ABSTRACT

One of those survivors, Yosef Krausz, later recounted that the targets of the investigation were divided into three categories: the "Kasztner Group"; those who took orders from the "Kasztner Group"; and the ordinary passengers on the Kasztner Train. The ordinary Kasztner Train passengers, some of whom returned to the city, were allowed to go free. But the first two groups were to be prosecuted for war crimes. During the Nazi occupation, the head of the Jewish rescue committee in Budapest visited his home city twice with official permission. But matters changed after liberation. In Hungary, charges of Rezso Kasztner's collaboration with the Nazis soon reached the national press. Kasztner had secured a respectable status in Israeli political life. He was a senior government official, serving as the spokesman for the Ministry of Commerce and Industry. The survivors' accusations finally caught the attention of the Israeli public in what became known as the Kasztner Trial.