Facing Justice

Fifty years ago, in April 1961, the Jerusalem District Court opened proceedings against Adolf Eichmann, former SS Obersturmbannführer and director of Section IV B 4 for “Jewish affairs” in the Reich Security Main Office. The trial became a major media event. However, it was not only a single perpetrator in the Holocaust who had been brought into the public eye. For the first time, descriptions by victims received attention around the world. In Jerusalem the era of the contemporary witnesses had dawned.