DNA and the Holocaust: Can we identify the relatives of the victims?

THE recent emergence of DNA research has proven itself a mighty key in the ongoing struggle to solve once impenetrable mysteries.

In Colorado alone, information derived from DNA has absolved people convicted of terrible crimes, convicted others of such crimes, and restored a name to a Jane Doe who perished at a murderer’s hand more than half a century ago.

Next week in Denver, Jews will have the opportunity to use this new but already powerful science to unlock some mysteries of the Holocaust.

On Thursday, March 11, 6:30 p.m., at Congregation Emanuel, the DNA Shoah Project will make its first foray into Colorado.

The project’s research coordinator, Matthew Kaplan, will give a presentation explaining the program and detailing in layman’s terms some of the science behind it.

Afterwards, eligible participants will be given the opportunity to provide a personal DNA sample — involving nothing more than swabbing the inside of the cheek with a cotton swab — so that it may be entered into a rapidly growing database.

The purpose of the sample, and of the entire DNA Shoah Project itself, is to put the mighty key of DNA research to use on yet another crime —  perhaps the greatest crime of all time.

THE DNA Shoah Project got underway in 2006, the brainchild of geneticist-turned-philanthropist Syd Mandle?baum, a second generation Holocaust survivor who became fascinated the idea of using genetic research as a Holocaust research tool.

Joining with a team of top geneticists, and basing the project at the University of Arizona, Mandlebaum’s non-profit DNA Shoah Project is currently in the first phase of its mission — amassing as large a database of genetic markers as possible.

That is precisely what will bring the project to Denver next week, in an event co-sponsored by the Jewish Genealogical Society of Colorado, Temple Emanuel, Hadassah and Colorado Child Survivors of the Holocaust.

After already collecting many thousands of markers from large Jewish communities across the world, the project is finally turning its attention to mid-sized Jewish communities such as Denver’s.

Eventually, when the genetic database gathered by DNA Shoah is of sufficient size, the project will begin seeking genetic matches, using DNA decoding to determine whether any two participants in the program are genetically related.

Dramatic decreases in the cost of DNA research in recent years have made a project of this scope possible, says Ellen Shindelman Kowitt, president of the Jewish Genealogical Society of Colorado and unofficial overseer of next week’s event.

That practical cost makes it possible to gather a database sufficiently large to make finding matches a tangible possibility.

What that means, in down-to-earth terms, is that members of families separated by the Holocaust have a real chance of finding one another, despite the passage of time.

A sibling reunion, for example, “is an absolute possibility,” Kowitt says.

“We see that with people who are just using the traditional Jewish genealogy resources, things like the Pages of Testimony at Yad Vashem and databases that the US Holocaust Memorial Museum and JewishGen have created.”

“There are amazing success stories that are still happening,” Kowitt says, adding that genetic testing can significantly increase the chances of such success.

“I consider this the latest tool — the next thing that you can try when you’re searching for answers.”

The DNA Shoah database also means that persons who went missing after the Holocaust — but who managed to survive — might actually be identified, such as Jewish children who were adopted by gentile families.

“They’re trying to help anyone who falls into that orphan category, which some of the child survivors definitely do,” Kowitt says.

“The orphans of the Holocaust were children who were probably too young to know even their names in some cases when they were separated from their parents. Many of them were raised by gentiles. Their names were changed.

“Some of them may have been told by their Catholic Polish, fill-in-the-blank adoptive families, that they were Jews, but they might not know anything more.

“It could give them some answers about who they are, perhaps match them to a living relative they didn’t know about, give them an identity. If there’s a match, then there could be a living relative or at least there could be information about who they are.”

THE project also carries the potential to identify at least some of those who perished during the Holocaust through forensic identifications.

This particular area remains fraught with uncertainty, Kowitt acknowledges.

Although some European governments have gathered forensic material from mass graves connected to the Holocaust, both officially and unofficially, it can be a very sensitive subject.

“It’s a religious issue,” Kowitt says. “I don’t know if any of the rabbis are going to show up for this lecture, but I would be very interested in their perspective. The whole idea of exhuming Jewish remains is a no-no. It has happened in Europe, sometimes by accident, sometimes intentionally.

“For a Jewish scientific research project to go in and say, ‘we’ve got this DNA and now we want the opportunity for someone to collect war reparations or prove without a doubt that someone died so that their kids can qualify for a scholarship or something,’ I don’t know whether that becomes a religious question — whether it can be done or should be done.”

Although DNA Shoah promises participants that all of the genetic material it collects will be used exclusively for the purposes of this study — and not exchanged or used for any other research — its mission statement holds out the hope that its database will one day “be able to assist European governments with Holocaust-era forensic identifications.”

THE DNA Shoah project is using a form of DNA testing known as autosomal DNA, which sits on the cutting edge of current research. This approach dramatically increases the number of familial matches that can be confirmed.

Kowitt provides a little background.

“About 10 years ago, DNA testing became the new tool, the latest and greatest in how to research Jewish family history,” she says.

“There were a bunch of companies that popped up early. The kind of DNA they tested was either mitochondrial or patrilineal. You could trace your mother’s line — your mother’s mother’s mother — or your father’s line — your father’s father’s father. Males can test both their father’s and mother’s lines but females can only test their mother’s line.”

Gradually replacing this “limited tool for genealogical research” is the autosomal approach.

“Four or five years ago, DNA Shoah popped up on the lecture circuit for the international genealogical community,” she says. “Instead of just talking about using DNA for a commercial company to test and find distant relatives through the mitochondrial or patrilineal DNA, this company was saying they were going to use autosomal testing, which is not limited to just the mother’s mother or the father’s father.

“It crosses 22 chromosomes so it enables you to connect with cousins and aunts and uncles. It’s a broader type of sampling.”

And it has a considerably broader application, especially when paired with the kind of database the DNA Shoah project is collecting.

The first level of eligibility for DNA Shoah constitutes those with the most direct link to the Holocaust — “survivors, their descendants and the second generation,” Kowitt says.

“The thing that’s different about autosomal testing is that the sampling is actually better if more people from the same identified family cluster test.

“In local terms, if a survivor comes but they also have a sibling or child or grandchild who lives in Denver, they should come and test together so that their samples are linked in the database together. Having more than one from the same family will help them to more strongly match to someone with a similar DNA.”

Those eligible, however, need not be linked directly to survivors, their children or grandchildren.

“There’s a second group that’s important, and I fall into this group,” Kowitt points out.

“We’re looking for people who are either pre-war immigrants of the Holocaust generation — and we realize that they would be very old at this point — or their descendants.”

She uses her own family tree to illustrate.

“I qualify as a descendant because my grandfather was a pre-war immigrant of that generation. My grandfather left Russia during the pogroms, so he was more of a 1919 to 1925 sort of immigrant.  But he had siblings who stayed in Russia and they were victims of the Holocaust.

“Theoretically, I could have second or third cousins who survived or were victims in a mass grave whose remains at some point could be tested.”

Kowitt acknowledges that precisely defining “pre-war immigrant” can be a little tricky.

“I always define it as pre-war of the Holocaust generation,” she says.

“Even though my grandfather was born in 1902 and by 1941 he was 39, he happened to have younger siblings who were teenagers. So every family is different. It’s hard to define a precise timeframe. If you had to put a number on it, you could go back to something like 1870.”

That is a fairly loosely-defined eligibility group — one that likely encompasses a significant portion of the Colorado Jewish community — and Kowitt encourages everyone with such a family history to consider giving a sample.

Even those with Sephardic roots, or families whose ancestors have lived in the US since the middle of the 19th century — demographic groups less likely to get results relating to the Holocaust — should consider coming to Temple Emanuel next week.

“They are less likely to find connections, but that possibility remains. Besides, the whole process is quite interesting, so why not just come and give a test? In fact, people should come even if they’re not certain that they’re eligible to test.”

It’s all about the numbers, Kowitt reminds.

“The more combinations, the more likely a second or third cousin would match to their combination.”

That’s one of the reasons why next week’s event will be a no-fee, all are invited affair. The idea is to make it as easy as possible to participate.

A SKEPTIC, of course, might say that looking for a DNA match in a project like this offers odds roughly equal to finding a needle in a haystack.

“And an optimist would say it doesn’t cost you anything except a few hours of your time to show up and do it,” says Kowitt. “So why not? Even if you’re not a candidate to test, it’s still fascinating science.”

As a volunteer genealogist who has already spent decades in the field, Kowitt has witnessed quantum leaps in genealogy.

“I remember when there was no Internet and if you did genealogy you were going through the archives and scrolling microfilm and looking at little cards.

It was pretty labor intensive.

“In my adult lifetime, in 20 years, we’ve gone from that to the Internet. And volunteers have been adding, exponentially, all this data.

“The amount of data seems to double every year so even if you looked at the Internet 15 years ago, it would be a shock how much you would find today. No one expected the Internet to open up so much in terms of research.

“I put DNA into the same category. When this DNA thing started, no one realized when they mapped the human genome that we were going to have this one, big, world family tree that can be used for all kinds of applications.”

For information on the March 11 DNA Shoah event, and on a JGSC follow-up on March 28 at Temple Sinai, contact Ellen Shindleman Kowitt, 720-221-6858.