The Kidnapping of Yossele Schumacher – A Domestic Quarrel that Divided Israel in the 1960's
The Yossele Schumacher affair was basically a domestic quarrel that got out of hand. It took two Supreme Court decisions, a nationwide police search and ultimately a joint Mossad-Shin Bet operation to find the kidnapped boy. The affair exposed a rift between religious and secular Jews. The cry "Where is Yossele?"directed in defiance towards ultra-orthodox (Haredi) Jews became a rallying call, if not a battle cry, for the secular Israeli public of the early 60's. The father of this writer remembers vividly seeing a truck full of soldiers in one of the main streets of Jerusalem singing this chant when they saw a Haredi man walking in the street.
Since the affair was initially an internal Israeli one, the vast majority of documents we are publishing here, including police reports, letters from both sides to the president and to Chief Rabbi Yitzhak Nissim, stenograms of government meetings and more, are in Hebrew. See them on our Hebrew blog.
Yosef (Joseph or 'Yossele', an affectionate Yiddish nickname) Schumacher was born in 1952 in the Soviet Union. In 1957, Yossele and his parents, Ida and Alter, came on aliya. Due to economic hardship the parents left Yossele with Ida's father, Nachman Shtarks, who lived in the Haredi Jerusalem neighborhood of Geula. Shtarks was a former prisoner in the Soviet gulag, where he was tortured for his steadfast religious beliefs. He didn't falter.
After settling down and improving their economic status, the parents asked the grandfather to return their son. The grandfather refused. Shtarks wanted Yossele to learn in a Haredi yeshiva. He believed that his son-in-law (with whom he wasn't on the best of terms) was a communist and wanted to return to the Soviet Union. He claimed that Alter was subjecting his grandson to Shmad –forced conversion to another religion (in this case – to Communist atheism). Shtarks received a Psak Din (a religious verdict) from Jerusalem's chief rabbi, Pesach Zvi Frank, which allowed him to keep his grandson in his custody, in order to prevent him from being forced to leave Judaism. (It later became clear that Rabbi Frank was not in full possession of the facts.)
After filing a complaint with the police, the parents took the case to the Supreme Court of Justice. The Supreme Court issued a Habeas Corpus order on 10/2/1960, ordering the grandfather to return the child to his parents. The grandfather refused. The court issued another order a month later demanding the immediate return of the boy and instructed the police to carry out the order. The grandfather did not comply, basing his objection on Rabbi Frank's Psak Din. In May 1960, the court ordered the arrest and imprisonment of Nachman Shtarks until he complied with the order. The grandfather remained in jail until the end of the affair in autumn 1962.
But what had happened to Yossele? After the complaint to the police and the first verdict, the boy was taken out of his Yeshiva in Rishon leZion and moved to different locations, including the Haredi village of Kommemiut (in the south of Israel, near Ashqelon) and later the city of Bnei Brak.
New faces entered the fray, such as Neturei Karta (Guardians of the Walls in Aramaic), the extreme anti-Zionist Haredi group, which joined the efforts to hide the boy and invited a Frenchwoman--a convert to Judaism named Ruth ben David--to help them in their efforts to smuggle the child abroad. Ben David (whose original name was Madeleine Ferraille) was a successful Maquisresistance courier during World War II and managed to smuggle Yossele out of Israel as her daughter (here is an article from the Jerusalem Post about her). Passport control at Lod airport was looking for a boy – not a girl.
Yossele was moved to several European countries – Switzerland, France and Britain. In July 1960, a police report mentioned the possibility that he was in London, from hints in postcards sent by Shtark's son Ovadiah who lived there. In March 1962, the principal of a boarding school in Gateshead, a major center of the Haredi community in England, complained to the Israeli ambassador in London, Arthur Lourie, about a search of the school. Feldman wrote that the local police and representatives of the Haifa police had descended on the school during morning prayers and held all those present for questioning, although there was no evidence that the boy was there.
Meanwhile Yossele was transferred to New York, under the supervision of theSatmar Hasidim, who (like the Neturi Karta) were virulent anti-Zionists. Meanwhile the parents' lawyer, Shlomo Cohen-Zidon, formed a public committee to return Yossele to his parents, and a wide range of public figures were approached to try to end the dispute.
Due to the Israel Police's failure to find Yossele and rising tensions between religious and secular Israelis, Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion ordered the head of the security services, Isser Harel (the overall director of both the Mossad and Shin Beth) to find the boy. Dozens of Mossad agents and volunteers were sent to Jewish communities in Europe, especially Haredi ones. Ruth Ben David's name came up and Harel believed that she could be the key person in the affair. Ben David was lured to a house in France and was held there for weeks, while Mossad agents tried to convince her to tell where Yossele was being held. Ben David refused to cooperate and only when Harel himself arrived and convinced her that it was for the boy's own good, she agreed to tell them the truth. Harel was so impressed that he offered her a job in the Mossad – but she declined.
Due to the Israel Police's failure to find Yossele and rising tensions between religious and secular Israelis, Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion ordered the head of the security services, Isser Harel (the overall director of both the Mossad and Shin Beth) to find the boy. Dozens of Mossad agents and volunteers were sent to Jewish communities in Europe, especially Haredi ones. Ruth Ben David's name came up and Harel believed that she could be the key person in the affair. Ben David was lured to a house in France and was held there for weeks, while Mossad agents tried to convince her to tell where Yossele was being held. Ben David refused to cooperate and only when Harel himself arrived and convinced her that it was for the boy's own good, she agreed to tell them the truth. Harel was so impressed that he offered her a job in the Mossad – but she declined.
Yossele was found in Brooklyn, New York in the residence of Rabbi Zanvil Gertner, a Satmar Hassid. He was reunited with his mother in the Israeli consulate in New York.
Following the return of Yossele to Israel, the government decided to stop all legal proceedings against the people involved in the kidnapping, except for Shalom Shtarks, Yossele's uncle, who denied involvement and left Israel to live in Britain. After his involvement was revealed, he was extradited to Israel after a long legal battle (here are the minutes in the House of Lords concerning the extradition of Shtarks), in which he claimed that as a resident of Jerusalem, Israel had no jurisdiction over him (which didn't endear him on to many of Israel's citizens). He was sentenced to 3 years in jail, but received a pardon in 1963. These moves were made to reduce tensions among the Israeli public.
Here is a part of a newsreel showing the return of Yossele to Israel
Yossele Schumacher joined the IDF in 1970 and served as an officer in the artillery corps. He worked in IBM Israel and lives today in Sha'arei Tikva (near Rosh Hayin).
Monday, April 8, 2013
"Eichmann?! I met him once!"
As noted in our previous post, today being Yom Hashoah, one should be focusing on Holocaust matters, and for that the most important Israeli archives are at Yad Vashem. Although given the trajectory of Jewish history in the 20th century, there is Holocaust-related documentation in just about every Israeli archive.
The ISA has, among other collections, the entire documentation of the Eichmann trial, much of it German. Yet since the overarching theme of this blog is to tell Israel's documented story, here's a record that tells about Israel in respect to the Eichmann trial: the transcript from the day David Ben Gurion told the members of the cabinet that Eichmann had been captured and brought to be tried in Israel. His announcement in the Knesset later that day (May 23, 1960) is the more famous; but the announcement in the cabinet tells us more about people's immediate response, since the ministers were a small group and they were having a conversation, not listening to a speech.
Ben Gurion's announcement itself was a low-key as you can imagine: one single sentence. "The security services have been looking for Eichmann, they found him, he's here and will be put on trial." He then added that he'd make the announcement in the Knesset, and finished by noting that the Law for Doing Justice to Nazis and their Accomplices allowed capital punishment.
The gasp of astonishment this was greeted with is audible from the immediate response of Yitzchak ben Aharon, who slipped into Yiddish: "How? Where? Wie macht men das?" To which Ben Gurion responded curtly "that's what the security services are for". Levi Eshkol congratulated them (the spooks), but Ben Aharon wasn't finished: "I met him in Vienna in 1936"; Moshe Haim Shapira: "And I met him in 1938".
The discussion that followed was anything but structured. The transcript is linear, but probably the ministers were talking all at once. While Ben Gurion wanted to talk about the legal process, and definitely didn't want to talk about how and where or even by whom the arrest had been made, Shapira was still reminiscing about that meeting. "He asked me if I'd come to remove Herzl's bones. I remember I was there with Dr. Senator, who didn't stand when Eichmann entered the room; Eichmann told him that if he wasn't gone from Austria within the day he'd be sent to a camp".
Dr. Yosef Burg, ever a cautious politician, worried that Eichmann might make a scene in court which would have a negative effect on Israel's image. This led to a discussion of the identity of his lawyers; the general assumption being that not only would no Jewish lawyer be willing to take the case, not even any Israeli Arab lawyer would. (Eichmann was represented at the trial by a German lawyer.) It's pretty clear from this part of the discussion that Pinchas Rosenne, the Minister of Justice, had prior knowledge of the matter.
Shapira, who seems to have been interested in the man, not the legal issues, asked how he was behaving in prison; this occasioned the only comment by Issar Harel, Israel's legendary spymaster who was present in the room: "He doesn't understand our behaviour. He was convinced we'd harm him and be cruel. Instead we're acting according to the law".
Finally, a puzzling recurring theme was the credit to be given to the agents. Eshkol, Pinchas Sapir and others felt they deserved public thanks, and perhaps some sort of award; Ben Gurion would have none of it. Israel didn't hand out medals in those days (and not much now, either), and he saw no reason to make an issue of the agents' actions. Given that at that moment he wasn't divulging even the country of arrest to the cabinet members - a group accustomed to top-secret deliberations - he clearly wanted to stay far away from anything that might reflect on the kidnapping action.
The ISA has, among other collections, the entire documentation of the Eichmann trial, much of it German. Yet since the overarching theme of this blog is to tell Israel's documented story, here's a record that tells about Israel in respect to the Eichmann trial: the transcript from the day David Ben Gurion told the members of the cabinet that Eichmann had been captured and brought to be tried in Israel. His announcement in the Knesset later that day (May 23, 1960) is the more famous; but the announcement in the cabinet tells us more about people's immediate response, since the ministers were a small group and they were having a conversation, not listening to a speech.
Ben Gurion's announcement itself was a low-key as you can imagine: one single sentence. "The security services have been looking for Eichmann, they found him, he's here and will be put on trial." He then added that he'd make the announcement in the Knesset, and finished by noting that the Law for Doing Justice to Nazis and their Accomplices allowed capital punishment.
The gasp of astonishment this was greeted with is audible from the immediate response of Yitzchak ben Aharon, who slipped into Yiddish: "How? Where? Wie macht men das?" To which Ben Gurion responded curtly "that's what the security services are for". Levi Eshkol congratulated them (the spooks), but Ben Aharon wasn't finished: "I met him in Vienna in 1936"; Moshe Haim Shapira: "And I met him in 1938".
The discussion that followed was anything but structured. The transcript is linear, but probably the ministers were talking all at once. While Ben Gurion wanted to talk about the legal process, and definitely didn't want to talk about how and where or even by whom the arrest had been made, Shapira was still reminiscing about that meeting. "He asked me if I'd come to remove Herzl's bones. I remember I was there with Dr. Senator, who didn't stand when Eichmann entered the room; Eichmann told him that if he wasn't gone from Austria within the day he'd be sent to a camp".
Dr. Yosef Burg, ever a cautious politician, worried that Eichmann might make a scene in court which would have a negative effect on Israel's image. This led to a discussion of the identity of his lawyers; the general assumption being that not only would no Jewish lawyer be willing to take the case, not even any Israeli Arab lawyer would. (Eichmann was represented at the trial by a German lawyer.) It's pretty clear from this part of the discussion that Pinchas Rosenne, the Minister of Justice, had prior knowledge of the matter.
Shapira, who seems to have been interested in the man, not the legal issues, asked how he was behaving in prison; this occasioned the only comment by Issar Harel, Israel's legendary spymaster who was present in the room: "He doesn't understand our behaviour. He was convinced we'd harm him and be cruel. Instead we're acting according to the law".
Finally, a puzzling recurring theme was the credit to be given to the agents. Eshkol, Pinchas Sapir and others felt they deserved public thanks, and perhaps some sort of award; Ben Gurion would have none of it. Israel didn't hand out medals in those days (and not much now, either), and he saw no reason to make an issue of the agents' actions. Given that at that moment he wasn't divulging even the country of arrest to the cabinet members - a group accustomed to top-secret deliberations - he clearly wanted to stay far away from anything that might reflect on the kidnapping action.
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