Shalom Nagar (Hebrew: שלום נגר; 1936 or 1938 – 26 November 2024) was a Yemeni-born Israeli prison guard known for executing war criminal and Nazi Party official Adolf Eichmann by hanging.
A member of the Israel Prison Service, Nagar was one of 22 guards assigned to Eichmann's security during his trial and imprisonment.
The prime minister at the time, David Ben-Gurion, ensured that the Eichmann guards were Sephardic, as he felt that Ashkenazi Jews whose families were killed in The Holocaust would be motivated to harm the prisoner.
While an official account states that there were two people who pulled a lever simultaneously to carry out the execution, Nagar did not recall anyone else being there.
He said that the loud gasping sound of air being released from the corpse's lungs made him feel that "the Angel of Death had come to take me too".
He claimed to have been the first to suggest that Moshe Levinger and the fourteen families who originally settled in Hebron be given living quarters converted from King Hussein's former stables.
[5] Nagar's identity as Eichmann's executioner was kept secret for 30 years due to fear of reprisals, until it was discovered and revealed by journalists in 1992.
At this time, Nagar was living at Kiryat Arba, an urban Israeli settlement in the West Bank, in which his was one of the founding families.
[9][6] He said that he was sworn to secrecy over the execution, but after Mossad chief Isser Harel had published a book about Eichmann's capture he felt he had nothing to fear, saying: "Besides, I was involved in the great mitzvah of wiping out Amalek".
The paper describes the "Jewish study hall" as being "anything but quiet", with "piles of books scattered all over and loud argumentative voices".
She explained: "Like the character played by Tom Hanks, Nagar improbably finds himself in the midst of historical events and meeting famous (infamous, really) people".
She concluded that "the look in Nagar's eyes [...] suggests more to this real-life character than religious platitudes and an affable nature".
[15][16] Library Journal said of the translation: "The weaving of past with present, fact with fiction brings Eichmann alive and even humanizes him, a feat that impressively expands our understanding of the Holocaust".