Israeli Agent Who Caught Eichmann Dies at 77

Peter Malkin, the Israeli agent who snatched Adolf Eichmann, the architect of the Holocaust, from the streets of Buenos Aires and took him to face trial in Israel, has died in New York at the age of 77.

Three years after the end of the second world war, Israel pledged to hunt down the Nazis responsible for the deaths of almost 6 million Jews. Heading the newly formed state's most-wanted list was Eichmann, Hitler's foremost expert on Jewish matters and the man who oversaw the Final Solution.

Malkin was one of the men sent by Mossad, the Israeli secret service, to hunt Eichmann down. He eventually found him wandering down a street in the Argentinian capital in 1960. According to his autobiography, Eichmann in My Hands, Malkin stepped up and said: " Un momentito, señor " (Just a moment, sir) - the only words he knew in Spanish. He then grabbed Eichmann's arm and wrestled him to the ground with the help of another agent.

Eichmann was interrogated for 10 days in a safe house before being spirited away to Israel on a diplomatic flight. In 1961, he was put on trial in Jerusalem for crimes against humanity and 14 other charges. He was executed in 1962.

Malkin was born Zvi Malchin in the British Mandate of Palestine, but the family moved to Poland when he was a boy. He returned to Palestine in 1936, unlike his sister. She was later killed in the Holocaust with some 150 relatives.

At the age of 12, Malkin joined the Palestine Jewish underground and later became a member of Mossad. He served for 27 years, becoming a master of martial arts.

The cause of his death is not yet known.