During cross-examination, when confronted with the fact that crematorium chimneys emit neither flames nor much smoke, Friedman eventually admitted that he didn’t really know any of that from personal experience, but that he had simply repeated what others had told him (ibid., p. 87):
“I don’t know if I would have listened to you. Some time I would have listened to other people, maybe I would have attached more credibility to your portion than theirs, but at the time I accepted theirs.”
When asked whether he ever heard rumors while in Auschwitz, Friedman answered: “Constantly”
