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Nakam (, 'revenge') was a
paramilitary A paramilitary is a military that is not a part of a country's official or legitimate armed forces. The Oxford English Dictionary traces the use of the term "paramilitary" as far back as 1934. Overview Though a paramilitary is, by definiti ...
organisation of about fifty
Holocaust survivors Holocaust survivors are people who survived the Holocaust, defined as the persecution and attempted annihilation of the Jews by Nazi Germany and its collaborators before and during World War II in Europe and North Africa. There is no universall ...
who, after 1945, sought revenge for the murder of six million Jews during the
Holocaust The Holocaust (), known in Hebrew language, Hebrew as the (), was the genocide of History of the Jews in Europe, European Jews during World War II. From 1941 to 1945, Nazi Germany and Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy ...
. Led by
Abba Kovner Abba Kovner (; 14 March 1918 – 25 September 1987) was a Jewish partisan leader, and later Israeli poet and writer. In the Vilna Ghetto, his 1942 manifesto was the first time that a target of the Holocaust identified the German plan to murde ...
, the group sought to kill six million
Germans Germans (, ) are the natives or inhabitants of Germany, or sometimes more broadly any people who are of German descent or native speakers of the German language. The Basic Law for the Federal Republic of Germany, constitution of Germany, imple ...
in a form of indiscriminate revenge, " a nation for a nation". Kovner went to
Mandatory Palestine Mandatory Palestine was a British Empire, British geopolitical entity that existed between 1920 and 1948 in the Palestine (region), region of Palestine, and after 1922, under the terms of the League of Nations's Mandate for Palestine. After ...
in order to secure large quantities of poison for poisoning water mains to kill large numbers of Germans. His followers infiltrated the water system of
Nuremberg Nuremberg (, ; ; in the local East Franconian dialect: ''Nämberch'' ) is the Franconia#Towns and cities, largest city in Franconia, the List of cities in Bavaria by population, second-largest city in the States of Germany, German state of Bav ...
. However, Kovner was arrested upon arrival in the British zone of occupied Germany and had to throw the poison overboard. After this failure, Nakam turned their attention to "Plan B", targeting German
prisoners of war A prisoner of war (POW) is a person held captive by a belligerent power during or immediately after an armed conflict. The earliest recorded usage of the phrase "prisoner of war" dates back to 1610. Belligerents hold prisoners of war for a ...
held by the
United States military The United States Armed Forces are the Military, military forces of the United States. U.S. United States Code, federal law names six armed forces: the United States Army, Army, United States Marine Corps, Marine Corps, United States Navy, Na ...
in the
American zone The American occupation zone in Germany (German language, German: ), also known as the US-Zone, and the Southwest zone, was one of the four Allied-occupied Germany, occupation zones established by the Allies of World War II in Germany west of t ...
. They obtained
arsenic Arsenic is a chemical element; it has Symbol (chemistry), symbol As and atomic number 33. It is a metalloid and one of the pnictogens, and therefore shares many properties with its group 15 neighbors phosphorus and antimony. Arsenic is not ...
locally and infiltrated the bakeries that supplied these prison camps. The conspirators poisoned 3,000 loaves of bread at (Consumer Cooperative Bakery) in Nuremberg, which sickened more than 2,000 German prisoners of war at Langwasser internment camp. However, no known deaths can be attributed to the group. Although Nakam is considered by some to have been a terrorist organisation, German public prosecutors dismissed a case against two of its members in 2000 due to the "unusual circumstances".


Background

During the Holocaust,
Nazi Germany Nazi Germany, officially known as the German Reich and later the Greater German Reich, was the German Reich, German state between 1933 and 1945, when Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party controlled the country, transforming it into a Totalit ...
, its allies and collaborators murdered about six million Jews, by a variety of methods, including
mass shootings A mass shooting is a violent crime in which one or more attackers use a firearm to Gun violence, kill or injure multiple individuals in rapid succession. There is no widely accepted specific definition, and different organizations tracking su ...
and gassing. Many survivors, having lost their entire families and communities, had difficulty imagining a return to a normal life. The desire for revenge, either against
Nazi war criminals The following is a list of people who were formally indicted for committing war crimes or crimes against humanity on behalf of the Axis powers during World War II, including those who were acquitted or never received judgement. It does not inc ...
or the entire German people, was widespread. From late 1942, as news of the Holocaust arrived in Mandatory Palestine, Jewish newspapers were full of calls for retribution. One of the leaders of the
Warsaw Ghetto uprising The Warsaw Ghetto Uprising was the 1943 act of Jewish resistance in the Warsaw Ghetto in German-occupied Poland during World War II to oppose Nazi Germany's final effort to transport the remaining ghetto population to the gas chambers of the ...
,
Yitzhak Zuckerman Yitzhak Zuckerman (; ; 13 December 1915 – 17 June 1981), also known by his nom de guerre "Antek", was one of the leaders of the Warsaw Ghetto Uprising in 1943 against Nazi Germany during World War II. Biography Zuckerman was born on December ...
, later said he "didn't know a Jew who wasn't obsessed with revenge". However, very few survivors acted on these fantasies, instead focusing on rebuilding their lives and communities and commemorating those who had perished. In all, Israeli historian
Dina Porat Dina Porat (Hebrew: דינה פורת; born 24 September 1943 in Buenos Aires) is an Israeli historian. She is professor emeritus of modern Jewish history at the Department of Jewish History at Tel Aviv University and the chief historian of Yad V ...
estimates that about 200 or 250 Holocaust survivors attempted to exact violent revenge, of which Nakam was a significant portion. Including assassinations carried out by
Mossad The Institute for Intelligence and Special Operations (), popularly known as Mossad ( , ), is the national intelligence agency of the Israel, State of Israel. It is one of the main entities in the Israeli Intelligence Community, along with M ...
, these operations claimed the lives of as many as 1,000 to 1,500 people.


Formation

In 1945,
Abba Kovner Abba Kovner (; 14 March 1918 – 25 September 1987) was a Jewish partisan leader, and later Israeli poet and writer. In the Vilna Ghetto, his 1942 manifesto was the first time that a target of the Holocaust identified the German plan to murde ...
, after visiting the site of the
Ponary massacre The Ponary massacre (), or the Paneriai massacre (), was the mass murder of up to 100,000 people, mostly Jews, Poles, and Russians, by German '' SD'' and '' SS'' and the Lithuanian '' Ypatingasis būrys'' killing squads, during World War II a ...
and the
extermination camp Nazi Germany used six extermination camps (), also called death camps (), or killing centers (), in Central Europe, primarily in occupied Poland, during World War II to systematically murder over 2.7 million peoplemostly Jewsin the Holocau ...
at
Majdanek Majdanek (or Lublin) was a Nazi concentration and extermination camp built and operated by the SS on the outskirts of the city of Lublin during the German occupation of Poland in World War II. It had three gas chambers, two wooden gallows, ...
, and meeting survivors of
Auschwitz Auschwitz, or Oświęcim, was a complex of over 40 concentration and extermination camps operated by Nazi Germany in occupied Poland (in a portion annexed into Germany in 1939) during World War II and the Holocaust. It consisted of Auschw ...
in
Romania Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern Europe, Eastern and Southeast Europe. It borders Ukraine to the north and east, Hungary to the west, Serbia to the southwest, Bulgaria to the south, Moldova to ...
, decided to take revenge. He recruited about 50 Holocaust survivors, mostly former
Jewish partisans Jewish partisans were fighters in irregular military groups participating in the Jewish resistance under Nazi rule, Jewish resistance movement against Nazi Germany and Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy, its collaborators during W ...
, but including a few who had escaped to the
Soviet Union The Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union, was a List of former transcontinental countries#Since 1700, transcontinental country that spanned much of Eurasia from 1922 until Dissolution of the Soviet ...
. Recruited for their ability to live undercover and not break down, most were in their early twenties and hailed from
Vilnius Vilnius ( , ) is the capital of and List of cities in Lithuania#Cities, largest city in Lithuania and the List of cities in the Baltic states by population, most-populous city in the Baltic states. The city's estimated January 2025 population w ...
,
Rovno Rivne ( ; , ) is a city in western Ukraine. The city is the administrative center of Rivne Oblast (province), as well as the Rivne Raion (district) within the oblast.
,
Częstochowa Częstochowa ( , ) is a city in southern Poland on the Warta with 214,342 inhabitants, making it the thirteenth-largest city in Poland. It is situated in the Silesian Voivodeship. However, Częstochowa is historically part of Lesser Poland, not Si ...
, or
Kraków , officially the Royal Capital City of Kraków, is the List of cities and towns in Poland, second-largest and one of the oldest cities in Poland. Situated on the Vistula River in Lesser Poland Voivodeship, the city has a population of 804,237 ...
. Generally known as ("revenge"), the organisation used the Hebrew name (, "judgement"), also an acronym of (, "the blood of Israel avenges"). The group's members believed that the defeat of Nazi Germany did not mean that Jews were safe from another Holocaust-level genocide. Kovner believed that a proportional revenge, killing six million Germans, was the only way to teach enemies of the Jews that they could not act with impunity: "The act should be shocking. The Germans should know that after Auschwitz there can be no return to normality." According to survivors, Kovner's "hypnotic" eloquence put words to the emotions that they were feeling. Members of the group believed that the laws of the time were unable to adequately punish such an extreme event as the Holocaust and that the complete moral bankruptcy of the world could be cured only by catastrophic retributive violence. Porat hypothesises that Nakam was "a necessary stage" before the embittered survivors would be prepared "to return to a life of society and laws". The group's leaders formed two plans: Plan A, to kill a large number of Germans, and Plan B, to poison several thousand SS prisoners held in US prisoner of war camps. From Romania Kovner's group traveled to Italy, where Kovner received a warm reception from
Jewish Brigade The Jewish Infantry Brigade Group, more commonly known as the Jewish Brigade Group or Jewish Brigade, was a military formation of the British Army in the World War II, Second World War. It was formed in late 1944 and was recruited among Yishuv, Y ...
soldiers who wanted him to help organise
Aliyah Bet ''Aliyah Bet'' (, "Aliyah 'B'" – bet being the second letter of the Hebrew alphabet) was the code name given to illegal immigration by Jews, many of whom were refugees escaping from Nazi Germany or other Nazi-controlled countries, and la ...
(illegal immigration to Mandate Palestine). Kovner refused because he was already set on revenge. Nakam developed a network of underground cells and immediately set out raising money, infiltrating German infrastructure, and securing poison. The group received a large supply of German-forged British currency from a
Hashomer Hatzair Hashomer Hatzair (, , 'The Young Guard') is a Labor Zionism, Labor Zionist, secular Jewish youth movement founded in 1913 in the Kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria, Austria-Hungary. It was also the name of the Hashomer Hatzair Workers Party, the ...
emissary, forced speculators to contribute, and also obtained some money from sympathisers in the Jewish Brigade.


Plan A (planned mass poisoning in Nuremberg)

Joseph Harmatz, posing as a Polish
displaced person Forced displacement (also forced migration or forced relocation) is an involuntary or coerced movement of a person or people away from their home or home region. The UNHCR defines 'forced displacement' as follows: displaced "as a result of perse ...
(DP) named "Maim Mendele", attempted to infiltrate the municipal water supply in
Nuremberg Nuremberg (, ; ; in the local East Franconian dialect: ''Nämberch'' ) is the Franconia#Towns and cities, largest city in Franconia, the List of cities in Bavaria by population, second-largest city in the States of Germany, German state of Bav ...
; Nakam targeted the city because it had been the stronghold of the
Nazi Party The Nazi Party, officially the National Socialist German Workers' Party ( or NSDAP), was a far-right politics, far-right political party in Germany active between 1920 and 1945 that created and supported the ideology of Nazism. Its precursor ...
. Harmatz had difficulty finding rooms for the conspirators to rent due to the housing shortage caused by the destruction of most of the city by Allied bombing. Through the use of bribes, he managed to place Willek Schwerzreich (Wilek Shinar), an engineer from Kraków who spoke fluent
German German(s) may refer to: * Germany, the country of the Germans and German things **Germania (Roman era) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizenship in Germany, see also Ge ...
, in a position with the municipal water company. Schwarzreich obtained the plan of the water system and control of the main water valve, and plotted where the poison should be introduced so as to kill the largest possible number of Germans. In Paris, was in charge of a Nakam cell including Vitka Kempner, Kovner's future wife and former comrade in the
Vilna Ghetto The Vilna Ghetto was a World War II Jewish ghetto established and operated by Nazi Germany in the city of Vilnius in the modern country of Lithuania, at the time part of the Nazi-administered . During the approximately two years of its existen ...
underground. Reichman reportedly spoke to
David Ben-Gurion David Ben-Gurion ( ; ; born David Grün; 16 October 1886 – 1 December 1973) was the primary List of national founders, national founder and first Prime Minister of Israel, prime minister of the State of Israel. As head of the Jewish Agency ...
during the latter's trip to a DP camp in Germany, but the latter preferred to work towards Israeli independence than seek revenge for the Holocaust. It fell to Kovner to obtain the poison from leaders in the
Yishuv The Yishuv (), HaYishuv Ha'ivri (), or HaYishuv HaYehudi Be'Eretz Yisra'el () was the community of Jews residing in Palestine prior to the establishment of the State of Israel in 1948. The term came into use in the 1880s, when there were about 2 ...
, the Jewish leadership in Mandatory Palestine. In July 1945, Kovner left the Jewish Brigade for
Milan Milan ( , , ; ) is a city in northern Italy, regional capital of Lombardy, the largest city in Italy by urban area and the List of cities in Italy, second-most-populous city proper in Italy after Rome. The city proper has a population of nea ...
, disguising himself as a Jewish Brigade soldier on leave, and boarded a ship for Palestine the following month. Reichman became leader in Europe in his absence. Upon reaching Palestine, Kovner was held for three days in an apartment by the
Mossad LeAliyah Bet The Mossad LeAliyah Bet (, ) was a branch of the paramilitary organization Haganah in British Mandatory Palestine, and later the State of Israel, that operated to facilitate Jewish immigration to British Palestine. During the Mandate period, it ...
and was personally interrogated by Mossad chief Shaul Meirov. Kovner negotiated with
Haganah Haganah ( , ) was the main Zionist political violence, Zionist paramilitary organization that operated for the Yishuv in the Mandatory Palestine, British Mandate for Palestine. It was founded in 1920 to defend the Yishuv's presence in the reg ...
chiefs
Moshe Sneh Moshe Sneh (; 6 January 1909 – 1 March 1972) was a Haganah commander and an Israeli politician. One of the founders of Mapam, he later joined the Israeli Communist Party (Maki). Biography Mosze Klaynboym (later Sneh) attended high scho ...
and Israel Galilee in hopes of convincing them to give him poison for a smaller revenge operation in return for not linking the murder to the Yishuv. In September, Kovner informed Nakam in Europe that he had not had any success in locating poison, and therefore they should recruit Yitzhak Ratner, a chemist and former Vilna Ghetto insurgent, and focus on Plan B. Kovner was eventually introduced to
Ephraim Ephraim (; , in pausa: ''ʾEp̄rāyīm'') was, according to the Book of Genesis, the second son of Joseph ben Jacob and Asenath, as well as the adopted son of his biological grandfather Jacob, making him the progenitor of the Tribe of Ephrai ...
and
Aharon Katzir Aharon Katzir (; born Aharon Katchalsky; September 15, 1914 – May 30, 1972) was an Israeli scientist who was known as a pioneer in the study of the electrochemistry of biopolymers. Biography Born 1914 in Łódź, Poland, he moved to Mandatory P ...
, chemists at the
Hebrew University of Jerusalem The Hebrew University of Jerusalem (HUJI; ) is an Israeli public university, public research university based in Jerusalem. Co-founded by Albert Einstein and Chaim Weizmann in July 1918, the public university officially opened on 1 April 1925. ...
, via one of their students who was a member of the Haganah. The Katzir brothers were sympathetic to Kovner's revenge plot and convinced the head of chemical storage at the Hebrew University to give him poison. Decades after the fact, Kovner claimed that he had pitched Plan B to
Chaim Weizmann Chaim Azriel Weizmann ( ; 27 November 1874 – 9 November 1952) was a Russian-born Israeli statesman, biochemist, and Zionist leader who served as president of the World Zionist Organization, Zionist Organization and later as the first pre ...
, then president of the World Zionist Organisation, who had directed him to the Katzir brothers. However, according to his biographer, if Kovner met Weizmann at all it was in February or March 1946, as Weizmann was out of the country before that. After several delays, Kovner travelled to
Alexandria Alexandria ( ; ) is the List of cities and towns in Egypt#Largest cities, second largest city in Egypt and the List of coastal settlements of the Mediterranean Sea, largest city on the Mediterranean coast. It lies at the western edge of the Nile ...
,
Egypt Egypt ( , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a country spanning the Northeast Africa, northeast corner of Africa and Western Asia, southwest corner of Asia via the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Mediterranean Sea to northe ...
, in December 1945 carrying false papers that identified him as a Jewish Brigade soldier returning from leave, and a duffel bag with gold hidden in toothpaste tubes and cans full of poison. Shortly after boarding a ship headed to
Toulon Toulon (, , ; , , ) is a city in the Provence-Alpes-Côte d'Azur region of southeastern France. Located on the French Riviera and the historical Provence, it is the prefecture of the Var (department), Var department. The Commune of Toulon h ...
, France, Kovner's name along with three others was called over the public address system. Kovner told a friend, Yitzik Rosenkranz, to convey the duffel bag to Kempner in Paris, and then threw half the poison overboard. After this, he turned himself in and was arrested by
Egyptian police Egyptian National Police or ENP is the national police force of Egypt responsible for law enforcement. It is a department in the Ministry of Interior. National organization The Ministry of Interior divides the functions of the police and public ...
. Nakam members later claimed that Kovner had been betrayed by the Haganah, but Porat writes that it is more likely that he was arrested as a suspected organiser of Aliyah Bet. Kovner, who spoke no English and had not attended the Jewish Brigade training, was not questioned about Nakam; after two months in jails in Egypt and Palestine, he was released. His involvement in Nakam ended at that time.


Plan B (mass poisoning of SS prisoners)

Because Kovner had not managed to secure the quantity of poison required, the Nuremberg cell decided to switch to poisoning SS prisoners definitively during the first months of 1946. Most of the Nakam action groups disbanded as ordered and their members dispersed into
displaced person Forced displacement (also forced migration or forced relocation) is an involuntary or coerced movement of a person or people away from their home or home region. The UNHCR defines 'forced displacement' as follows: displaced "as a result of perse ...
s camps, promised by the leaders that in future they would be reactivated to implement Plan A. The cells in Nuremberg and Dachau remained active because of the large US prisoner of war camps nearby. Yitzhak Ratner was recruited into the group to obtain poison locally. In October 1945, he set up a laboratory in the Nakam headquarters in Paris, where he tested various formulations in order to find a tasteless, odorless poison that would have delayed effects. Ratner eventually formulated a mixture of arsenic, glue, and other additives which could be painted onto loaves of bread; tests on cats proved the lethality of the mixture. He obtained more than of arsenic from friends who worked in the tanning industry, which was smuggled into Germany. Nakam focused on Langwasser internment camp near Nuremberg (formerly Stalag XIII-D), where 12,000 to 15,000 prisoners, mainly former SS officers or prominent Nazis, were imprisoned by the United States. Initially, two Nakam members were hired by the camp, one as a driver, another as a storehouse worker. The bread for Langwasser came from a single bakery in Nuremberg, the (Consumer Cooperative Bakery). Leipke Distel, a survivor of several Nazi concentration camps, posed as a Polish displaced person awaiting a visa to work at an uncle's bakery in Canada. He asked the manager if he could work for free and eventually secured access to the bakery storeroom after bribing him with cigarettes, alcohol, and chocolate. The Nakam operatives met each night in a rented room in
Fürth Fürth (; East Franconian German, East Franconian: ; ) is a List of cities and towns in Germany, city in northern Bavaria, Germany, in the administrative division (''Regierungsbezirk'') of Middle Franconia. It is the Franconia#Towns and cities, s ...
to discuss their findings, especially how to confine their attack to the German prisoners and avoid harming the American guards. When Harmatz placed a few of the workers in clerical positions in the camp, they discovered that on Sundays, the black bread would be eaten only by the German prisoners because the American guards were specially issued white bread. Therefore, they decided to execute the attack on a Saturday night. Similar preparations were made with regard to a prison camp near Dachau and the bakery supplying it, an effort led by Warsaw Ghetto uprising veteran
Simcha Rotem Simcha Rotem (born Simcha (Szymon) Rathajzer, also known by his nom de guerre Kazik; 24 February 1924 – 22 December 2018) was a Polish-Israeli veteran who was a member of the Jewish underground in Warsaw and served as the head courier of the ...
. After becoming friends with Poles who worked in the bakery, Rotem got the manager drunk, made copies of his keys, and then returned them before he sobered up. A few days before the planned attack, Reichman received a tip-off from a Jewish intelligence officer in the United States Army that two of the operatives were wanted by the police. As ordered, the Dachau Nakam operatives aborted on 11 April 1946. Reichman feared that the failure of one attack would cause the United States to increase its security measures at prison camps, preventing a second attack. By this time, six Nakam members worked at the in Nuremberg. Subverting tight security aimed at preventing the theft of food, they smuggled the arsenic in over several days, hiding it under raincoats, and stashed it beneath the floorboards. Because experiments had shown that the arsenic mixture did not spread evenly, the operatives decided to paint it onto the bottom of each loaf. On Saturday 13 April, the bakery workers were on strike, delaying the Nakam operatives and preventing three of them from entering the bakery. As a result, Distel and his two accomplices had only enough time to poison some 3,000 loaves of bread instead of 14,000 as originally planned. After painting the loaves, they fled to
Czechoslovakia Czechoslovakia ( ; Czech language, Czech and , ''Česko-Slovensko'') was a landlocked country in Central Europe, created in 1918, when it declared its independence from Austria-Hungary. In 1938, after the Munich Agreement, the Sudetenland beca ...
, helped by an Auschwitz survivor named Yehuda Maimon, continuing on through Italy to southern France. On 23 April 1946, ''
The New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...
'' reported that 2,283 German prisoners of war had fallen ill from poisoning, with 207 hospitalized and seriously ill. However, the operation ultimately caused no known deaths. According to documents obtained by a Freedom of Information request to the
National Archives and Records Administration The National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) is an independent agency of the United States government within the executive branch, charged with the preservation and documentation of government and historical records. It is also task ...
, the amount of arsenic found in the bakery was enough to kill approximately 60,000 persons. It is unknown why the poisoners failed, but it is suspected to be either that they spread the poison too thinly, or else that the prisoners realised that the bread had been poisoned and did not eat very much.


Aftermath and legacy

About 30 former Nakam operatives boarded the ship ''Biriya'' on 23 June 1946 and arrived by the end of July following brief detention by the British authorities. They received a warm welcome at Kovner's
kibbutz A kibbutz ( / , ; : kibbutzim / ) is an intentional community in Israel that was traditionally based on agriculture. The first kibbutz, established in 1910, was Degania Alef, Degania. Today, farming has been partly supplanted by other economi ...
,
Ein HaHoresh Ein HaHoresh () is a kibbutz in the Sharon region of the Central District of Israel. Located to the north of Netanya and to the south of Hadera, it falls under the jurisdiction of the Hefer Valley Regional Council. In it had a population of . ...
, from leading members of the Haganah and the
Israeli Labor Party The Israeli Labor Party (), commonly known in Israel as HaAvoda (), was a Social democracy, social democratic political party in Israel. The party was established in 1968 by a merger of Mapai, Ahdut HaAvoda and Rafi (political party), Rafi. Unt ...
, and were invited to travel through the country. Although Kovner, and the majority of the operatives, considered that the time for revenge had passed, a small group led by Bolek Ben-Ya'akov returned to Europe to continue the mission. Nine other Nakam operatives broke away in the spring of 1947 and returned to Europe the following year, helped by Labor Party politician
Abba Hushi Abba Hushi (Also: Aba Khoushy; ; born Abba Schneller; 1898 – 24 March 1969) was an Israeli politician who served as mayor of Haifa for eighteen years between 1951 and 1969. Hushi was one of the founders and activists of Hashomer Hatzair move ...
. The breakaway groups faced mounting challenges, both logistical and financial, and the foundation of the
Federal Republic of Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen constituent states have a total population of over 84 ...
in 1949 made illegal operations even more difficult. Many of the members turned to a life of crime to support themselves, and then tried to escape from German jails with the help of former
French Resistance The French Resistance ( ) was a collection of groups that fought the German military administration in occupied France during World War II, Nazi occupation and the Collaboration with Nazi Germany and Fascist Italy#France, collaborationist Vic ...
members. Most returned to Israel between 1950 and 1952. Ben-Ya'akov said in an interview that he "could not have looked at himself in the mirror" if he had not tried to get revenge, and that he still deeply regretted that it did not succeed. After coming to Israel, former Nakam members refused to speak about their experiences for several decades, beginning to discuss the issue only in the 1980s. Porat writes that Kovner "committed political suicide" by participating in Nakam; she describes its failure as a "miracle." Members of the group showed no remorse, said that the Germans "deserved it," and wanted recognition, rather than forgiveness, for their actions. In 1999, Harmatz and Distel appeared in a documentary and discussed their role in Nakam. Distel maintained that Nakam's actions were moral and that the Jews "had a right to revenge against the Germans." German prosecutors opened an investigation against them for
attempted murder Attempted murder is a crime of attempt in various jurisdictions. Canada Section 239 of the ''Criminal Code'' makes attempted murder punishable by a maximum of life imprisonment. If a gun is used, the minimum sentence is four, five or seve ...
, but halted the preliminary investigation in 2000 because of the "unusual circumstances." , four members of the group are reported to still be alive.


Historiography and popular culture

An early journalistic account of Nakam's mission is in
Michael Bar-Zohar Michael Bar-Zohar (; born 30 January 1938) is an Israeli historian, novelist and politician. He was a member of the Knesset on behalf of the Alignment and Labor Party in the 1980s and early '90s. Biography Born in Bulgaria, Bar-Zohar immigrate ...
's 1969 book ''The Avengers''. The story was given a fictionalised treatment in ''Forged in Fury'' by
Michael Elkins Michael Elkins (22 January 1917, in New York, United States – 10 March 2001, in Jerusalem) was an American broadcaster and journalist who worked for the American network, CBS, for the magazine ''Newsweek'' and then for 17 years with the BBC. ...
in 1971. Jonathan Freedland's novel ''The Final Reckoning'' is based on the story. The story of Nakam has also entered German popular culture. In 2009, Daniel Kahn & the Painted Bird, a Germany-based
klezmer Klezmer ( or ) is an instrumental musical tradition of the Ashkenazi Jews of Central and Eastern Europe. The essential elements of the tradition include dance tunes, ritual melodies, and virtuosic improvisations played for listening; these wou ...
band, recorded a song called "Six Million Germans (Nakam)". Based on tapes Kovner made on his deathbed describing his activities in Nakam, a television documentary was produced by
Channel 4 Channel 4 is a British free-to-air public broadcast television channel owned and operated by Channel Four Television Corporation. It is state-owned enterprise, publicly owned but, unlike the BBC, it receives no public funding and is funded en ...
for its ''
Secret History Secret History or Secret Histories may refer to: Literature * '' The Secret History'', a novel by Donna Tartt * '' Ash: A Secret History'', a novel by Mary Gentle * ''Secret History'' (book series), a fantasy/science fiction series by Simon R. G ...
'' series titled ''Holocaust – The Revenge Plot'', which was first broadcast on
Holocaust Memorial Day A Holocaust memorial day or Holocaust remembrance day is an annual observance to commemorate the victims of the Holocaust, the genocide of six million Jews and of millions of other Holocaust victims by Nazi Germany and its allies. Many countries ...
, 27 January 2018. According to Israeli
counterterrorism Counterterrorism (alternatively spelled: counter-terrorism), also known as anti-terrorism, relates to the practices, military tactics, techniques, and strategies that governments, law enforcement, businesses, and Intelligence agency, intelligence ...
experts and
Idith Zertal Idith Zertal (; born 1945) is an Israeli historian, considered one of the " New Historians". Career After a career in journalism, Zertal began a career as a professor of history and cultural anthropology at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. She ...
, Nakam's worldview was similar to
messianic In Abrahamic religions, a messiah or messias (; , ; , ; ) is a saviour or liberator of a group of people. The concepts of '' mashiach'', messianism, and of a Messianic Age originated in Judaism, and in the Hebrew Bible, in which a ''mashiach' ...
groups or
cult Cults are social groups which have unusual, and often extreme, religious, spiritual, or philosophical beliefs and rituals. Extreme devotion to a particular person, object, or goal is another characteristic often ascribed to cults. The term ...
s because of its belief that the world was so evil as to deserve large-scale catastrophe. The Nakam operatives came from "heavily brutalized communities" which, according to Sprinzak and Zertal, sometimes consider catastrophic violence.
Dina Porat Dina Porat (Hebrew: דינה פורת; born 24 September 1943 in Buenos Aires) is an Israeli historian. She is professor emeritus of modern Jewish history at the Department of Jewish History at Tel Aviv University and the chief historian of Yad V ...
is the first academic historian to systematically study the group, meeting with many of the survivors and gaining access to their private documents. She hypothesises that the failure of the attack may have been deliberate, as Kovner and other leaders began to realise that it could have greatly harmed the Jewish people. She struggled to reconcile the personalities of Nakam's members with the actions that they tried to carry out. When asked how he could plan an attack in which many innocent people would have been killed, one survivor explained that " you had been there with me, at the end of the war, you wouldn't talk that way". Porat's 2019 book on Nakam is titled ''
Vengeance and Retribution Are Mine ''Nakam: The Holocaust Survivors Who Sought Full-Scale Revenge'' (originally published in Hebrew as , , also published in German) is a book by Israeli historian Dina Porat on Nakam, a small paramilitary organization of Holocaust survivors led b ...
'' (), a phrase from
Deuteronomy Deuteronomy (; ) is the fifth book of the Torah (in Judaism), where it is called () which makes it the fifth book of the Hebrew Bible and Christian Old Testament. Chapters 1–30 of the book consist of three sermons or speeches delivered to ...
which expresses her belief that the Jewish people are best to leave vengeance in the hands of the
God of Israel In monotheistic belief systems, God is usually viewed as the supreme being, creator deity, creator, and principal object of Faith#Religious faith, faith. In polytheistic belief systems, a Deity, god is "a spirit or being believed to have creat ...
. In 2021, the film '' Plan A'', directed and produced by Doron Paz and Yoav Paz, adapted the plot for cinema.


See also

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Herberts Cukurs Herberts Albert Cukurs (17 May 1900 – 23 February 1965) was a Latvian aviator and Nazi collaborator. He served as the deputy commander of the Arajs Kommando, a collaborationist unit that carried out the largest mass murders of Latvian Jews ...
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Tilhas Tizig Gesheften Tilhas Tizi Gesheften (commonly known by its acronym TTG) was a group of Jewish Brigade members formed immediately following World War II. Under the guise of British military activity, this group engaged in the assassination of Nazis and SS cons ...
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References


Bibliography

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Further reading

* {{refend Anti-German sentiment Chemical warfare Collective punishment Nuremberg in World War II Jewish ethics Jewish terrorism * Nazi hunters Revenge Terrorism in Germany