Reinhard Heydrich

Reinhard Heydrich has a brief but consequential role in the book’s account of Nazi-era efforts concerning Jewish emigration. On September 26, 1937, he gave Adolf Eichmann permission to accept an invitation from Feivel Polkes, a senior member of the Haganah, to visit Palestine and discuss coordination between German and Jewish organizations.

Authorization and the 1937 Visit

Heydrich did not make the journey described: Eichmann and his assistant boarded a train in Berlin. The visit to Palestine was blocked by British authorities amid unrest, but Eichmann and Polkes met days later in Cairo to discuss coordinating their activities. Heydrich’s documented role in this episode is the authorization that enabled Eichmann to accept Polkes’s invitation.

Place in the Book’s Argument

The episode is presented as an unsettling convergence of interests, not as evidence that the parties shared the same purposes. The book explains that German officials wanted Jews to leave Western Europe, while Zionist organizers wanted more Jews to settle in Palestine. Heydrich’s authorization places him within this specific policy episode; the account does not provide further personal motives or actions by him.