"The Grey Zone"
I was surfing the TV channels late one night when I came across a riveting movie entitled "The Grey Zone." This tells the story of the 12th Sonderkommando (special commando), the group of Jews that were forced by the Nazis to dispose of the bodies in the crematoria in Auschwitz, and under unimaginable circumstances revolted and blew up one of the crematoria.
First it should be noted that even though the movie made in 2001 is almost incredible to believe and hard to watch, this was based on the book of Dr. Miklos Nyiszli, a Hungarian Jewish doctor who worked for Dr. Mengele in the Camp and who was allowed to live in comparative luxury while helping Mengele to carry out his experiments. Nyiszli was a skilled surgeon and Mengele valued his assistance, and his job was to carry out pathological studies on the tissues of Jews subjected to Mengele's experiments and of bodies from the crematoria. He was in constant contact with the Sonderkommando and so knew of their activities, and was probably the only survivor able to describe what happened.
Each Sonderkommando consisted of ca. 500 able-bodied Jewish men, whose job it was to process the Jews who arrived on train transports, usually after days without food and water. When they were told to undress in the underground dressing room, they were told to remember the number of the hook where their clothes were hung, and then they were ushered naked into the gas chamber, and the door was sealed. Then after the gassing the Sonderkommando had to process the bodies, remove any hidden jewelery, gold teeth, etc. and then transfer the bodies to the crematorium where they were placed on pallets and then burned. All the time there were German soldiers surrounding the Sonderkommando and if they failed to follow instructions or hesitated they were shot immediately. Since this was a death factory, their bodies were then added to the hundreds being processed. It was quite a complex multi-stage process and consequently the Sonderkommando were considered to be skilled prisoners and were allowed more food and even alcohol. They found food and drink in the suitcases and packages left in the dressing room, and generally were allowed by the Germans to retain some of this. But, the Germans were careful, every two months they executed all the Sonderfommando and trained another group.
The title "Grey Zone" comes from a book describing Auschwitz by the Italian Jewish survivor Primo Levi. It was used to describe the area around the crematoria where the bodies were burned and everything was covered with a layer of grey ash. The title also refers to the incredibly difficult moral choices faced by the Sonderkommando. To not obey the order to send the Jews into the gas chamber would result in instant death. Also, any one suspected of being involved in anything suspicious was immediately shot. The 12th Sonderkommando decided that since they were all going to die in 2 months anyway they would try to organize an uprising and blow up the crematorium. They were able to obtain guns smuggled in from the nearby Polish village and gun powder smuggled in inside bodies from the nearby women's camp. But, this was detected and four women, Polish and Jewish, were tortured, but did not reveal the plot.
The sergeant in charge of the 12th Sonderkommando SS-Oberscharfuhrer Muhsfeldt, played by Harvey Keitel, bribes Dr. Nyiszli to tell him about the plot in exchange for saving the lives of his wife and daughter who were in one of the camps. Nyiszli was kept in the dark by the Sonderkommando, but he manages to save his family by telling Muhsfeldt that there will be an attempt at an uprising, something he already suspected. When one of the Jewish couriers is found my Muhsfeldt in the wrong place he shoots him without compunction. Also, a young Hungarian Jewish girl somehow survives the gassing, under a pile of bodies, and although unconscious, Dr, Nyiszli revives her. The Sonderkommando although engaged in the process of killing Jews, claim that they never "pulled the trigger" and that they only did what they did in order to survive. So they are faced with trying to save this girl under impossible circumstances, and when Muhsfeldt finds her he eventually shoots her too.
When the 12th Sonderkommando were warned that they were to be murdered on October 12, 1944, they initiated their uprising, first killing several SS men and kapos with knives and axes, then they fired on the SS troops sent to attack them, and then they started a fire and blew up crematoria 1 and 3 at the Auschwitz complex. About 350 of the Sonderkommando were killed in the uprising and another 200 were executed by being shot in the back of the head. As a warning to others, every third man in another Sonderkommando at another crematorium was shot. Fortunately the 13th Sonderkommando was the last, and the destroyed crematorium was never rebuilt, thus possibly saving unknown numbers of lives, although subsequently bodies were burnt in pits. Of the thousands of Jewish men who were in the Sondercommandos at Auschwitz only 27 survived and 20 have written descriptions of their experiences. After the war, Sergeant Muhsfeldt was executed by hanging.
When I see terrible events like this reenacted it reminds me why I am here in Israel, and why we need Israel despite any minor glitches, such as the relatively trivial action on the Mavi Marmara in which 9 Islamic extremists were killed.
First it should be noted that even though the movie made in 2001 is almost incredible to believe and hard to watch, this was based on the book of Dr. Miklos Nyiszli, a Hungarian Jewish doctor who worked for Dr. Mengele in the Camp and who was allowed to live in comparative luxury while helping Mengele to carry out his experiments. Nyiszli was a skilled surgeon and Mengele valued his assistance, and his job was to carry out pathological studies on the tissues of Jews subjected to Mengele's experiments and of bodies from the crematoria. He was in constant contact with the Sonderkommando and so knew of their activities, and was probably the only survivor able to describe what happened.
Each Sonderkommando consisted of ca. 500 able-bodied Jewish men, whose job it was to process the Jews who arrived on train transports, usually after days without food and water. When they were told to undress in the underground dressing room, they were told to remember the number of the hook where their clothes were hung, and then they were ushered naked into the gas chamber, and the door was sealed. Then after the gassing the Sonderkommando had to process the bodies, remove any hidden jewelery, gold teeth, etc. and then transfer the bodies to the crematorium where they were placed on pallets and then burned. All the time there were German soldiers surrounding the Sonderkommando and if they failed to follow instructions or hesitated they were shot immediately. Since this was a death factory, their bodies were then added to the hundreds being processed. It was quite a complex multi-stage process and consequently the Sonderkommando were considered to be skilled prisoners and were allowed more food and even alcohol. They found food and drink in the suitcases and packages left in the dressing room, and generally were allowed by the Germans to retain some of this. But, the Germans were careful, every two months they executed all the Sonderfommando and trained another group.
The title "Grey Zone" comes from a book describing Auschwitz by the Italian Jewish survivor Primo Levi. It was used to describe the area around the crematoria where the bodies were burned and everything was covered with a layer of grey ash. The title also refers to the incredibly difficult moral choices faced by the Sonderkommando. To not obey the order to send the Jews into the gas chamber would result in instant death. Also, any one suspected of being involved in anything suspicious was immediately shot. The 12th Sonderkommando decided that since they were all going to die in 2 months anyway they would try to organize an uprising and blow up the crematorium. They were able to obtain guns smuggled in from the nearby Polish village and gun powder smuggled in inside bodies from the nearby women's camp. But, this was detected and four women, Polish and Jewish, were tortured, but did not reveal the plot.
The sergeant in charge of the 12th Sonderkommando SS-Oberscharfuhrer Muhsfeldt, played by Harvey Keitel, bribes Dr. Nyiszli to tell him about the plot in exchange for saving the lives of his wife and daughter who were in one of the camps. Nyiszli was kept in the dark by the Sonderkommando, but he manages to save his family by telling Muhsfeldt that there will be an attempt at an uprising, something he already suspected. When one of the Jewish couriers is found my Muhsfeldt in the wrong place he shoots him without compunction. Also, a young Hungarian Jewish girl somehow survives the gassing, under a pile of bodies, and although unconscious, Dr, Nyiszli revives her. The Sonderkommando although engaged in the process of killing Jews, claim that they never "pulled the trigger" and that they only did what they did in order to survive. So they are faced with trying to save this girl under impossible circumstances, and when Muhsfeldt finds her he eventually shoots her too.
When the 12th Sonderkommando were warned that they were to be murdered on October 12, 1944, they initiated their uprising, first killing several SS men and kapos with knives and axes, then they fired on the SS troops sent to attack them, and then they started a fire and blew up crematoria 1 and 3 at the Auschwitz complex. About 350 of the Sonderkommando were killed in the uprising and another 200 were executed by being shot in the back of the head. As a warning to others, every third man in another Sonderkommando at another crematorium was shot. Fortunately the 13th Sonderkommando was the last, and the destroyed crematorium was never rebuilt, thus possibly saving unknown numbers of lives, although subsequently bodies were burnt in pits. Of the thousands of Jewish men who were in the Sondercommandos at Auschwitz only 27 survived and 20 have written descriptions of their experiences. After the war, Sergeant Muhsfeldt was executed by hanging.
When I see terrible events like this reenacted it reminds me why I am here in Israel, and why we need Israel despite any minor glitches, such as the relatively trivial action on the Mavi Marmara in which 9 Islamic extremists were killed.
posted by Jack Cohen at 9:30 AM
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