Upfall

The train passed the platform and headed for the small rail station two hundred meters down the track. The station consisted of a small wooden building set by the track, another nearly identical hut a few meters behind, and what appeared to be a decrepit outhouse alongside the second building. On a worn plank platform stood three uniformed but unarmed German railroad men. The Germans were short, stocky, stolid looking men, like brothers from the same peasant clan, who regarded their straightforward task with childlike seriousness.

Steam hissed from the engine as the Polish engineers brought the massive locomotive to a stop directly in front of the German crew. Yatom, already holding his suppressed Sig in his right hand, motioned for Mofaz to join him at the engine door. Mofaz held his own Sig at the ready. The commandos exchanged glances but no words. The task before them was obvious.

"Bleib still” Yatom whispered harshly at the Polish engineers.

Hearing Yatom's German, spiced as it was with a guttural Hebrew accent, the Poles reacted with the wide-eyed fright, as if facing an outlandish golem.

With a single fluid movement Yatom slid open the engine door and raised his pistol. Directly in from of Yatom stood the three German railroad-men, their heads almost level with the barrel of the Sig, barely a meter away. Yatom shot the first man directly in the forehead. The German fell, the barest hint of surprise on his face.

Before his comrade on the right could move or utter an alarm he was struck in the neck with a bullet from Mofaz's pistol. The third German could have yelled an alarm, but chose to flee instead. He managed to turn his body half-a-step when Yatom put a round into the the back of his head. The two Israelis exchanged another glance—Mofaz had finally committed himself, and thought Yatom, looked relieved.

Yatom looked back down the track. From his position on the train, he could not see onto the German platform in Sobibor. It stood to reason that he was likewise out of the view of the Germans in the camp. Satisfied, Yatom jumped onto the platform and without breaking stride burst into the small station office building, pistol at the ready. Mofaz followed him covering his blind side. The building was empty. "Follow me" said Yatom.

Together the two men moved quickly around the station office towards the second hut in back. Yatom strode calmly up to the door and opened it. Inside were two more German railroad men, playing cards and drinking beer. Yatom shot them both before Mofaz got through the doorframe.

”Yalla. Let's go" said Yatom. The two commandos jogged back to the train, then climbed back into the second class coach and reported that the special train crew had been dispatched. Then, according to plan, Feldhandler left the coach and climbed into the locomotive with the Polish engineers, along with his Galil, for the ride back into the camp—insurance that the nervous Poles stayed true to their new job.

Chapter 14

Ordinarily, before a transport arrived in Sobibor, SS Commandant Franz Stangl received a phone call from the Fahrplanbuero Sonderauggruppe, which was the train scheduling office of the SS special trains unit. This organization was entirely devoted to shipping Jews to the extermination camps in Eastern Poland, which had top priority on the Polish rail system, even above military transports to or from the Russian front.

The Fahrplanbuero didn't actually know when a transport was close to Sobibor. They phoned the Commandant based on their own arrival schedules which given the vagaries of the wartime Polish rail system, were usually overoptimistic. In fact, Sobibor was so isolated and the rail-bed in such bad repair, that a large section of track was scheduled to be shut down in July for renovation, which would effectively halt operations at the camp for awhile. All the more reason, thought Stangl, to keep Sobibor operating at top efficiency through June.

This day, May 25, 1942, Stangl had received the warning phone call at about 9:00am, indicating a train was en route. That meant arrival in an hour or half a day. Regardless, Stangl immediately issued warning orders to assemble the many SS men, Ukrainian guards and Jews of the Bahnhof Kommando to prepare for the train. When, not unexpectedly, the morning lapsed into the afternoon without further information about the train, Stangl ordered the men to stand down at their posts, while keeping the several dozen Jews of the Bahnhoff Kommando at the ready and under guard.