In his tower Yatom saw a large German stand and wave his men forward like they were crossing the Polish frontier in 1939. The German leader was surrounded by nearly twenty soldiers who huddled around him near exit from the passage. Yatom could feel the tension of Nir and Feldhandler in the tower with him. Finally, like a jockey loosing his mount he let them go. Yatom spoke calmly into the Madonna at normal volume. “Yatom here. All teams fire at will.”
In the quiet that had settled over Treblinka Hahn heard the strange voice from the tower. The language sounded vaguely familiar, like the shouting of dying Jews. A second later three different Israelis peppered Der Speiss with more a half-dozen rounds that sliced through his body from head to knee. An SS sergeant who had crouched next to him was ripped apart by a burst from Feldhandler’s Galil. Some of the panicked SS men about the passageway threw up their arms in a vain attempt to stop the Israeli rounds while others attempted to crawl back into the main camp. But the sayeret’s fire enveloped them like a deluge from which it was impossible to emerge dry. Within a minute every German who had emerged from the Himmelgang was off to heaven, or hell, or nowhere.
Next to Yatom Feldhandler shoveled magazines in and out of his Galil, firing with a demented abandon at the Germans below him, apparently indifferent that he was running through irreplaceable ammunition. Yatom called a ceasefire into the radio and placed a hand on the receiver of Feldhandler’s smoking Galil shaking the scientist out of his mania. “It’s done Feldhandler!” he shouted. “They are all dead. The Germans here are dead or fled.” Feldhandler stared at Yatom a moment and then smiled. The same strange quiet had returned to the camp.
“Well,” said the scientist, “let’s get out of this tower.”
“Wait” ordered Yatom. He looked down at the mass of dead Germans below the tower, and scanned the camp once more with the thermal binoculars. Satisfied that the German resistance was broken, or nearly so, he raised Shapira on the radio. “Ron—Yatom here. What’s your position.”
“We are near wire on the east side of the camp ready to cut in.”
“Send Sandler’s or Fliegel’s men in first. Let them take the risk in case there is a trap.”
Shapira looked over at the Jewish fighters spread out around him. In the thirty minutes since the rout of the Ukranians he had reorganized the men, and given them a little rest. Now prone in a small depression outside the Treblinka fence they seemed recovered and capable of further action. He called over Sandler and Fliegel and issued them orders in a matter of fact way.
The Bears moved first. Mimicking the strange commandos, Fliegel stepped out in front of his men and simply said in Yiddish “after me.” The Bears set off at a trot for the wire, while the Sandler’s team remained prone, their weapons pointing toward the camp. Shapira watched the advance nervously through his thermal binoculars, searching for potential dangers—he found none.
A minute later the Bears reached the wire, where two men began cutting the dense fencing. Fliegel’s men had an easier time of it then had Itzak and Roskovsky, since nobody was shooting at them. Indeed, Treblinka remained eerily quiet.
As he squatted in the dark, waiting for Fliegel’s men to open a breach in the barbed-wire fencing, Sandller couldn’t help but marvel at the irony. For the last few months of his life he had thought of little else than finding a way to cut himself out of Sobibor. Now having found deliverance, he was cutting his way back into a death camp. The thought suddenly scared him, and he wondered if he had gone mad. He quickly gave up his macabre musings when one of the Bears signaled that he was through the wire, and Fliegel, standing now like traffic cop, waived him on.
Sandler led his men forward. He ducked through the opening first, heading back into a death camp despite his reservations. He crossed the patrol area between the twin wire fences, MP-40 at the ready and stepped into Treblinka proper. The former Sonderkommando didn’t know whether his men recognized the irony of their act, or shared his trepidations. It was enough, thought Sandler that they continued to follow him. Seconds later Sandler and the Bulls were in Treblinka.
Sandler led his men into an uneasy hush. Other than an occasional shot from the snipers in the towers and the sound of several burning buildings, Treblinka was as quiet as a sleepy Polish hamlet. It reminded him of his grandparents’ village—before it was liquidated.
Chapter 25
Erbel stayed in his office, bereft of Sergeant Major Hahn, and the rest of his officers, who as best he could tell, had either died, run away or gone into hiding. Wirth had run. Erbel would have run too, but feared facing General Globocnik as much as staying put. Wirth would be able to make his excuses, he would not. Like the thousands of victims murdered in his camp, Erbel found himself strangely resigned to his fate. He was terrified, but unable to act. His only companions were Klum and Engel, a pair of SS headquarters clerks who now awaited his orders. He had none. Finally, one of the boys screwed up the courage to speak.
“Herr Kommandant, what are your orders?” asked Klum. “What is it like outside, Klum?” whispered Erbel, as if the deadly men in the towers could overhear him. “Are they still shooting?”
“Weiss nicht Herr Kommandant. The shooting has died down. Perhaps the attack is over. Maybe we won the battle” said Klum hopefully, but without much conviction. “Shall Private Engel and I go see?” Klum wanted to flee the Koinmandanfs quarters, which he was sure was a death trap.
“No” said Erbel morosely. “Are there any other German soldiers nearby?”
“There are a few right outside the door, Herr Kommandant” said Engel, a little less rattled then Klum. “There are others hiding behind other buildings, or in them, I’m sure.”
Erbel pulled a bottle of vodka from his desk, and took a long swallow. The two clerks looked on expectantly, but Erbel corked the bottle and put it down. The liquor burned his throat and numbed his teeth, but gave him a bit of courage, and an idea.
“Engel, do you think you could lead us out of here, under cover of the buildings, as far as the deportation square.”
“Yes, Mein Herr. I think so.”
“Good. Gather the men at the back of the building and have them come with us. You lead the way Engel. I’m counting on you.” Erbel took another swallow of the vodka, and tucked it into a small haversack, with a bit of food from a sideboard. He checked his pistol.
Engel stood at attention, proud that he would soon be leading an SS column, or something like it. Erbel motioned toward the door, and the two SS priv’ates grabbed their rifles and went out into the shadow of the headquarters building. There they found four Ukranians and an SS Corporal named Schweinsteiger. After briefly explaining the movement, the clerks set off for the deportation square with the other Germans, including Erbel, and the Ukranians in tow.
From their position in the tower at the northeast corner of the camp, llan and Bolander could see almost all the open areas of Treblinka, except those in defilade due to the camp’s buildings. The snipers suspected that Germans and Ukranians hid in the lee of the buildings. They waited patiently for the enemy troops to expose themselves. Both marksmen had chalked up impressive scores through the night, but business now lagged. Either most of the enemy was already dead or gone, or they were sensibly not moving.