"And That's Shameful" Einsatzkommando 10a

This photo taken from a the body of a dead German officer who was killed in Russia shows a German firing squad shooting Soviet-Jewish civilians in the back as they sit beside a mass grave in the Babi Yar ravine on the outskirts of Kiev.  AP

"Oberlander found comfort and freedom in Canada. His victims were denied the right of life, of family of happiness, of children and grandchildren -- all of which Oberlander celebrated in abundance."

"It is a sad day not because he died, but because Canada has been exposed in terms of allowing men and women like Oberlander to come to this country, live here in peace and never face justice. And that's shameful."

"He very successfully played a very poor Canadian immigration system -- and won."

"Every government, it doesn't matter if it was Conservative government or Liberal government throughout the postwar period, has blame on this file, as does the very poor Canadian justice system."

Bernie Farber, CEO, Canadian Anti-Hate Network

"The peaceful demise of Helmut Oberlander on Canadian soil is a stain on our national conscience. The fact is that this country slammed its doors on Jewish refugees fleeing the Nazis, then allowed some of their tormentors into Canada and failed to deport them."

Michael Mostyn, CEO, B'nai Brith Canada

"The delays in these cases were unconscionable. The result was justice for victims of the crime addressed in these cases was denied."

David Matas, senior legal counsel, B'nai Brith Canada

 

"Canada's war record on first admitting Nazi war criminals and then failing to properly investigate and then deport them is a national shame."

"While victims of the Holocaust were brutally murdered, Nazi war criminals mostly died peacefully in this country."

"Many have literally gotten away with murder."

Avi Abraham Benlolo, chairman, Abraham Global Peace Initiative, Toronto

After the mass murder of 33,771 Jews at Babyn Yar, Ukraine, September 1941 (public domain)

 

Helmut Oberlander, a resident of Canada since he and his wife applied for immigration in 1952, held permanent residence status from 1954 forward, becoming a citizen of Canada in 1960. On his immigration application he failed to disclose his status as a former German soldier in World War II, knowing that this would invalidate his application. Legally, he had no right to Canadian citizenship. A false declaration on an immigration application, evidence of participation in war crimes would make him inadmissible.

He was an ethnic German living in Ukraine, then part of the Soviet Union, when it was invaded by Nazi forces. He was conscripted and assigned work as a translator for Einsatzkommando 10a (Ik10a), a special police task force operating in occupied territory. His claim to innocence rests in his arguing that he was a teen at the time of his conscription, and that he never personally took part in the killings conducted by the death squad he was associated with. Merely an innocent observer. 

There is the philosophical observation that an observer is a participant merely by being at the scene of an atrocity. And that observing while working as an enabler as a translator, the claim of innocence is in and of itself an utter absurdity. He was actively engaged with the killing squads whose purpose was to act as roving killers in uniform armed with deadly weapons seeking out vulnerable victims whom local populations were less than loathe to identify and on occasion more than willing to help in their eradication. They too were/are guilty of crimes against humanity.

When I was a child I recall the horrors of whispered agonies of my parents and their friends over the unspeakable atrocities taking place in Nazi Germany. There were underground pamphlets passed around detailing news of massacres and cattle cars and transports, and work camps and concentration camps and death camps ... the scale of which would be revealed to the world at large in good order. I remember my parents speaking in hushed, disbelieving voices with their friends, post Holocaust of someone they know walking along Bloor Street in Toronto and suddenly confronting a guard from Auschwitz.

Photo Courtesy B'nai Brith Canada

"Helmut Oberlander has passed away peacefully. In the end, he was surrounded by loved ones in his home."

"Notwithstanding the challenges in his life, he remained strong in his faith. He took comfort in his family and the support of many in his community. He gave generously to charity, supported his church and was a loving family man. He will be dearly missed."

Oberlander family statement

 

My parents came to Canada in the pre-war years. My father, an orphan living on the streets of Warsaw was sent to Canada by a philanthropic Polish society of Jews, to work as an indentured farmhand until such time as his passage was paid off and he was free to become a free man, albeit younger then than Oberlander. My mother and her sister came as young girls after their parents were murdered in the Pale of Settlement by a mob of White Russians. They worked in garment factories to repay distant relatives in the U.S. who had paid for their passage to Canada. 

During the war years entrance to Jews facing annihilation in Europe was closed off. Canada had all the Jews it would tolerate. They would have to find haven elsewhere. Japan, though part of the Axis, helped some Jews escape Europe into China. Canada turned away desperate Jewish refugees sailing on the German passenger vessel,  the St.Louis looking for haven abroad. It was not to be.

 

It was, in fact, former Conservative Prime Minister Brian Mulroney who was convinced by Jewish human-rights lobbyists that Canada had a moral and human-right responsibility to identify and either prosecute or surrender German Nazi war criminals settled as good citizens in Canada, back to Germany to stand trial there for their participation in war crimes where they could inform a court 'nicht schuldig". Being part of a "mobile killing unit" is a criminal offence and a war crime.

Helmut Oberlander, a retired businessman of 97, is dead in Waterloo, Ontario. It was 35 years ago that a commission set  up to find and prosecute Canadians born in Germany, who had Nazi affiliation in the Third Reich, that Helmut Oberlander became its first target. During those 35 years he used every legal opportunity available to him to defend himself in court, to counter charges, to appeal to higher authorities to overturn judgements not in his favour. Anything to avoid deportation.

Oberlander's citizenship was revoked in 2001 in 2007 in 2012. The final time, in 2019, the Supreme Court of Canada would not hear his appeal of the last revocation of his citizenship, accepting the reality that because of fraudulently entering the country, citizenship was invalid. Which would enable his deportation. But there were always more avenues of appeal. The final judgement was in the works, with the Immigration and Refugee Board adjudicator prepared to rule on his motion of dismissal. No need now.