Rudi Haymann’s book Beyond Borders takes readers through his escape from Nazi Germany to when he learns to be a kibbutz pioneer in Palestine, then his missions as a soldier in the Jewish Brigade of the British Army, and finally as he navigates life after World War II.
“I wrote this book not appealing to a public – I wrote this book for my grandchildren,” Haymann said. “I wanted them to know what sort of grandfather they had – his historical background, his psychological or human background, and the challenges he had to face, and give them an idea that I hope that they never will have to face as many challenges as I did.”
The first parts of the story are engagingly accompanied by letters from Haymann’s parents and younger sister, detailing their experiences in Berlin as it became increasingly dangerous, their escape to Chile, and their struggles as Jewish immigrants.
Haymann arrived in the Galilee in 1938 and spent years contributing to the transformation of a swamp into a sustainable kibbutz.
Haymann was among the Jewish 25,000 men and 3,000 women who stepped forward to volunteer for the British Army, many of whom had military training from learning to defend their kibbutzim.
“I thought life is not at the kibbutz at this very moment, but life is in the war,” Haymann said. “So that is when I decided to join the Jewish Brigade.”
Stories from Haymann’s military assignments in North Africa, Europe, and the Middle East bring together the remainder of the book. While getting swept up reading about his various assignments as a soldier, thoughts of the Land of Israel and Jews slightly fade into the broader subject of World War II until the Jewish roots of the story are brought back into sharper focus, such as when Haymann makes it his personal mission to visit the Great Synagogue of Rome after completing his assignment in the newly liberated city.
“Yes, this would also be a target for us tomorrow,” Haymann wrote, referring to the synagogue. “Because each soldier wages two wars – the official war, and his personal war, which can take many forms: collect as many medals as possible or conquer the most female hearts. Our private war was the Jewish war.”
Haymann highlighted details about the masses of survivors and displaced people not often discussed in the Holocaust, such as how aside from limited functioning trains, walking was the only form of transport, so millions of people walked weeks and months to return to their countries of origin.
When the war ended, Haymann was assigned to Trieste, where he was part of a unit uncovering Nazi collaborators disguised as refugee migrants, and he was recruited to work for Aliyah Bet, the code name for Holocaust survivors immigrating illegally.
“I immediately understood where my place was and where my priorities and loyalties were,” Haymann wrote. He would enter a refugee camp and give passes to elderly Jews seeking to return to their homes throughout Europe, and he helped the young Jews looking to start a new life in the US or Israel.
After VE-Day, Haymann traveled from Rome to Berlin, finding his uncle Fritz, who survived the Terezin concentration camp.
For twelve days, Haymann wrote, the two spoke of their stories for hours on end.
This interview was edited for length and clarity.
An interview with Rudi Haymann
The Jerusalem Report: You mention that you started putting together this book when you were in your seventies. What drove you to put your experiences into writing?
Rudi Haymann: I started to write this book when the Jewish German community of Santiago, Chile, decided to celebrate 60 years of existence. I found out I had many things to tell, but I didn’t do it. So I started collecting my memories, [including] through the writings I had done in my war diary, and writing experiences and stories, and improving them by a circle of future writers, and improving my style and my writing.
I wrote many stories, and when they did well I put them together and showed them to my daughters, my grandchildren, and to friends, and they thought that it should be given a more formal [structure].
Then I gave it to my history teacher at a local university, and he thought it might be fit to be edited and published.
JR: How did you come to learn about the kibbutz movement as a child in Berlin?
RH: All this Holocaust experience and the hunting of Jews as a youngster between ages 11 and 17 years made me think that there is more than just giving a life and trying to save your life, and life should have more meaning and to construct a future.
So I went and looked for [that] and found it in halutzim. That is when I joined the Jewish movement Hashomer Hatzair and became a kibbutznik when I came to Palestine. I could have gone to Canada or to England or any other country, but that was not enough for me. I wanted not just to get away [but] to have a better world.
JR: How did you balance your dual identities as a Jew and as a soldier in the British Army?
RH: The answer was given by David Ben-Gurion when he said, ‘Let’s forget about the White Paper for a moment.’ We saw there are some problems between British and Jewish ideology, but there’s a war on and we have a common adversary, so that is where we put our power and our initiative.
There was no time for arguing or political arguing. First it was the emergency of winning the war, and then see what’s coming.
JR: When you talk about prisoners, you touch on topics such as the Geneva Conventions, and stress that the British Army never had you torture or physically harm prisoners for information. Do you think the standards have changed?
RH: I think things have changed because war tactics have changed. At that time, there were very formal wars – with uniforms, with established proceedings. Today, war is on another level. At that time, it was clear that once you have a uniform, you earned certain respect from your adversary. It might be kept or it might not, but that was the spirit.
Today, there is what we call terrorism – that’s a new appearance, a new fact. So, how to act and how to evaluate maybe changed because tactics have changed.
JR: The book concludes with you traveling to Chile in 1948. What were some of the next steps you took in life?
RH: There was first of all to win the war, which I shared. Then came the end of the war, and I was seeing the real Holocaust. There, I decided that I was one of the lucky ones whose family was saved. To be a lucky one, I had my priority – to see my parents and sister again. This is why I didn’t stay in Palestine. When I went to Chile I started a new life, guided first by the beautiful fact of being a member of a family again, having parents and a sister. Then I could see what to do, how to work, how to live. There was no way of being a dairy farmer in Chile, so I decided to try a new path.
Since my childhood, I always wanted to be an architect. I couldn’t be because I didn’t even finish school, so here was a chance not to be an architect – because I didn’t have the knowledge or education – but there was a parallel way to work in the field. It was construction, [which] I didn’t like too much, but then I discovered there was the job of an interior designer, and that was a creative job close to architecture. I became an interior designer, which I worked in for 62 years until retirement. It was a beautiful, peaceful, life in this beautiful, friendly country.
JR: What is the Jewish community like in Chile?
RH: There is a very active Jewish community – a smaller one – about 17,000 or 18,000 Jews. Before that, Jewish history is immigration from Russia, from Poland at the end of the 1960s, and then the German and Central European immigration of German, Czech, Hungarian Jews to Chile. They organized very well and continue to be active and progressive. I am active as much as an old man can be, and so are my daughters.
Beyond Borders was initially published in Spanish. This review is based on the revised English edition, published in 2023.■
- Beyond Borders: Escaping the Holocaust and Fighting the Nazis
- Rudi Haymann
- Amsterdam Publishers, 2023
- 212 pages; $17