Shoah Page #19

- Uh-huh.

- So everything was screened.

People couldn't see anything

to the left or right.

Nothing.

You couldn't see through it.

- Impossible.

[ Repeats Phrase]

Here and here too.

Here, too.

- Ja?

- Und hier.

[ Suchomel]

Impossible to see through.

THE CAMP TODAY:

[ Lanzmann ]

Treblinka,

where so many people

were exterminated,

wasn't big, right?

[ Suchomel]

It wasn't big.

1600 feet at the widest point.

It wasn't a rectangle,

more like a rhomboid.

You must realize

that here the ground was flat,

and here it began to rise.

And at the top of the slope

was the gas chamber.

You had to climb up to it.

The funnel was called

the Road to Heaven, right?

The Jews called it the Ascension.

Also The Last Road.

I only heard those two names for it.

[ Lanzmann ]

I need to see it.

The people go into the funnel.

Then what happens?

They're totally naked?

- Totally naked.

Here...

stood two Ukrainian guards.

- Yes.

- Mainly for the men.

If the men wouldn't go in,

they were beaten with whips.

Here too. Even here.

- Ah, yes.

The men were driven along.

Not the women.

- Not the women.

- No, they weren't beaten.

Why such humanity?

- I didn't see it.

- Ja.

I didn't see it.

Maybe they were beaten too.

Why not?

[ Repeats Phrase]

They were about to die anyway. Hmm?

Why not?

Hmm?

At the entrance to the gas chambers,

undoubtedly.

ABRAHAM BOMBA:

- ISRAEL -

[ Lanzmann, In English]

Abraham, can you tell me how did it happen?

How were you chosen?

[ Bomba ]

There came an order

from the Germans

to take out the barbers they could get.

And they needed them for a certain job.

What kind ofjob they needed it for,

we didn't know at that time.

But, we gathered together

as many barbers as we could.

How long did it happen

after your arrival in Treblinka?

That... I would say that happened to me

about four weeks after I was in Treblinka.

When was it?

It was in the morning, in the...

That was in the morning.

It was around 10:00

when a transport came to Treblinka,

and the women went into the gas chambers.

And they chose some people

from the working people over there,

and they asked the question:

Who was a barber, and who was not a barber?

I was a barber for quite a number of years.

Some of them, they knew me,

like people from Czestochowa

and from other places.

So, naturally, they chose me,

and I selected some more barbers

which I know of them,

and we got it together.

- Professional barbers?

- Professional, yes.

We got it together,

and we were waiting for the order.

And the order came to go with them,

with the Germans.

They took us into the gas chamber,

to the second... part

of the camp in Treblinka.

It was far from the first part?

It was not too far,

but it was all covered

with gates, barbed wires

and trees covering the gate,

that nobody should see there is a gate,

or there is a place

going into the gas chambers.

Is it what the Germans

called the 'Schlauch?

No, the Germans,

what they called it, they called...

Like going to...

Road to the Heaven.

- 'Himmelweg ?

- "Himmel"... "Himmel way", yeah.

The Road to the Heaven.

And we knew about it

because we worked for quite a time

before we went in

to work in the gas chamber.

Going in over there,

they put in some benches

where the women could sit

and not to have the idea

that this is their last way,

or that it is the last time

they're going to live

or they're going to breathe,

or they're going to know

what is going on.

How long did it last that the barbers

cut the hair inside the gas chamber,

because it was not always the case?

We worked inside the gas chamber

for about a week or 10 days.

After that,

they decided that we will cut the hair

in the undressing barrack.

- How did it look, the gas chamber?

- It was a room, not a big room.

The room was, I would say, the size, by feet...

Around...

12 by 12.

But, in that room,

they pushed in a lot of women,

almost one on top of the other one.

But, like I mentioned before,

when we came in, we didn't know

what we're going to do.

And then, one of the kapos,

he came in and he said,

Barbers, you have to do a job:

to make to believe

all those women that came in

that they are just taking a haircut

and going in to take a shower,

and, from there,

they go out from this place.

But we knew already that there is

no way going out from this room.

Because this room is the last place

where they went in alive,

and they will never go out alive again.

Can you describe precisely?

Precisely, to describe, is...

When the transport came in...

Waiting there

until the transport came in.

The transport came in.

Women with children.

And pushing into that place.

We, the barbers, started to cut the hair,

and some of them,

I would say all of them,

some of them, they knew already

what's going to happen to them.

We tried to do the best what we could...

- [ Lanzmann ] No, no, no, no. No.

- the most human being what we could.

Excuse me.

How did it happen?

When the women came

into the gas chamber,

were you yourself already in the gas chamber...

- In, in.

- or did you come afterwards?

I said we were already

in the gas chamber,

because we were waiting over there

for the transport to come in.

- You were inside?

- Inside, yes.

Inside the gas chamber.

We were already in.

And suddenly you saw the women coming?

Yes, they came in.

How were they?

They were undressed, all naked,

without clothes, without anything else.

- All of them completely naked?

- Completely naked.

All the women and all the children.

- All the children too?

- The children too.

Because they came

from the undressing barracks.

There was a barracks

before going into the gas chamber

where they had undressed themselves.

What did you feel the first time

that it happened that you saw

all these naked women coming?

Well, I felt that,

accordingly,

I got to do what they told me:

to cut the hair in a way

that it should look like

a barber is doing his job,

like he's doing a job for a woman,

a nice haircut to give them,

but to take off as much hair as we could,

because they needed the women's hair

to be transported to Germany.

This means that you didn't shave them?

No, we did not shave them.

We just cut their hair to make them believe

that they're getting a nice haircut.

- But you cut with what? With scissors?

- With scissors, yes.

With scissors and with a comb,

without any clippers.

Just like a...

a man's haircut, I would say.

Not a... Not a baldy one to take out...

to take off all the hair,

but just to have the imagination

that they're getting a nice haircut.

- There were no mirrors, no?

- No, there were no mirrors.

There were just benches, not chairs,

but just benches where we worked,

about 16, 17 barbers,

and we had a lot of women in.

Every haircut, it took about two minutes,

no more than that,

because there was a lot of women to come in

and to get rid of their hair.

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