Aftermath of the November Pogrom 
 Aftermath of the November Pogrom - From the Testimony of Benno Cohn 
 Source: the Testimony of Benno Cohn at the Eichmann Trial in Jerusalem, 25 April 1961, Criminal Case 40/61. [The text is from the transcript of the simultaneous translation and therefore may include linguistic errors.] 
 A: After some weeks, the Jewish offices were opened, Jewish offices were opened…not political organisations - not the Zionist organisation and other organisations of this kind - but only the administrative organisations of Jews. For instance the Palestine Office was reopened…When I entered this office after some time, this was the first time that I ordered a call for Jerusalem, and I got on the line the Jewish Agency in Jerusalem, and I asked Mr. Moshe Shertok, who was then head of the Political Department of the Jewish Agency, and I told him I had to conduct the conversation in a very cautious manner because it was quite obvious that it was being tapped, and that the enemy was eavesdropping. And I said only a few words. I first of all jotted them down in order to prove what I had said. Mr. Shertok, S.O.S.' this is what I said. S.O.S., of course is known to anyone - Save Our Souls. 40,000 males in concentration camps. Send us [emigration] certificates immediately. It's a matter of life and death.' I repeated these words several times…. Then Dr. Georg Landauer, head of the German Department of the Jewish Agency, also spoke to me and told me that they would do their utmost to send certificates, but to our great regret the results yielded were extremely insignificant. In spite of all this, we were able to bring a considerable number of Jews to Israel…. I remember those things as if… It was a short while before I left Germany. It was in March 1939 that I left Germany, I emigrated. 
 
 Before then I received a phone call from the Gestapo that the representatives of the various Jewish Organisations are invited to a meeting on Prinz Albrecht Strasse. 
 Q: What was there on Prinz Albrecht Strasse? 
 A: Prinz Albrecht Strasse was the National Centre of the secret State Police, the Gestapo in Germany - not in Berlin, but in Germany. This was the centre then. I went there. I was rather hesitant about it because the emigration papers were already in my pocket. I went alone as the representative of the Palestine Office. At that time I was also the Director of the Palestine Office… There was still Heinrich Stahl, Chairman of the Jewish Community in Berlin, Dr. Lilienfeld, Director of the Finance Department of the Reichsvertretung , Dr. Katzhofer, a lawyer, one of the representatives of the Jewish community, and Dr. Epstein, head of the Emigration Department of the Reichsvertretung at that time. We were invited there. It was rather late in the afternoon, at six o'clock as a matter of fact. I remember the place. It was one of the upper stories of the building. We entered this place. There was a kind of rope that separated us from Eichmann, who sat on the other side of the rope. 
 Q: How was he dressed? 
 A: He wore civilian clothes. At his side, at a writing-desk, a man in uniform was seated. I am already tired and therefore my Hebrew is not as good as it should be. Presiding Judge: The witness may sit down. 
 A: …in uniform. He was a high ranking officer. If I am not mistaken, he was a Gruppenfuehrer or Untergruppenfuehrer, one of the high SS officers. He did not participate at all in the conversation. He did not open his mouth. He was silent all the time in our presence. 
 Q: when the conversation began…. 
 A: We were seated. At that time we were still seated. Eichmann began the conversation. In front of him there were documents - actually clippings taken from the 'Pariser Tagesblatt', a French paper published by the immigrants. We had not seen this paper in Germany. Apparently its dissemination was banned. He was terribly excited and angry that we had published a certain article on him in the paper. He read some of the passages from this particular article. He was styled as 'bloodhound Eichmann'. It was styled in colloquial language – 'a new foe of Jewry'. I do not remember the epithets, but those, which he read out to us were extremely stern. He accused us. He said that one of us had given this spurious information about him to the French immigrant paper.… Who gave this information to the publication?' This was the first problem, and the situation was extremely strained. He shouted at us. He threatened us with all means within his power. Of course none of us admitted that he had given the information. Nobody confessed anything that he did not do, and this was the first item. Then he went over to the second item on the agenda of this particular meeting. He spoke to us with regard to our visit to Vienna – and I am saying what will perhaps be corroborated by other witnesses - that Eichmann had invited the representatives of Jewish associations to Vienna, so that they set up this particular Central Office for Jewish Emigration. 
 Q: When was this invitation? 
 A: I was sick at the time. 
 Q: Around what time? 
 A: December 1938 or January-February 1939. I did not participate. I was sick in bed. Others participated. He addressed the other people. 
 Q: Those who had been in Vienna? 
 A: Those who had been in Vienna. The others had all been in Vienna. He shouted at them in a most aggressive manner. He said: why did you violate the ban according to which you should not get in touch with the leaders of Jewry in the East? Why did you infringe this rule? It was absolutely forbidden and you did it.' He used very rude language - he used very aggressive lingo - and he submerged us with accusations that we had violated the ban on contacts with Jewish representatives in Vienna. Then somebody was standing - I believe it was Stahl - somebody stood up - I believe it was Stahl or Epstein - and they said, if we were visiting Vienna, after all that had happened, we were certainly permitted - this was only human - to contact our friends who are sharing our sad destiny, in order to comfort them. The fate hit them right away, whereas we had been under this rule for a long time. It was only human and natural to contact them. You have to understand that… Eichmann then wound up the meeting with the following words - after so many years they are blurred in my memory, but he said: if this happens again, you will go to a concert camp. It was a vulgar term for concentration camp. 
 Q: Do you remember him using this term Concert Camp? 
 A: He used the word Concert Camp several times. Then Mr. Heinrich Stahl was in a way attacking him. He stood up and said that we all were interested, as the Gestapo was, in mass emigration - mass exodus - from Germany. But you are going to frustrate our efforts by the transports over the borders'. Because at that time transports of Jews to the neighbouring countries set in - to Holland, to Belgium, to Poland, to France and to other countries as well, in the north of Europe and in the west of it. A considerable number of them were brought back. Some of the people managed to stay in the Countries to which they were sent, but some of them were returned to Germany and many of them stayed in the no-man's land. Many of them were either imprisoned or were sent to concentration camps. The result was that the possibilities of emigration had been closed. 
 Q: Is this what he meant, Dr. Stahl, when he spoke to Eichmann? 
 A: To this, Eichmann reacted very sternly and he said in very aggressive words. I am ashamed to use all these words, to repeat them as they were, but he used obscene language. 
 Q: You do not have to translate. If you remember Eichmann, you may quote him in his own language. 
 A: One word which has been engraved in my memory - I'd never heard it before, I learned it actually from Eichmann, from his vocabulary at the time. He said: Du alter Scheisser , for a long time you haven't been in concentration camp. What do you mean here? Still complaining and grumbling?' This is what I remember quite clearly. He attacked Stahl for my having levelled accusations and criticism against Germany complicating the emigration. I don't know who was responsible for the transports at that time. At any rate, he was furious whim for his criticism… After that Dr. Epstein stood up and delivered a short speech. He said: the people who are sitting in front of you, they are public workers, they are volunteers of Jewish associations in Germany. They had certainly been elected by German Jews who had faith in them. We are a Jewish people facing a terrible tragedy and you have to take the situation into consideration. We have to give reports to the Jews who elected us. It is impossible to speak in this way during this meeting.' I remember it very well. He said: you might bring us to a concentration camp if you like. You can certainly imprison us. You can throw us into gaol, but as we are at large, as long as we are free men, you have got to speak to us as free men are spoken to. Otherwise we cannot possibly represent freely and in an unfettered manner the interests of the associations which entrusted us with this unpleasant task.' 
 Q: Did Eichmann reply? 
 A: Eichmann shouted again. He then whispered in consultation with a high SS officer and later on when he concluded this consultation, he said: Out, we interrupt the meeting. Get out of here.' And then we left the hall…. The meeting was adjourned we didn't go home yet. We assembled in a private home of one of our friends, I do not remember whose house, and we were consulting until late in the night. Hirsch was also present and he said that we have no other alternative but to co-operate. We knew that the World War was in the offing, and that we had to do our utmost in order to pick out Jews by hook or by crook and this arrangement was extremely important because this way the process was certainly accelerated. Because otherwise the process was going on weeks and months because the Jews were sent from pillar to post and this concentration was extremely propitious for accelerating the pace of this emigration. Then we put an announcement in writing, I believed it was Dr. Epstein who went to the Gestapo and read the declaration to them, that in light of the situation we are ready to do everything, but we pointed out that we can not implement Gestapo orders. We are doing it out of the authority, which has been entrusted to us by the Jewish organisation. Later on Epstein told us… I went to his office at noon. He was received after long waiting by the senior officer whose name is unknown to him. He read him the declaration, which we had drafted. I don't know whether he submitted it to him or whether he read it to him. The man was silent all the time. He hadn't really opened his mouth all the time….