Editing Treblinka extermination camp (section)

===Court exhibits and affidavits===
[[File:Daily deportations to Treblinka.jpg|frameless|right|upright=2|Daily deportations to Treblinka]]
The Treblinka trials of the 1960s took place in [[Düsseldorf]] and produced the two official West German estimates. During the 1965 trial of Kurt Franz, the Court of Assize in Düsseldorf concluded that at least 700,000 people were murdered at Treblinka, following a report by Dr. [[Helmut Krausnick]], director of the [[Institute of Contemporary History (Munich)|Institute of Contemporary History]].<ref name="nizkor.org">{{cite web |url=http://www.nizkor.org/faqs/reinhard/reinhard-faq-13.html |publisher=Operation Reinhard: Treblinka Deportations |title=First Treblinka Trial |year=1968 |access-date=8 January 2014 |work=Excerpts From Judgments |archive-date=23 September 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20130923030356/http://www.nizkor.org/faqs/reinhard/reinhard-faq-13.html |url-status=dead }} Source: [[Alexander Donat|Donat, Alexander]] (1979), The Death Camp Treblinka: A Documentary, New York, pp. 296–316. Decision of the Düsseldorf County Court (AZ-LG Düsseldorf: II-931638, p. 49 ff.) in translation</ref> During Franz Stangl's trial in 1969, the same court reassessed the number to be at least 900,000 after new evidence from Dr. [[Wolfgang Scheffler (historian)|Wolfgang Scheffler]].{{sfn|Donat|1979|p=14}}{{sfn|Kopówka|Rytel-Andrianik|2011|p=114}}

A chief witness for the prosecution at Düsseldorf in the 1965, 1966, 1968 and 1970 trials was [[Franciszek Ząbecki]], who was employed by the ''Deutsche Reichsbahn'' as a rail traffic controller at Treblinka village from 22 May 1941.<ref name="Ząbecki 1977">{{cite book |last=Ząbecki |first=Franciszek |author-link=Franciszek Ząbecki |title=Wspomnienia dawne i nowe |trans-title=Old and New Memories |year=1977 |publisher=[[PAX Association|PAX]] |location=Warsaw |page=148 |id=PB 7495/77 |language=pl |url=http://www.swistak.pl/a6143172,Wspomnienia-dawne-i-nowe-Franciszek-Zabecki.html |quote=Book description with digitized text samples at ''Swistak.pl''. |access-date=31 October 2013 |url-status=bot: unknown |archive-url=https://archive.today/20130820031136/http://www.swistak.pl/a6143172,Wspomnienia-dawne-i-nowe-Franciszek-Zabecki.html |archive-date=20 August 2013}}</ref> In 1977 he published his book ''Old and New Memories'',<ref name="Wiścicki-MHP">{{cite web |url=http://www.muzhp.pl/artykuly/1059/stacja-tuz-obok-piekla-treblinka-w-relacji-franciszka-zabeckiego.html |title=Stacja tuż obok piekła. Treblinka w relacji Franciszka Ząbeckiego |trans-title=Train station to hell. Treblinka retold by Franciszek Ząbecki |publisher=Muzeum Historii Polski (Museum of Polish history) |quote=''Source:'' [[Franciszek Ząbecki]], "Wspomnienia dawne i nowe", Pax Publishing, Warsaw 1977 |date=16 April 2013 |access-date=14 August 2013 |author=Wiścicki, Tomasz |archive-date=6 October 2013 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131006052152/http://www.muzhp.pl/artykuly/1059/stacja-tuz-obok-piekla-treblinka-w-relacji-franciszka-zabeckiego.html |url-status=live }}</ref> in which he used his own records to estimate that at least 1,200,000 people were murdered at Treblinka.{{sfn|Donat|1979|p=14}}<ref name="Zabecki-Treblinka" /> His estimate was based on the maximum capacity of a trainset during the ''Grossaktion'' Warsaw of 1942 rather than its yearly average.<ref name="The Ministry">{{cite book |title=The trial of Adolf Eichmann: record of proceedings in the District Court of Jerusalem, Volume 5 |page=2158 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=-JDjAAAAMAAJ&q=5%2C000+train+per+day |author=Bet ha-mishpaṭ ha-meḥozi (Jerusalem) |year=1994 |publisher=Trust for the Publ. of the Proceedings of the Eichmann Trial |isbn=9789652790149 |access-date=20 September 2020 |archive-date=16 August 2021 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210816212729/https://books.google.com/books?id=-JDjAAAAMAAJ&q=5%2C000+train+per+day |url-status=live }}</ref> The original German [[waybill]]s in his possession did not have the number of prisoners listed.<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.holocaustresearchproject.net/ar/treblinka/trebdocs.html |title=Documents Related to the Treblinka Death Camp |publisher=Holocaust Research Project.org |year=2007 |access-date=10 August 2014 |author1=Holocaust Education |author2=Archive Research Team|name-list-style=amp |quote=''Bundesarchiv – Fahrplanordnung 567''. |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20141017001752/http://www.holocaustresearchproject.net/ar/treblinka/trebdocs.html |archive-date=17 October 2014}}</ref> Ząbecki, a Polish member of railway staff before the war, was one of the few non-German witnesses to see most transports that came into the camp; he was present at the Treblinka station when the first Holocaust train arrived from Warsaw.<ref name="Zabecki-Treblinka">{{cite web |url=http://www.holocaustresearchproject.org/revolt/zabecki.html |title=Franciszek Zabecki – The Station Master at Treblinka. Eyewitness to the Revolt – 2 August 1943 |publisher=Holocaust Education & Archive Research Team |work=H.E.A.R.T |year=2007 |access-date=14 August 2013 |author=S.J. C.L. H.E.A.R.T |archive-date=25 March 2014 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140325042843/http://www.holocaustresearchproject.org/revolt/zabecki.html |url-status=live }}</ref> Ząbecki was a member of the ''Armia Krajowa'' (Polish: Home Army), which formed most of the [[Polish resistance movement in World War II]], and kept a daily record of the extermination transports. He also clandestinely photographed the burning Treblinka II perimeter during the uprising in August 1943. Ząbecki witnessed the last set of five enclosed freight wagons carrying ''Sonderkommandos'' to the Sobibór gas chambers on 20 October 1943.<ref name="Grzesik-Lublin 2011">{{cite web |url=http://alija.4me.pl/pdf/PK-%20%20Zaglada%20Zydow.pdf |title=Holocaust – Zaglada Zydów (1939–1945) |publisher=Liber Duo S.C. |quote=''Source:'' Ząbecki, Franciszek, "Wspomnienia dawne i nowe", Warszawa 1977. s. 94–95 |year=2011 |access-date=14 August 2013 |author=Grzesik, Julian |page=13 |archive-date=15 October 2017 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20171015150246/http://alija.4me.pl/pdf/PK-%20%20Zaglada%20Zydow.pdf |url-status=dead }}</ref> In 2013, his son Piotr Ząbecki wrote an article about him for ''Życie Siedleckie'' that revised the number to 1,297,000.<ref name="Piotr">{{cite web |url=http://zyciesiedleckie.pl/zyciowe-sprawy/7509-byl-skromnym-czlowiekiem# |title=Był skromnym człowiekiem |trans-title=He was a humble man |date=12 December 2013 |author=Piotr Ząbecki |publisher=Życie Siedleckie |page=21 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20131219001325/http://zyciesiedleckie.pl/zyciowe-sprawy/7509-byl-skromnym-czlowiekiem |archive-date=19 December 2013}}</ref> Ząbecki's daily records of transports to the camp, and demographic information regarding the number of people deported from each ghetto to Treblinka, were the two main sources for estimates of the death toll.{{sfn|Kopówka|Rytel-Andrianik|2011|p=114}}

In his 1987 book ''Belzec, Sobibor, Treblinka: The Operation Reinhard Death Camps'', Israeli historian Yitzhak Arad stated that at least 763,000 people were murdered at Treblinka between July 1942 and April 1943.{{sfn|Arad|1987|p=223}} A considerable number of other estimates followed: see [[Treblinka extermination camp#Table of estimates|table]] (below).