
I recently watched the five part series The Devil Next Door. It is a documentary about the arrest and prosectution of US citizen of Ukrainian descent John Demjanjuk for alleged war crimes. During WWII, Demjanjuk was an operator in gas chambers of infamous death camp Treblinka, called Ivan The Terrible by the inmates. He used to stab with his sword people on their way to death in gas chambers and cut off their body parts to make their deaths even more horrible. He worked in Ford factory in America, but was extradized to Israel to be processed there for his crimes. He defended himself that he was not that man, that he was framed for his Ukrainian anti Soviet movement sentiments. The crucial and almost only proof besides testimonies of the survivors was a photograph from the old ss identity card. This documentary series is heavy, heartbreaking when seeing actual survivors of Treblinka and other death camps stating their testimonies at the court in Israel. It is also a story of morality, ethics, how far could you sacrifice your ideals for money and what would you do for survival. Me personally wasn´t sure that the guy was Ivan The Terrible indeed, but as the series progressed and finished, now I am sure that the guy was a war criminal, whether that guy or some other ss camp killer it is not so important. Does war crime ever ends being important issue? Never! I have many old people in my neighbourhood, I often caught myself thinking while watching this series, how much do I know them? Maybe that smiling, old nice man was indeed a beast in human form killing thousands couple of decades ago. This is not light to watch, but it is important issue, never being out of importance.



