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A German town built a granary atop its Jewish cemetery. Now the bones are yielding insights about Ashkenazi DNA.
BERLIN (JTA) – The city of Erfurt in central Germany is home to an impeccably restored medieval synagogue made possible because local Jews had been expelled long before the Nazis began their campaign to destroy Jewish sites.
Now, Erfurt’s long-hidden Jewish past is again offering new insights — this time about the genetic history of Ashkenazi Jews.
Human remains from a medieval Jewish cemetery in Erfurt have allowed what researchers say is the largest ancient Jewish DNA study to date. Conducted without disinterring any remains, in keeping with Jewish law, the study published Wednesday in the scientific journal Cell found that Erfurt’s medieval Jewish community was more genetically diverse than their modern-day cousins, and carried many of the same Jewish genetic diseases — such as Tay Sachs and cystic fibrosis — that affect Ashkenazi Jews today.
“There have been many previous DNA studies, but not of Jews,” said geneticist Shai Carmi, a professor at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, whose search for study material led him to an archaeological dig at the Jewish cemetery in Erfurt. He and his collaborators were able to analyze DNA of 33 individuals who died between 1270 and 1400, using teeth they found there.
The study follows a similar analysis revealed in August by researchers in England, who studied the DNA from skeletons found at the bottom of a medieval well and concluded that the remains were likely of victims of an antisemitic massacre in 1190. Analysis of six individuals prior to their identification as Jewish revealed that Ashkenazi Jews developed a unique genetic variation centuries earlier than realized.
The Erfurt analysis also includes samples from before the epidemic of Black Death that was until recently understood to have created the genetic “bottleneck” that created the genetic markers common among Ashkenazi Jews today.
Erfurt’s Jewish settlement existed from the 11th to 15th century, with a brief gap following a 1349 massacre perpetrated after the Jews were falsely blamed for causing the bubonic plague. Surviving Jews returned there, but after all Jews were expelled once and for all in 1454, the city built a granary on top of the Jewish cemetery.
Karin Sczech participates in the excavation at the medieval Jewish cemetery of Erfurt. (Courtesy of TLDA Ronny Krause)
In 2013, the city approved the repurposing of the unused granary into a parking lot. Because it was an historic site, a rescue excavation was initiated, overseen for the State of Thuringia by German archaeologist Karin Sczech.
Meanwhile, Carmi had been looking for Jewish cemeteries anywhere in the world “where we could analyze remains already excavated,” he told JTA in a telephone interview from Jerusalem. “I consulted historians and eventually reached the archeologist in Erfurt.” Fortunately, he said, “they still hadn’t reburied the remains.”
He approached Sczech, who later became a co-author of the new study. In 2018, with a supportive judgment from Rabbi Ze’ev Litke — an Israeli expert on genetics and Jewish law — and permission from Erfurt’s then-rabbi, Benjamin Kochan, work began to extract and analyze DNA from detached teeth found in the graves. (About 500 Jews live in Erfurt today, most of them having migrated from the former Soviet Union since 1990.)
American geneticist David Reich picked up the teeth and brought them back to the department of human evolutionary biology at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where drilling and DNA extraction took place.
While the skeletons were reburied, the teeth are still stored at the research institutes where they have been analyzed, in case scientists need to retest to verify the result.
The project provides an ethical basis for studies of ancient Jewish DNA, Carmi said. “Of course we couldn’t just go to a cemetery and dig and take out skeletons; this would be prohibited,” he said, referring to Jewish law prohibiting the removal of bones from where someone was buried.
But Litke opined that the study could be done, because the bones already had been disturbed for an unrelated reason. “He recommended using teeth, as the analysis does almost no damage,” Carmi said.
There are many motivations to study Jewish DNA: One can find lost relatives going back a few generations, and answer questions about Jewish origin of partners intending to marry. But the goal of Carmi’s team was “to fill the gaps in our understanding of Ashkenazi Jewish early history.”
There are several non-destructive ways to obtain DNA from human remains, said Carmi, who also works as a consultant to an Israeli firm that helps clients trace their genetic roots.
“You can take an almost microscopic slice of bone and extract DNA in a solution, or put the entire bone in a solution and extract the DNA without drilling, without disturbing the dead. This opens the way to doing studies even without teeth,” he added.
His team found that the Erfurt community appeared to fit into two genetically distinct groups, descending either from Middle Eastern or European populations. This genetic variability no longer exists, Carmi said.
At the same time, Carmi said, the analysis found remarkable continuity in the local community, as well. “One third of the Erfurt individuals descended from one woman through their maternal lines,” he said, adding that evidence suggested that she lived between 1,000 and 2,000 years ago.
In a press statement, geneticist Reich of Harvard said the work “also provides a template for how a co-analysis of modern and ancient DNA data can shed light on the past. Studies like this hold great promise not only for understanding Jewish history, but also that of any population.”
The research team, with more than 30 scientists, included Hebrew University’s Shamam Waldman, a doctoral student in Carmi’s group, who performed most of the data analysis.
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Orthodox students to rally outside Mamdani’s home. Alumni of their schools want them to stay home.
With two Orthodox schools planning a joint protest outside Gracie Mansion, home to New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani, a group of parents and alumni have organized a petition calling on administrators to stand down.
Ramaz and SAR, prominent Modern Orthodox schools in Manhattan, plan to send hundreds of high school students Friday morning to hold prayer services outside the official residence of the mayor, an outspoken critic of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
SAR principal Rabbi Binyamin Krauss told the Jerusalem News Syndicate the intended message was “We’re here. We’re Jewish. We want to be safe and express our Zionism.”
The planned gathering was first reported by Jewish Currents, which noted that an email to parents did not express a specific reason for the event — and quoted two members of the community expressing displeasure with the approach.
Now, a petition to the heads of the two schools to cancel the event has collected more than 180 signatures from parents, alumni and current students. Roughly one-third of the signatures are anonymous, with only the school and graduating class listed.
“This gathering needlessly inflames tensions between the mayor and the Modern Orthodox Jewish community, as opposed to inviting him into conversation as a potential ally working for the shared safety of all New Yorkers,” the petition reads. “Additionally, members of our community do not all share the same opinions regarding Mayor Mamdani. Choosing to gather outside of his residence, whatever the stated purpose, inaccurately portrays the Modern Orthodox community as a political monolith opposed to the mayor.”
The gathering — which the school was careful not to label a protest in an email to parents — reflects an oppositional approach to Mamdani from pro-Israel Jewish New Yorkers that dates back to his campaign. And it is timed to a particularly intense moment both in the Jewish tradition — a period of heightened spiritual importance known as the Ten Days of Repentance between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur— and in Mamdani’s tenure, as Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is scheduled to visit New York City next week to address the United Nations General Assembly.
Mamdani has repeatedly castigated Netanyahu during his time in office and campaigned on arresting him, part of the mayor’s broader critique of Israel, its war in Gaza — which the mayor calls a genocide — and the country’s treatment of Palestinians.
Mamdani said at a press conference Wednesday, said he won’t join protests against Netanyahu during his U.N. visit, and said he has “never encouraged” New Yorkers to demonstrate againt Netanyahu either. It’s a softening of his earlier rhetoric toward the Israeli leader.
Some Jewish New Yorkers think Mamdani’s criticism of Israel is itself antisemitic; others believe it has fostered an antisemitic environment in the city, evidenced by an uptick in hate crimes against Jews during his tenure.
‘Political pawns’
The prayer program and the petition it prompted also revealed a divide between Modern Orthodox institutions and some of their community members. Ramaz and SAR, located respectively in the Upper East Side and Riverdale, are two of the leading college preparatory Orthodox schools in the country, liberal-minded — Judaic studies classes are coed — and fiercely pro-Israel.
About 240 students from Ramaz and SAR are expected at the event, SAR principal Rabbi Binyamin Krauss told JNS, adding that he hopes other schools also join. SAR will send 8th, 9th, and 10th graders.
The petition also highlighted the students’ age in their letter to the rabbi.
“We are also concerned that this planned prayer gathering has the appearance of using the children of our community as political pawns, presenting them as ‘lead[ing] the way,’ when they are being brought to an event planned by adults,” the letter said.
Mamdani acknowledged the event in his media briefing Wednesday, but said he did not expect to be there.
“I welcome them,” he said. “They can have a vigil, or I’ve heard some describe it even as a ‘protest.’ Whatever it is intended to be, they have the room and space to do so outside of Gracie Mansion. I think that at the time that they are there, I will probably be somewhere else across the city.”
Rabbi Joshua Lookstein, Ramaz’s associate head of school, said, “The mayor is the one to change that so that we his citizens feel safe. We think he will get that message whether he is there or not.”
The post Orthodox students to rally outside Mamdani’s home. Alumni of their schools want them to stay home. appeared first on The Forward.
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Ed Sheeran’s support acts bail on Loop Tour after Macklemore dropped
(JTA) —
All of Ed Sheeran’s opening acts and his backing band have withdrawn from his Loop Tour after the pro-Palestinian rapper Macklemore was dropped as an opening act amid pressure from Robert Kraft and other stadium owners.
Kraft, the Jewish and pro-Israel billionaire who owns the Boston-area stadium where one of the tour stops had been scheduled, said on Monday that he had told Sheeran’s team that Macklemore wouldn’t be allowed to perform there.
Macklemore was subsequently dropped from the tour following pushback from unnamed venues that “will not allow a concert to take place with Macklemore on the lineup,” Rolling Stone reported on Monday.
At a Macklemore performance at MetLife Stadium in East Rutherford, N.J., earlier this month, the rapper declared “Free Palestine” before performing his 2024 song, “Hind’s Hall,” referring to Columbia University’s Hamilton Hall. Pro-Palestinian protesters occupied the building and unofficially renamed it for Hind Rajab, a 6-year-old Palestinian girl who was killed during the war in Gaza. Israel is investigating her killing.
Sheeran said Tuesday that he wasn’t behind the tour promoter’s decision to drop Macklemore.
“I am not complicit,” Sheeran wrote in a statement on Instagram Tuesday, saying that Macklemore leaving the tour “was the promoter’s decision, it was not mine.” It was Sheeran’s first public statement on the controversy.
Hours after Sheeran’s comments, acts began pulling out of the tour.
His backing band, Beoga, said in an Instagram post that it was leaving the tour “following the silencing of Macklemore by zionist lobbies.”
“We believe in dialogue as a means of progressing the plight of the Palestinian people,” they added. Beoga’s management did not immediately respond to requests for further comment.
Kraft’s decision to bar Macklemore from performing at Gillette Stadium in Foxboro, Mass. got the backing of the Jewish Community Relations Council of Greater Boston.
“Mr. Kraft drew a clear moral line in the sand about the demonization and offensive conduct that he will not allow in ‘his home’,” Jeremy Burton, the JCRC CEO, said, referring to the stadium. “He also showed leadership and complexity … by rejecting those who would diminish the suffering of innocent Palestine people.”
“This decision is not about diminishing the suffering of innocent Palestinians or denying anyone the right to advocate on their behalf,” Kraft had said in his statement. “Their pain and loss are real.”
Other acts scheduled to support Sheeran on the Loop tour, including Aaron Rowe, Finneas and Lukas Graham, also withdrew Tuesday. Rowe and Lukas Graham were supposed to replace Macklemore on the remaining U.S. dates, AP reported.
It’s not yet clear what the fate of the tour is, given the withdrawal of his backing band. At least one Israeli musician joked that he was ready to put together a replacement band for “unlimited beer.”
Sheeran’s own note added, “I am appalled by the conflict between Israel and Palestine.” The British singer-songwriter wrote that he had been “involved in direct talks” between Kraft and various promoters “to try and find a mutual resolution for all.”
Sheeran didn’t mention Jews in his statement, but noted, “I have always used my platform and music to bring people from all backgrounds and cultures together and this won’t ever change.”
He also had some veiled criticism of his tourmate’s methods. “Those who come to my shows do not expect a political forum,” Sheeran wrote. “I respect Macklemore’s strength of purpose to stand up for what he believes. However, there is room for multiple approaches to the same end: peace… If we only focus on shouting the loudest, nothing will ever change.”
The Israeli-American Council, which organized a boycott against Macklemore following his New Jersey show, criticized Sheeran in a statement to the Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
“It’s time to take responsibility for giving a stage to antisemitic messaging,” the IAC said, of Sheeran. “This isn’t just ‘criticism of Israel.’ It’s a message that crosses the line between legitimate political criticism and antisemitism. This is Ed Sheeran’s stage, it’s the tour that carries his name — and so the responsibility for what happens on it is his too.”
The post Ed Sheeran’s support acts bail on Loop Tour after Macklemore dropped appeared first on The Forward.
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Vance: Trump willing to ‘part ways’ with Netanyahu when necessary, and has often opposed him
(JTA) —
President Donald Trump has an unprecedented track record of opposing Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu when it comes to advancing the interest of the American people, Vice President JD Vance said during a virtual address Tuesday at a Los Angeles-based technology summit.
More than any president in the last 40 years Trump “has shown a willingness to actually part ways with ‘Bibi’ Netanyahu when he feels like the interests of the American people are different from the interests of the government of Israel,” Vance told the All-In Summit on technology.
The claim that Trump is the “one president” who would differ with Netanyahu is one that would surprise many watchers of the U.S.-Israel relationship.
The most significant U.S.-Israel rupture since 2009, when Netanyahu was first elected prime minister, was with President Barack Obama in 2015 over Obama’s nuclear deal with Iran.
Vance’s comments were the latest in a series he has made emphasizing the widening gulf between Jerusalem and Washington as November midterm elections approach and at a time when Netanyahu’s popularity in the United States is at a low after three years of Middle East wars.
A Pew poll from the end of March, when the United States was actively at war with Iran, found that 60% of U.S. adults unfavorably view Israel and that 59% lacked confidence in Netanyahu’s handling of world affairs, an increase of 7% in both categories.
Republicans are scrambling to shuck off unpopular policies and associations, fearing the party will lose control of Congress in the midterms, a result that would cripple Trump’s agenda in the final two years of his presidency.
“I find it a little ironic … that you have Democrats criticizing Donald Trump for his relationship with Bibi when Donald Trump is the one president of the last 40 years who’s been willing to say, you know what, yeah, Bibi is a good partner, but also Bibi and I have a different opinion on this, or Bibi’s wrong about this, or maybe Bibi’s right about this from the perspective of Israel. But the American people need us to go in a different direction,” Vance said.
Trump has often touted himself as the president who has done the most for Israel, including relocating his country’s embassy to Jerusalem and rupturing Obama’s Iran deal, during his first term in 2018 and securing the release of the Gaza hostages in 2025 during his second, nonconsecutive term. The war he and Netanyahu launched against Iran in February is the first ever joint U.S.-Israeli military action.
The friendship between the two leaders is a highly public one, with Netanyahu enjoying more White House visits than any other world leader. Each has made the close ties central to their electoral campaigns. Netanyahu pitches himself as the world leader most influential with Trump, while Trump’s evangelical base lauds his closeness with Israel.
Vance, however, has often taken a harsher line, including accusing Israel of trying to manipulate U.S. public opinion on the Iran war.
“Israel has been an important partner when it comes to military technology, when it comes to intelligence sharing, but also sometimes the United States doesn’t always agree with Israel,” Vance said on Tuesday.
Serious differences have emerged since the joint U.S.-Israel goals in the Iran war – to change the regime and end once and for all Iran’s potential to acquire a nuclear weapon – have foundered. Among these has been the U.S. decision to end the Iran war without a clear plan to block the Islamic Republic’s path to nuclear weapons and its agreement to enter into a civilian nuclear deal with Saudi Arabia, without insisting on a normalization deal with the Jewish state.
“We cannot let our Middle Eastern foreign policy be subservient to the state of Israel,” Vance told the All In Summit.
Vance has also ruffled American Jewish feathers by refusing to disavow media personality Tucker Carlson, who has promoted conspiracy theories about Israel and Jews.
Vance’s remarks rankled pro-Israel figures who have otherwise been supportive of Trump’s policies.
“American foreign policy should be subservient to no country,” Jonathan Schanzer, the executive director of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies, an influential think tank that backed the Iran war, wrote on X. “Why does the VP feel compelled to call out Israel in this respect? Why not call out the Qataris, or the Saudis, or Ukraine? Odd how this keeps happening.”
Heather Johnston, a Christian evangelical who founded the U.S. Israel Education Association, accused Vance on X of catering to Israel haters.
“Our U.S. foreign policy has never been subservient to Israel’s foreign policy,” she said, attaching a clip of Vance’s remarks. “He knows that. Why would he need to say that unless he’s trying to politically gain some points with Israel haters?”
The accusation hit a nerve. Vance’s communications director Taylor Van Kirk quoted Johnston’s tweet, and posted the entire exchange on X. “Let’s all take a moment to actually watch this exchange in full, where the VP was specifically asked about Israel,” Van Kirk said.
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