Will revival of Demjanjuk case reopen old wounds?

CLEVELAND -- Just minutes after the Department of Justice filed papers in U.S. District Court here seeking to revoke the citizenship of Cleveland-area resident John Demjanjuk, Marty Plax, regional director of the American Jewish Committee, got an important call.

Eli Rosenbaum, director of the Justice Department's Office of Special Investigations, phoned Plax about the suit and urged him to call the leaders of the Ukrainian community. Plax has had a dialogue with them since the OSI filed its first case against the Ukrainian-born Demjanjuk in 1978.

Many erroneously want to portray the Demjanjuk saga as a Jewish vs. Ukrainian issue, said Plax. But the Ukrainian and Jewish communities here have worked together for years to make sure that is not the case. The result, he says, is one of the best relationships between two such communities in any American city.

It does not matter what any body's position is on whether or not Demjanjuk lied about his Nazi past to gain admittance and eventually U.S. citizenship, said Plax. "OSI is bringing a case against Demjanjuk. That's going to play itself out in court. We must just make sure it is not a case of one community against another."

William Liscynesky, president of the United Ukrainian organization, said. "We get along with the Jewish community pretty well. We don't need somebody to stir it up."

Still, he emphasizes, it is the Jews that have headed up the OSI who are out to get Demjanjuk -- for their own gain.

"The Jewish community should call off their dogs or muzzle them. What does the Jewish community gain from this?"

Cliff Savren, regional director of the Anti-Defamation League, believes that it is important for everyone to recognize that the Ukrainian community is not on trial. Nor is the Jewish community charging him.

"I think the essence of the case is the sanctity of American citizenship. Someone who acquired it under false pretenses should not be living as our neighbor."

The U.S. Justice Department filed the request to revoke Demjanjuk's citizenship on May 19. The case has been assigned to Judge Paul Matia, chief judge for the Northern District of Ohio, and the same judge who in February 1998 restored Demjanjuk's citizenship after determining that the government was "reckless" in withholding information from Demjanjuk.

The new complaint charges that Demjanjuk, 79, was a guard at Sobibor extermination camp, and the Majdanek and Flossenberg concentration camps, and that he was a member of the SS-run Trawniki unit. The complaint further alleges that Demjanjuk concealed these facts when he applied to become a U.S. citizen, and should be denaturalized.

Demjanjuk has denied serving as a guard in any concentration or death camp.

In 1981, the federal court in Cleveland found Demjanjuk to be "Ivan the Terrible," a gas chamber operator at the Treblinka extermination camp, and revoked his citizenship. He was extradited to Israel in 1986, convicted of crimes against humanity and sentenced to death. But after the Israeli Supreme Court found reasonable doubt existed that he was Ivan the Terrible, he was released. The Israeli Supreme Court did, however, conclude that Demjanjuk was a guard at both Sobibor and Trawniki, and Majdanek and Flossenberg.

Last year the U.S. District Court in Cleveland revoked the original denaturalization order, but left the door open for the government to refile the case.

The U.S. Court of Appeals in Cincinnati reopened the case in 1992, and appointed a "special master" to inquire into allegations that federal prosecutors had improperly withheld exculpatory evidence from Demjanjuk's attorneys. The special master found that prosecutors had acted in good faith, but that they had failed to disclose certain documents to the defense. He ruled, however, that no evidence undermined the initial finding that Demjanjuk had been a guard at Trawniki, and pronounced the 1981 denaturalization order "sound."

The reopening of the Demjanjuk case has left area Holocaust survivors pleased, yet unsettled.

Gita Frankel of Beachwood, who was stunned last year when Demjanjuk's citizenship was reinstated, said she was just beginning to put thoughts of the man she considers a Nazi behind her when she learned last week that the government was reopening its case.

"Every time his name comes up it just bothers me so much," Frankel said. "He should disappear out of my life after what I went through."

Whenever the Demjanjuk case or other Holocaust horrors come up in the local media, survivors are affected, said Zev Harel, a professor of history at Cleveland State University, and a survivor himself. "It's not an intellectual exercise. Everyone is back with his or her experiences."

Avi Goldman, president of the Cleveland Holocaust Center and the child of survivors, is ready to let the court system do its work. If Demjanjuk is found guilty, said Goldman, U.S. law demands that he be denaturalized and deported. If he is found innocent, "then I think he should get an apology from all of us."