notes Eichmann writes in preparation for the trial. Over one hundred witnesses testify, with fifty-three of them coming from Poland and Lithuania; only Belgium and Bulgaria are left unrepresented by witnesses. One such witness, Zindel Grynszpan, a Polish Jew, had been living in Germany for twenty-seven years; in the fall of 1938, the Polish government announces that all Polish Jews living in Germany will lose their nationality. Grynszpan had never asked for naturalization, and he testifies about the events that befall him in October of 1938, to which Arendt reacts: “Everyone, everyone should have his day in court” (229). As the witnesses come and go, “Judge Halevi has been asking [them]: ‘Did the Jews get any help?’ with the same regularity as that with which the prosecution had asked: ‘Why did you not rebel?’ The answers had been various and inconclusive...” (230).
Chapter 15 Summary: “Judgment, Appeal, and Execution”
At the end of the war, Eichmann is captured by the Americans and placed in a camp for S.S. men but they cannot force him to reveal his identity. The Nuremberg trials begin in November of 1945 and Eichmann’s name surfaces repeatedly. Eichmann escapes the camp to a town fifty miles south of Hamburg, where he works as a lumberjack for four years. He then contacts a clandestine organization called ODESSA which helps him get to Italy. There, a Franciscan priest gives him a refugee passport and sends him to Buenos Aires as Richard Klement in 1950. By 1952, Eichmann’s wife and children join him in Buenos Aires, where they have a fourth son and Eichmann reveals his true identity to the large Nazi population in Buenos Aires. Israelis capture Eichmann in Buenos Aires on May 11, 1960 and for eight days keep him hostage before flying him to Jerusalem to await trial.
For two reasons, Eichmann cooperates with the Israeli trial: he is tired of living in anonymity, and he has heard of the guilty feelings of the German youth, which disturbs him so greatly, so he feels he must cooperate. Arendt points out that nothing has kept Eichmann from returning to Germany to give himself up, which he could have done at any point prior to his capture. Eichmann’s trial lasts one hundred and fourteen sessions before adjourning for four months for deliberation and review, then reconvenes for five sessions over the course of two days, wherein Eichmann’s judgment is read, all two hundred and forty-four sections of it. The judges drop the charge of conspiracy but convict Eichmann on all fifteen counts of the indictment. Eichmann’s last statement to the court expresses his disappointment that no one believes the truth as he sees it: that the Nazis abused his virtue of obedience. Eichmann’s appeal, which he loses, occurs three months later, and the proceedings take only one week. All of Eichmann’s pleas for mercy are rejected and he is executed on May 31, 1962.
Chapters 13-15 Analysis
Though the most horrific atrocities are committed in the East, the court ultimately defines Eichmann’s involvement in the East as having been very little. And even though at the end of the war, Eichmann’s office burns its files, there is still insurmountable evidence made available to the prosecution and defense. On the defense’s side, however, Servatius cannot afford the appropriate research staff to be able to sift through everything available and pick out what might assist him in the defending of his client. The prosecution can afford such assistance, which is why they submit 1,500 documents to the defense’s 110. The prosecution provides over one hundred witnesses whose testimony about Eichmann is ruled mostly hearsay but whose haunting recounting of their experiences moved Arendt to state that everyone should have their day in court. Listening to the witnesses provides a kind of catharsis for Arendt, and, in her opinion, for the witnesses themselves.
Arendt reminds readers that they are in a Jewish court in Israel judging a German on crimes performed on the Jewish people. Her setting is never lost on her nor the impact of the court’s inevitable verdict. Once the judges convict Eichmann, and his appeal is denied, he is swiftly executed.
Related Titles
By Hannah Arendt
