Kastner Train - Kastner Trial

Kastner Trial

The transport played a major role in the Kastner trial in Israel in 1954, in which the government of Israel sued Malchiel Gruenwald, a political pamphleteer, for libel after he self-published a pamphlet charging Kastner, by then an Israeli government spokesman, with collaboration. A major detail of Gruenwald's allegations was that Kastner had agreed to the rescue in return for remaining silent about the fate of the mass of Hungarian Jews. This accusation was accepted by the court, leading Judge Benjamin Halevi to declare that Kastner had "sold his soul to the devil." In 1958, most of the ruling was overturned by the Supreme Court of Israel. The Court upheld Judge Halevi's verdict on the manner in which Kastner offered testimony after the war on behalf the SS officer Kurt Becher.