Inge Bernhard Part VII: The Civil War

Carlos worked with Ernst Liebes in El Salvador. In 1979, Ernst was kidnapped in the very same car which the two men used to share each morning and each afternoon.

Carlos went to the doctor that day.

Carlos was really under attack and under attack, you know, in a way, from terror. Because when Ernst Liebes was captivated [sic] from these—

Ruth: Terrorists.

(The guerrillas.)

—terrorists, Carlos could have been in the car with him. But that day that they took Ernst, Carlos called me and said, “Please take me home because I had to go to the skin doctor, and I don’t have a car. Ernst already left.”

Ruth: He was supposed to be in the car.

Then I picked him up, and that was his salvation. We didn’t know that they wanted to take Carlos also. Carlos was a Consul, Israeli Consul. Ernst was the Consul General, Carlos was the Consul. And we knew before, we had read in the New York Times that the terrorists wanted to take Israeli diplomats, Japanese and English, and—-so we were really in great danger. We could prove that, and when David wanted to become a citizen, we used that and he was really accepted as a citizen because of this. So he became a citizen and he could stay and become a lawyer without a problem.

(So he really—he became—he made his life in America?)

Yes.

(And Ariela eventually settled in America as well?)

Yes.

(After the kidnapping of Ernst Liebes, did you decide, “We have to get out of here. We have to leave immediately”? What was your reaction?)

We had told Ernst—we had gone to Israel before. We wanted—Carlos knew with the Parkinson’s he would not be a good asset to the farm any more, so we had gone to Israel to see if—to find a place to live and to see what furniture we should take. And when we came back from Israel, that was in December, we met Ernst in Miami. It was his birthday. Alice didn’t come, and we were the only people that he could celebrate his birthday with in Miami. And we told Ernst—actually, we didn’t want to tell him on his birthday. But when he came back to El Salvador, we told him we are leaving. Ernst was so upset that he said, “You cannot do this! You stayed with me forty years. You cannot leave the farm. You cannot leave me.”

Carlos gave in. David came on holiday from his school. He felt what was happening, that we were really in danger. He was very angry at us not to leave. He came and left for Miami, stayed with friends in Miami because of this.

We still stayed because of Ernst, and we could have been really kidnapped at that time. I don’t know whether Alice came. I think she came, and they got strange phone calls from somebody. They took the receiver and they didn’t hear anything, and put it down again. Sometimes there was some music. We got the same phone calls. So we thought that this was very strange. I was really afraid. I wanted to go. Carlos said, “No, we cannot do this to Ernst.” So the moment Ernst was kidnapped, we said, “This is it. We cannot stay any more. We have to leave.”

We arranged everything secretly, as secret as we could. Our maid, Alicia, took care of us. We didn’t have a second maid any more. Alicia warned us of the gardener who was living in a place where there were many people that we wouldn’t trust. So she said, “Don’t trust the gardener because he has bad intentions.” Then we closed our gate. Alicia went out of the gate before we wanted to leave and looked if there would be somebody. Because there was a car standing there the whole day sometimes, and we didn’t know why was he there, and we were really afraid of that.

So we knew we had to leave as soon as possible. I got the tickets. Carlos stayed home. He didn’t leave the house any more. All this story we told the immigration—David told the immigration officers afterward. This is how he became a citizen. Then we left.

We stayed one night at the Hamers’and the Pfeiffers came—
—with their car and picked us up and Carlos was lying on the ground of the car and the next day, the Hamers took us to the airport. I was still trembling. I really must say, I was afraid. But we boarded the plane and we left, and we never got back. Never. Carlos didn’t want to go back any more.

Then, we were in America already when we heard that Ernst had been killed. We went back to Miami for the funeral. David was with us. He had vacations. And after that, we went to New York to be with the children once more, and then we went to Israel, straight.

Transcription by Sandy Adler, Adler Enterprises LLC
Ruth Reich de Alpert participated in this section of the interview.