wfn.org | [PCUSANEWS] Nazi hunter Simon Wiesenthal dies at 96

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Note #8918 from PCUSA NEWS to PRESBYNEWS:

05499
Sept. 22, 2005

Nazi hunter Simon Wiesenthal dies at 96
	 
by Michele Chabin
Religion News Service

JERUSALEM - Simon Wiesenthal, the Jewish concentration-camp survivor who
dedicated his life to combating anti-Semitism and bringing Nazi war criminals
to justice, died in Vienna on Sept. 20. He was 96.

	Abraham Foxman, director of the Anti-Defamation League and a
Holocaust survivor, said: "No Nazi war criminal, big or small, was able to
rest peacefully, because he never knew when Wiesenthal's voice of moral
outrage would find him. His determined leadership in the fight against
anti-Semitism and all forms of prejudice will be sorely missed."
	 
	A spokesman for Yad Vashem, Israel's Holocaust center, called
Wiesenthal "the world's conscience, determined to document the full extent of
Nazi war crimes and hold those responsible accountable."
	 
	Wiesenthal, a native of what is now the Lvov Oblast section of
Ukraine, is best known for hunting down Adolf Eichmann, who along with Adolf
Hitler spearheaded the genocide of 6 million Jews and many others during the
Holocaust.
	 
	With Wiesenthal's assistance, Israel's Secret Service captured
Eichmann and brought him to Israel, where he was tried and convicted of
crimes against humanity, and was hanged in 1961.
	 
	Wiesenthal, an architectural engineer by training, weighed barely 100
pounds when American troops liberated the Mauthausen death camp. After
regaining his strength, he gathered documents and testimony about the
thousands of Nazis and sympathizers who had committed atrocities. His work
led to the convictions of many war criminals in addition to that of Eichmann.
	 
	Wiesenthal's memoir, The Murderers Among Us, was published in 1967.
      
	He also served as a consultant on the film "The Odessa File." And his
hunt for Eichmann inspired the book The Boys of Brazil, by Ira Levin, which
was turned into a 1978 film starring Laurence Olivier.
	 
	Wiesenthal continued his work until the final days of his life,
despite receiving almost constant death threats. He received decorations from
the Austrian and French resistance movements, the Dutch Freedom Medal, the
Luxembourg Freedom Medal, the United Nations League for the Help of Refugees
Award, the French Legion of Honor and the U.S. Congressional Gold Medal.
	 
	The Web site of the Simon Wiesenthal Center in Los Angeles contains a
story explaining Wiesenthal's motivations for hunting down Nazis. It quotes a
1964 article in The New York Times Magazine describing a visit Wiesenthal
made to the home of another concentration-camp survivor, who had become a
successful jewelry manufacturer.
	 
	After dinner, the man asked: "Simon, if you had gone back to building
houses, you'd be a millionaire. Why didn't you?"
	 
	"You're a religious man," Wiesenthal replied. "You believe in God and
life after death. I also believe. When we come to the other world and meet
the millions of Jews who died in the camps, and they ask us, 'What have you
done?' there will be many answers. You will say, 'I became a jeweler.'
Another will say, 'I have smuggled coffee and American cigarettes.' Another
will say, 'I built houses.' But I will say, 'I didn't forget you.'"

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