MOSSAD Killed an Innocent Man

Rather than ask “how many Jews did Cukurs kill?”,
ask “did he even kill one Jew?”

1Even as I was writing my book The Holocaust in Latvia, I noticed that there were many exaggerations regarding the question of the Holocaust itself—the matter of Cukurs did not seem like an important question at the time. I could have looked at it as a microcosm to the wider problem of exaggerations and untruths in literature about the Holocaust in Latvia, if I had known ten years ago that Mossad”s version about Cukurs being the biggest mass killer of Hebrews in Latvia, to whom would be assigned the destruction of 30,000 people, contains a deep lack of knowledge, if not lies. The Mossad version not only contains simple falsehoods, but also shows a lack of knowledge about the Nazi's system of destruction as such. That system of destruction was brought to Latvia by and operated under Einsatzgrupe leadership. Not one individual was given the opportunity to set killing “records.”

Ten years ago I did not have the opportunity to access materials which these days the filmmakers1 were able to gather. A very important document which has come to light is that which Cukurs provided as testimony to the police in Brazil. To the filmmakers’ credit, they changed the question, from how many Hebrews Cukurs killed to did he kill any. What happened to the democratic system’s presumption of innocence? If someone would ask me if there was the possibility while serving under Arajs command to kill a Hebrew in his home, I would say yes. In 1941, 300 men served under Arajs and his unit needed administrative people, who were responsible for maintaining modern inventory. Lieutenant Leimanis served as an officer for arms. He was still alive in the 1970’s/80’s and Eriks Parups testified on his behalf. He said that the Latvi4an officers’ resistance movement infiltrated Arajs commando to spy on their activities. He cooperated with American judiciary instances, thus no accusations were raised against him. Among the many hundreds of Arajs’ former soldiers' depositions, nowhere are Leimanis or Cukurs mentioned. When Arajs was tried in Hamburg, Germany, Cukurs was not mentioned among his documents.

2The only accusations about Cukurs as the “butcher of Riga" come from surviving Hebrews, who wanted to find explanation for the tragedy of their people, but there are multiple problems with their testimony. In first place they lack information about Holocaust internal organization, and methods of destruction. They had no knowledge about the Latvians who did the shooting. Many of them believe that the killing of Hebrews in Latvia was improvised on the spot and did not follow an organized plan. The majority of those who survived could not name one shooter except Cukurs. We arrive at crass conflict of testimony: none of those who testified are able to place Cukurs at the edge of shooting pit, but the only Latvian whom Hebrews were able to name was Cukurs. If I were given a choice of whom I would believe, I would lean towards the Latvian testifier who was with Cukurs. At least those testimonies were given under oath. If Cukurs had participated, as an officer he would have given orders and would not have participated as a shooter. The Latvian shooters would not have forgotten his name. Yet none has ever mentioned or testified to Cukurs's involvement in the Holocaust.

3As far as testifiers' testimony has been examined and analyzed, the coefficient of truth has been low and full of contradictions. As examples we could mention SD officer Elke Scherwitz’s—of Hebrew ancestry—trial, who was accused by survivors, Max Kaufmann in particular. In his 1948 trial in Munich, Scherwitz was found guilty of killing 30,000 Hebrews in Latvia. German historian Anita Kugler studied Scherwitz and views these accusations as exaggerated and false. Then follows the trial of Captain Vilis Hazners, who was tried in the United States. He was (also) accused of killing 30,000 Hebrews in Latvia. Again, accusations were based on survivors' testimony. These were full of contradictions and exaggerations. The accusations against Hazers evaporated during cross examinations by lawyers.2 Hazners was exonerated. More than 70,000 Hebrews were exterminated in Latvia, but that did not happen in the manner testified to in survivor depositions. The same 30,000 exterminated Hebrews in Latvia were assigned to Cukurs, and based on these same survivors' depositions, Mossad overhastily assassinated Cukurs. This is not the time to analyze all of Cukurs’ alleged cruelty, yet we can without doubt affirm that during the first weeks of German occupation he was on his farm in Bukaiši village (and might even have come under German arrest as a suspected Soviet sympathizer3), and only arrived in Riga on July 14, 1941. Thus all the testimony—some three quarters—about his cruelty before July 14th are nullifed. That also means that all other testimony should be looked at through a skeptical lens.

That Cukurs was part of Arajs’ unit as supervisor of a garage is not deniable. In Cukurs’ book of life one should also note that he helped at least three Latvian Hebrews to escape the Holocaust. The Mossad omits this fact in their book about Cukurs. The Cukurs family hid a girl named Miriam Kaizner on their farmstead in Bukaiši and later took her with them to Brazil; a youth named Abram Shapiro was given working papers in the summer of 1941; and Lutrins, whom Cukurs’ garage workers saved from shooting in Rumbula, was hidden and brought back to the garage on Valdemar street where he was working as a garage mechanic.

*

To affirm that Herberts Cukurs is responsible for the deaths of 30,000 Jews is, in the least, frivolous and irresponsible. Sufficient verified documentation now exists to show that in the vast majority of accusations, Cukurs could not have even been present, let alone responsible. Documentary evidence all points to Herberts Cukurs's innocence. Military archives, the archives of international, responsible courts adjudicating war crimes, all confirm this truth. Historians who have had access to these materials are unanimous in affirming this. In the case of Herberts Cukurs, it was a mistake not to investigate sooner, and by that inaction Mossad killed an innocent man. The media must rethink the information that it gives its readers, as if it were under risk to have that to prove the truth of its information in court. The presumption of innocence is clear. Cukurs never was accused, judged or condemned. It is irresponsible to publish affirmations of his guilt.

Edited from correspondence, April, 2011. Andrievs Ezergailis, Professor Emeritus of History at Ithaca College, foreign member of the Latvian Academy of Sciences, is the most recognized authority on the Holocaust and related issues in Nazi-occupied Latvia.


1In 2005, forty years after Cukurs's assassination, journalist and documentary filmmaker Roberts Klimovičs undertook a project to investigate the circumstances of Cukurs's death, traveling to and filming in Latin America and the United States.
2Furthermore, in the government's trial brief against Hazners, Department of Justice attorneys stonewalled the defense's requests for records, lied about the availability and contents of records, and ignored German military records which confirmed Hazners had no involvement in the Holocaust.—Ed.
3Cukurs had been invited to Moscow during the Soviet occupation and was offered the command of a Soviet Latvian air wing, a command he declined. That Cukurs had refused a Soviet request and survived placed him under Nazi suspicion.—Ed.
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