Day Yoimie Snippets .... Arachin 7,8,9, 10, 11, 12 & 13

A great opportunity for the entire family, to share some thoughts on the daf ...  the  family feels united by discussing what the head of the house is studying.
I try to break it down so that everyone can understand it .... 

You can copy and print this without my consent, since Torah belongs to all of us..... 

See  previous Daf Yoimie Snippets 

This week's "Daf Yoimie Snippets Sponsored For the Refuah Shliemah of 

צארטל בת אסתר מלכה 

''דף ז' ''נודד ערכין      

Page 7  Mesectas Arachin

''A Vow of Valuation "

A needy individual who makes a Neder Arachin, saying:

"Erki alai" "I vow to consecrate .. the sum of my own value" but does not have enough money to pay the sum stipulated in the Torah for one who proclaims this vow, must appear before the kohein to assess his financial situation and determine what sum that individual will have to pay.

However, an individual who makes an "Erki alai" vow was never permitted to pay less than one sela coin. 

Likewise, an individual who makes a Neder Arachin never paid more than 50 sela, which is the maximum specified by the Torah.

Press "read more" right below to see rest of the dafim

Neturei Karta Are "Menachim Aveil" Family of Palestinian Terrorist

A group of Neturei Karta savages went to the Palestinian neighborhood of Isawiya in East Jerusalem to express their condolences to the family of a terrorist who was killed while attempting to kill an Israeli soldier.

The dead terrorist also was involved in planning shooting attacks on Israelis in the past but that did not stop the Neturei Karta barbarians from expressing their sympathies to the terrorist’s family.

Israeli Police Learned How to Pull Protestors By the Peyois From the Rebbes of the Yeshivos !

Recently the Chareidim are going berserk accusing the Mishtara of "Nazi Behaviors" because  they pulled a Chareidie protester by his peyois!

Well...... not so fast guys....

I'm not condoning it .... but this minhag.... comes from an old "minhag yisroel" of rebbes puling the peyos of their talmidim in Yeshivah Ketana!

The Chareidim are also accusing the Police of a double standard ...

That they use force against the illegal Chareidie Protesters and do nothing with the Ethiopian protests!

I say ....

Hashem also judges Tzaddikim כחוט השערה

If you are a "ben Torah" behave like one... 

When we were children our parents used to say that "bnei Torah" are judged more severely ...........

Metal Straws May Be Great for the Planet, But They Can Also KILL You.

Reusable metal straws may be good for the planet, but they can also kill you.

The November 2018 death of Broadstone, England, resident Elena Struthers-Gardner has just been ruled accidental. According to the Daily Echo, the 60-year-old woman collapsed in her kitchen while holding a glass — whose 10-inch steel straw drove through her left eye socket and pierced her brain.

Specifically, Struthers-Gardner was carrying a jar-style glass with a screw-top lid that held the straw in place.

R' Reuven Bauman MISSING! Rebbe/Counselor Swept Out To Sea At Virginia Beach

Emergency personnel continued their search as night fell, for a Rebbe (counselor) at a day camp in Norfolk Virginia who was swept out to sea, early Tuesday afternoon.

Tefillos were being recited around the globe for Reuven Tzvi ben Esther Baila who went missing in the water off False Cape State Park Tuesday afternoon.

Emergency dispatchers say they received a call reporting a drowning at the park, located at 4001 Sandpiper Road in Virginia Beach. The caller said two people had been in the water. One was 35 years old. The other was an 11-year-old student.

WVEC reports that the teacher was with a group of 20 students when he saw one of the struggling in the water so he went into help. The student was able to get out, but the teacher has not been located.

The missing person has been named as Rabbi Reuven Bauman. He is a Rebbi at Yeshiva Toras Chaim in Norfolk Virginia.

An MH-60 Jayhawk helicopter aircrew from Coast Guard Air Station Elizabeth City, N.C. and a 45-foot Response Boat-Medium boatcrew from Coast Guard Station Little Creek are currently searching for the man. Crews from the Virginia Beach Fire Department and the Virginia Marine Police are also assisting with the search.

Emergency personnel from the New York area are mobilizing to head to the area to assist in the search and recovery. A large trained team from “Hatzolah Air” are scheduled to depart NY on Wednesday morning and will assist the search by air, land and sea. 

A team from Rockland Chaveirim are mobilizing as well, including special sonar equipment used to search underwater.

KOSHER SEX IN TEL AVIV

BY SHMULEY BOTEACH

 Last week, The Jerusalem Post ran a story on my daughter Chana, who recently opened the world’s first Kosher Sex store. 

The first one is in Tel Aviv. She trusts there will be many other actual stores to complement the online sites of Kosher.Sex and SensualRevolution.com, from which the store stems.

The store was opened to coincide with the new 20th anniversary edition of Kosher Sex, the book I published in 1999 that at the time was extremely controversial but has, two decades after its original appearance, gone mainstream.

“I wanted to open a store that is more of a boutique; that promotes sensuality and intimacy between couples in a framework of Jewish values,” my daughter Chana told reporter Hannah Brown, who then asked her whether her father approves of the Tel Aviv and online store.

My daughter answered that I gave the store “my blessing.” I was not aware of the story or its content until it appeared and now that I have read it, I feel I must comment.

Outrage At Associated Press That Targeted Jewish American Who Supports Israel

Simon Falic

Last week, the Associated Press ran a hit job on a successful American businessman. 

Simon Falic and his two brothers own the Duty Free Americas chain, a private company that runs duty free stores in airports throughout the United States and Latin America.

They also happen to be Jewish. Simon Falic in particular is a powerful advocate for Jewish causes worldwide and for the State of Israel.

Through their family foundation, Simon Falic and his wife donate to dozens of organizations in Israel. The causes they support run the gamut from medical research to Jewish education. They support synagogue construction and refurbishment; archaeological excavations and preservation of archaeological sites; battered women’s shelters and day care centers; and the construction of new Jewish communities in Israel.

AP’s hit piece centers on Falic’s charitable work.

The title of the article gave the game away. It read, “U.S. duty free owners give millions to settlements.”

The obvious question is: so what? 

There is nothing even vaguely illegal about Falic’s charitable undertakings. And indeed, the article doesn’t accuse him of committing or facilitating any crime.

Jews Upset Because Some "Shvartzah" Florida School Principal Says He Cannot Take A Position On The Holocaust

A "Shvartzah" high school principal in Boca Raton, Florida told a parent that inquired about the school’s educational plan for teaching the Holocaust that “Not everyone believes the Holocaust happened.”

Spanish River Community High School principal William Latson in an email in April 2018 first told the parent, that “the curriculum is to be introduced but not forced upon individuals as we all have the same rights but not all the same beliefs.”

The exchange of emails was first reported by the Palm Beach Post, which obtained the emails through a public records request.

When the parent, who is not named in the report to protect the identity of her child, asked the principal to clarify his remarks, telling him that the Holocaust is a “factual, historical event,” he doubled down saying: “you have your thoughts, but we are a public school and not all of our parents have the same beliefs.” He said that as a school district employee he cannot take a position on the Holocaust.

The school with about 2,500 students is said to have one of the county’s largest Jewish student populations in the county, according to the report.

In a statement to The Post, Latson, who has been principal since 2011, apologized, saying his email “did not accurately reflect my professional and personal commitment to educating all students about the atrocities of the Holocaust.”

The school’s educational offerings on the Holocaust exceed the state’s requirements, according to Latson, though not all of the offerings actually take place in the classroom. The parent proposed a change, adopted this school year, which has every 10th grader read “Night” by Elie Wiesel.

Latson was not disciplined for his emails.

3,000 Year-Old Town Where Dovid Ha'Melech Hid From Shaul Found

Researchers from the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, the Israel Antiquities Authority and Macquarie University in Sydney, Australia, believe they have discovered the Philistine town near Kiryat Gat, immortalized in the Biblical narrative.

Ziklag is mentioned multiple times in the Bible in relation to David (in 1 Samuel and 2 Samuel).

 According to the Biblical narrative, Achish, King of Gat, allowed David to find refuge in Ziklag while fleeing King Saul and from there David also departed to be anointed King in Hebron. 

According to scripture, Ziklag was also the scene of a dramatic event, in which the Amalekites, desert nomads, raided and burned the town taking women and children captive.

Chaim Binyomin Biegeleisen 11-year-old Dies After Being Hit in "Hit And Run" in Yerushalyim

An 11-year-old boy who was severely hurt in a hit-and-run in Jerusalem in April succumbed to his injuries on Sunday, the hospital said.

Chaim Binyamin Biegeleisen was struck by a car in the Ramot neighborhood in north Jerusalem on the Passover holiday.

The suspected driver, Netanel Sandrusi, 23, fled the scene and turned himself in a week later, following a manhunt. The abandoned car was found hours after the accident near a West Bank settlement adjacent to the city.

Sandrusi, a Jerusalem resident, turned himself in to authorities, but has maintained his innocence and initially said he didn’t know police were looking for him since he is religious and isn’t exposed to “secular media.”

He was charged with the fatal accident, while a passenger in the car, Meir Gamliel, stands accused of taking the wheel after the collision and fleeing the scene.

Ehud Barak Preaches Satmar’s ‘Three Oaths’ Line Against Zionism

Score this one in favor of the argument that the extremists on either side of any debate are bound to meet sooner or later. 

We’ve gotten used to extreme anti-Zionists such as Neturei Karta collaborating with the worst anti-Semites in Tehran, but we did not expect the former IDF chief of staff, former prime minister and former defense minister Ehud Barak to start citing the traditional Satmar anti-Zionist line. 

Well, he did, on Sunday morning, and it’s not clear at this point whether or not he had been to either of the Rabbis Teitelbaums’ tish on Shabbat.

Here is what Barak said verbatim on Reshet Bet radio Sunday morning, on the occasion of announcing the official name of his new party (Democratic Israel), starts around min. 5:

“The extreme right has diverted the ship of Israel to directions against which the Talmud has already warned us, about two catastrophes that have happened in history as a result of such a policy of false messianism, which pushes to usher in the end, and tries to dictate to God Almighty a schedule of when to send the Messiah; which storm the wall and provokes world powers and sows baseless hatred. These three Talmudic prohibitions are transgressed every day by people wearing kippot and priding themselves on their title of rabbis, but in fact, they falsify and distort Judaism, Zionism and Israelism.”

Holy red heifer.

Grown "Men" In Bet Shemesh Interfere With Crew That Remove Grafittee Calling Mayor Aliza Bloch "Hitler"

Authorities clean up graffiti in Beit Shemesh appearing to say "Aliza Bloch is Hitler" 

Nooooooooo! These weren't kids looking for trouble... these weren't kids bored out of their minds ...

These were "grown men" married barbarians who were interfering with the cleaning crews........

These are the same guys that schnoor every day in the shuls in Bet Shemesh Alef and Gimmel ..

Ye! let's keep funding these miserable parasites!

Minor scuffles broke out Friday in Beit Shemesh between the police and ultra-Orthodox demonstrators as authorities cleaned up graffiti against the Jerusalem-area city’s mayor.

Video footage showed a group of ultra-Orthodox men approaching an official cleaning the graffiti, while police officers tried to stop them. In a second video, shoving could be seen as the police tried to keep the demonstrators away.

The graffiti in Hebrew appeared to read “Aliza Bloch = Hitler.”

According to the Kan public broadcaster, the graffiti seemed to be in protest of the demolishing of an illegally built synagogue in the city earlier in the week.

A photo of other graffiti purportedly from the city labeled Bloch a “terrorist” over the demolition.

“To call Aliza Bloch, the mayor of Beit Shemesh, a terrorist is grave incitement and we can’t be silent,” centrist Blue and White MK Yair Lapid wrote on Twitter.

Lapid called on police to probe the graffiti and arrest whoever was behind it. “Terrorists are people who murder not a mayor in Israel,” he said.

Bloch, a religious Zionist woman, was elected Beit Shemesh’s first female mayor last year in a runoff against ultra-Orthodox incumbent Moshe Abutbol.

Beit Shemesh in recent years has seen conflict between ultra-Orthodox, non-ultra-Orthodox and secular residents over restrictions on women’s dress and gender-segregated seating on public buses. In a widely publicized incident in 2011, an 8-year-old Orthodox girl was spat on by ultra-Orthodox men on her way to school for her perceived immodest dress.

Will "Off the Derech" be the Greatest "Kiddush Hashem?

by 

RIVKAH LAMBERT ADLER

Yerachmiel Ziegler finally found his happy place in Israel. But it wasn’t a smooth ride to his current destination.

Born and raised Orthodox in Monsey, NY, Ziegler first visited Israel on a family trip when he was seven. “I remember being one of the first people to go on the Kotel tunnel tours. I had an uncle who was one of the excavators. That left an impression on me,” he recalled.

He has visceral memories of Bnei Brak as a child. “It smelled like a different country. The old buildings were on stilts. Everything there reminded me [that] I was in a different world.”

Ziegler started his musical career early in life. Inspired by older brothers who auditioned for the Tzlil V’zemer Boy’s Choir, Ziegler joined at age seven, two years younger than the choir’s minimum age.

"MAD Magazine" Closes ... Was Infused With Jewish Humor!

Mad Magazine’s gap-toothed mascot, Alfred E. Neuman, always said, “What? Me Worry?” and now there is really nothing left to trouble him, as the iconoclastic humor magazine announced it is shutting down after nearly 70 years of publication.

The magazine said Wednesday that its next issue would no longer be available on newsstands and would only be sold to subscribers, and that subsequent issues would feature only previously published content.

Day Yoimie Snippets ... Bechoros Dafim 60 ,61 ... Arachin 2,3,4, 5 & 6

A great opportunity for the entire family, to share some thoughts on the daf ...  the  family feels united by discussing what the head of the house is studying.
I try to break it down so that everyone can understand it .... 

You can copy and print this without my consent, since Torah belongs to all of us..... 

See  previous Daf Yoimie Snippets 

This week's "Daf Yoimie Snippets Sponsored For the Refuah Shliemah of 

צארטל בת אסתר מלכה 

''דף ס' ''שתי בהמות יחד      

Page 60  Mesectas Bechoros  

''Two Animals Together "

Is it possible for someone to set aside a pair of animals as Ma'aser simultaneously?

On this daf, Rabbi Yochanan says that if a person leads cattle out of an animal pen and two animals exit simultaneously, the person should continue to lead the animals in pairs.

The two animals exiting together as the tenth pair are both deemed sacred and consecrated as Ma'aser Beheimah.

Press "read more" right below to see rest of the dafim

25th Year Yurzeit of the Rebbe of Lubavitch!

"מה זרעו בחיים - אף הוא בחיים"

    

Twenty-five years is enough time to pause and reflect. This is what Jews around the world are doing this Shabbat as they observe the 25th yahrzeit of the Lubavitcher Rebbe, Menachem Mendel Schneerson. For hassidim who stood in the New York cemetery that ominous day, it’s almost unfathomable that so much time has passed.
 

I remember the funeral vividly. With thousands gathered in the cemetery, I was standing inside the ohel, the granite-walled grave site, with some 75 others as the Rebbe was interred near his father-in-law and predecessor, Rabbi Yosef Yitzhak Schneerson. After listening to the Rebbe’s secretaries recite a tearful Kaddish, there was an eerie silence. We stood there, wondering what was next, still unbelieving and filled with unasked questions about how we as a community, as hassidim, could proceed. 

Rabbanut Nullifies "Heter Meah Rabbanim" of Michael Eizenbach the Get Refuser

This guy, Michael Eizenbach , is a Toldos Aaron Chasid ... the Chassidus that wear the "Golden Bekeshes" ! 

He is a father of 5 and refuses to give his wife a "get."

First he went to the Eida Ha'chareidis and they told him that he must divorce his wife .... so he ran to the Rabbanut...and they told him that he cannot leave his wife an Agunah and must give her a "get!"

So he ran to Europe where he somehow convinced some old Rebbele to give him a "Heter Meah Ra'bonnim" and married someone else!

As you probably know that Biblically a man can have many wives, but once the "Issur Rabbeiny Gershon" kicked in, the rabbis forbade a guy to have another one ....

So what do you do, if a guy winds up with a woman that he claimes is insane?

 The rabbis came up with a loophole...that if the husband manages to get 100 rabbis to sign off, they allow him to remarry !

What they do then is put the "Get" in escrow and the wife can pick up the "get" in Bais Din anytime she wants ....

Not so fast.....

The husband can put all kinds of conditions and restrictions on the "get in escrow"...and that's exactly what this menuval did ...

When the wife came to the Bais Din in Europe to collect her "get" they gave her so many conditions that it made it impossible for her to claim it ...

A similar story as with the EVIL RASHA Meir Kin

But this time he met his match and the Rabbanut in Israel nullified the "Heter Meah Rabbanim" on the basis that he got the Heter under false pretenses....

And so now... the Eizenbach guy is fighting the Rabbanut ...

Good Luck!

Have the "Chareidim Traffic Stoppers" Learned Anything From the Ethiopian Violent Protests?

A Jew answers a question with a question.....

The question .... is .. What did the Ethiopians accomplish with their violent protests?

Not only have they not accomplished anything, but they caused an avalanche of hatred and racism that hasn't been experienced in Israel since its creation.
It brought out the worst in people, and I'm not talking about the worst of the Ethiopians .... but the worst in the average guy!
The controversy if they are even Jewish is coming up again...since no one has seen such violence emanating from Jewish DNA!

60,000 people were stranded on the roads for hours, we still don't know the untold tragedies that occurred because of not being able to move ...

But what is surprising is that last night, the Auerbach Crazies, were also demonstrating ..... in Bnei Brak ...holding up traffic until the police arrived and beat the hell out of them...
It didn't make the news because the "Ethiopian Protests" sucked the oxygen out of the news cycle!

But in the shuls in Israel, and the Chareidie Newsletters, there was debate why the police "beat the Chareidim and not the Ethiopians."

First of all, we now know that it is a big lie spread by the Chareidim...
The police after two hours were given orders to use force against the Ethiopians... and wow...did they use force!

But my question is now to the Chareidim ...
Have you not seen that there is no sympathy for the Ethiopians at all now??

Now that they let the entire nation knows of their grievances ...is anyone going to do anything??

I am sure that a lot of Auerbach Crazies got stuck on the roads when the Ethiopians rioted ...
I wonder how they enjoyed that? 
Do they have any sympathies for the "shvartzas" because they made you sit for hours in traffic?

In one of the Charedie Newsletters it was reported that a Chareidie lady sitting in a regular car on the way to the hospital in Bnei Brak and who was in traffic because of the Auerbach Crazies ... lost her unborn child!.....
Another person who was going to dialysis became very sick and had to be helicoptered to Shaarei Tzedek because they wouldn't let the car thru...
I am happy to hear that the Chareidie Newspapers are no longer keeping these tragic awful stores quiet ... but publicizing them ..and maybe now ..... the "oilim goilim" .... will take these Auerbach Crazies for who they are ... a bunch of hooligans ...
and all this came about because of the Ethiopian Violent protests ....

‘Politics is not for women,’ Rabbi Shlomo Aviner

A leading religious-Zionist rabbi in Israel rejected the possibility of asking former Justice Minister Ayelet Shaked to head the Union of Right Wing Parties because “politics is not for women.”

Rabbi Shlomo Aviner was one of dozens of rabbis who signed a letter objecting to seeing Shaked named head of the Jewish Home Party, and thus the union. Shaked is secular.

“The composition of the party list is a statement that expresses our priorities, and this statement has far-reaching implications for us as a public and for the educational message that we convey to our children,” read the letter signed by heads of yeshivas and pre-army preparatory programs, neighborhood rabbis, and other rabbis. It did not specifically name Shaked.

The existence of the letter was first reported on Wednesday by the Walla! Hebrew news website.

Kiddush Clubs Panic As Fire Destroys Jim Beam Warehouse Filled With Bourbon Barrels

A fire destroyed a massive Jim Beam warehouse filled with 45,000 barrels of bourbon, sending flames shooting into the night sky and generating so much heat that firetruck lights melted, authorities said Wednesday.

Firefighters from four counties responded to the blaze that erupted late Tuesday. Lightning might have been a factor, but fire investigators haven’t been able to start looking for the cause, Woodford County Emergency Management Director Drew Chandler said.

No injuries were reported, Chandler said. The fire was contained but was being allowed to burn for several more hours Wednesday, he said.

“The longer it burns, the more of the distilled spirits burn with it,” he said in a phone interview. “So when they go to put it out, there will be less contaminated runoff that goes into a drinking-water tributary.”

How Many of the Rioters Were Really Ethiopians??

A far-left organization funded by the New Israel Fund has been actively aiding the recent wave of protests – many of them violent – which erupted across the country following the shooting death of Solomon Tekah, an Ethiopian teenager, in Haifa.

While some of the protests across the country have been peaceful, others turned violent, including attacks on police officers, ambulances, and private cars.

The joint Arab-Jewish ‘Standing Together’ organization, which is funded by the NIF, has taken an active role in the protests, which began Monday, resumed Tuesday following Tekah’s funeral, and which are expected to continue Wednesday.

“When police officers shooting people, civilians, and kill them, we go out to the streets,” Standing Together said. “When officers with a trigger finger start shooting people – that is everyone’s problem, so we’re all going out to the streets: blacks and whites, Jews and Arabs. Let’s demand that the police protect civilians, or at least to begin with, that they stop killing them.”

DIN Caught Up In Traffic During Ethiopian Riots

The Holiest of the Holy, the deepest of the deep got caught up in the "Svartzah" Riots in Israel!

Yes... you heard it first, I was sitting in the car for 4 & 1/2 hours in with my wife on the way back from Ashdod to Bet Shemesh!

The Ethiopians learned very well from the Auerbach Parasites, but the Ethiopians were able to perfect this to a science ...

they started fires and when the fire trucks arrived they threw bricks and glass bottles at the firemen just like they do in Meah Shearim!

But they became the experts and the Auerbach barbarians still have a lot to learn...

The Ethiopians managed to shut down within a few minutes the entire Israel, and according to some reports.. 60,000 people were effected by the riots ......

I went out of my car to see what was holding it up and noticed a few hundred police officers standing around 5 little skinny girls sitting on Kvish ... not letting any cars go in four directions...

the police stood around and did absolutely nothing!

Since I couldn't go anywhere, I shut my car off and chapped a shmuz with the other drivers ...
One particular driver a Yeshivishe guy, was cursing the "Zionist Police" because they were standing around waiting for orders and wouldn't do anything ...
He was going on and on telling us that his "wife and children are starving" and "thirsty and tired" and he "is so frustrated .."
I asked him to calm down ... and told him we are not going anywhere for a very long time...one cop had told me "עד הבוקר "  that the riots are expected to go on "till Morning" so it's better not to make a scene and calm his family down...
I told him that I have some snacks and water and asked him where his car was so that I can personally do the mitzvah ...
Guys ... sit down for this...
When I approached his car ....his wife was screaming her head off telling us that her husband should be "the last one to be upset since he is one of the "Auerbach Faction" protest leaders ..."
I'm telling you ..... only in Israel!

Lazer Scheiner To Hold Fundraiser For President Trump

Lazer “Louis” Scheiner from Monsey New York, will be holding a fundraiser for President Trump in September, Belaaz News reports.

Scheiner will be joined by other American Jewish philanthropists whose purpose are to strengthen the connection between the President and the frum community in the United States.

Though the exact time and place have not yet been set the cost to take part in the event will be is expected to be $25,000.

Watch the Hypocrisy of the Democrats ....

Satmar Rebbe's Favorite Country .. IRAN ... Breached the 2015 Nuclear Deal's Stockpile Limit

 א' קרח כ"ז סיון תשע"ט

The Holy Rebbe of Satmar, R Aron Teitelbaum who begged US Congressmen to back the Iran Deal .... must be very happy with his work fighting the State of Israel ..... since his favorite country, Iran is very close to having complete Nuclear capabilities...

In addition, Iran just threatened Israel again ... stating that Israel will be totally annihilated, Chas Ve'Shalom if the US should attack Iran!

IRan has breached the limit of its enriched uranium stockpile set in a 2015 deal with major powers, two sources told Reuters on Monday, defying a warning by European co-signatories to stick to the deal despite U.S. sanctions.

“As we announced when we said our steps would continue, the stockpile has passed 300 kg,” one of the sources said.

Iran has breached the limit of its enriched uranium stockpile set in a 2015 deal with major powers, two sources told Reuters on Monday, defying a warning by European co-signatories to stick to the deal despite U.S. sanctions.

“As we announced when we said our steps would continue, the stockpile has passed 300 kg,” one of the sources said.

Don't forget Ezra "the capo" Friedlander wrote an op-ed in Jewish Newspapers supporting the deal...
Lo Tishkach! 

The Rebbe also made the bizarre statement 

"That it is prohibited to learn Torah in Israel"

Carlebach Ve'Shomru Sung With Names of Ball Players ...Very Clever

Mental Health of Three Generations Has Been Harmed by the Holocaust

The physical effects of the Holocaust are still present in the brains of survivors’ grandchildren, research suggests.

The mental health of at least three generations of the same families was potentially damaged, say scientists, suggesting that the environment that one lives in can affect your offspring’s genes.

The study presented at a meeting of the European Academy of Neurology in Oslo was based on 56 people aged 79 and 80, half of whom survived the Holocaust. 

It found that survivors had significantly less grey matter, or neurons, in areas of the brain responsible for stress response, memory, motivation, emotion, learning and behaviour.

Lead author Professor Ivan Rektor, from Masaryk University, Czech Republic, said: ‘Early results show this is also the case in children of survivors, too.’

The findings may lead to descendants being offered therapy to help them cope with the emotional legacy of the genocide, Professor Rektor added. 

Further research will identify markers of stress resilience and post-traumatic growth and will determine whether transmission to offspring is based on behavioural, psychological or genetic factors.