The executioner of notorious Nazi official Adolf Eichmann died on Wednesday.
Shalom Nagar, who said he kept the secret for 30 years and had nightmares after the execution, was 86.
Eichmann was one of the key figures responsible for the Holocaust’s “Final Solution.” He was a principal actor in managing and enabling the logistics and transportation of deporting Jews to death camps.
In 1960, he was captured by the Mossad in Argentina, where he was living under the name Ricardo Clement.
Following his trial, which began in 1961 in Jerusalem, the court sentenced Eichmann to death. Nagar hanged Eichmann in the Ramle prison in 1962, and his ashes were dispersed at sea. His execution was the only time that an Israeli court had given a death sentence.
'Their ashes are piled up on the hills of Auschwitz'
“When I stand before you here, judges of Israel, to lead the prosecution of Adolf Eichmann, I am not standing alone. With me are six million accusers,” attorney-general Gideon Hausner said at the beginning of Eichmann’s trial.
“But they cannot rise to their feet and point an accusing finger toward him who sits in the dock and cry: ‘I accuse,’” Hausner added.
“For their ashes are piled up on the hills of Auschwitz and the fields of Treblinka and are strewn in the forests of Poland. Their graves are scattered throughout the length and breadth of Europe. Their blood cries out, but their voice is not heard,” Hausner said.