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Holocaust gravesites identified in Latvia and Netherlands using contemporary technology
(JTA) — A mass grave of Jews killed by the Nazis has been identified in Latvia following decades of searching.
Separately, the body of a World War II Jewish resistance fighter buried in a mass grave has been identified in the Netherlands.
The grave in Latvia was located using technology created by American researchers, LTV News Service reported Wednesday. It holds the bodies of dozens of Jews murdered by the Nazis in July 1941 in the western Latvian city of Liepāja. The massacre, one of a series of Nazi mass murders of thousands of Jews in the area over the course of that year, was filmed by German soldier Reinhard Wiener, and the footage survived the war.
Wiener’s film includes shots of the trenches where the Jews were murdered, as well as the city’s historic lighthouse. For decades, researchers had tried to use the lighthouse as a landmark in order to identify the exact location of the mass graves, but those efforts were unsuccessful.
This summer, a team of students and researchers led by Harry Jol and Martin Goettl from the University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire, and Philip Reeder from Duquesne University in Pittsburgh, were invited to Liepāja to search for the grave. Using soil sampling and georadar analysis, they were able to locate the mass burial site from 82 years ago.
“There are historical maps that we can compare with our data and see changes in the soil layers,” Jol told Latvian Public Media. “We can use the dendrological method, determined by the age of trees. There is also a relatively new technique for soils — optically stimulated luminescence dating.”
According to Latvian press reports, the researchers are certain that the grave they located is the one filmed by Wiener, and are looking for documents and testimony to buttress that finding.
The area of the mass grave is currently being leased by a Lithuanian fish processing company, Ilana Ivanova, a representative of the Jewish community in Liepāja, told LTV News Service.
Ilya Lensky, director of the Museum of Jews in Latvia, told LTV News Service that he believes the site should be marked as a memorial to honor the Jews who died there. Gunārs Ansiņš, the mayor of Liepāja, said that discussions are ongoing in the municipal council to address what to do with the site.
In the Netherlands, the body of Jewish resistance hero Bernard Luza was also identified in a mass grave, according to a statement from the Dutch Defense Ministry published on Tuesday. Luza was executed by firing squad in 1943, when he was 39, after he and hundreds of Jews were arrested following a raid on a factory in Amsterdam the previous year. Luza was a member of the Dutch Communist Party and People’s Militia, and joined the resistance after the Nazi takeover of the Netherlands in May 1940. He was accused of distributing an illegal newspaper and encouraging acts of sabotage.
“Now, through the use of DNA technology employed in a relationship study, his remains were finally identified,” said Geert Jonker, head of the ministry’s forensic unit specializing in identifying human remains, according to Agence France-Presse. According to the ministry statement, the ministry ascertained Luza’s identity after a cousin of his was identified in Australia.
In 1945, Luza’s body was discovered buried along with four others. Two of those bodies were identified soon after as those of Theodorus Cramer and Carel Abraham, and a third was identified a decade ago as Nicolaas van der Horst, but Luza’s remained a mystery until this year.
Just two months after they received a farewell letter from Luza before his execution, his wife Clara and daughter Eva were murdered at the Nazi Sobibor extermination camp. Luza’s father Solomon and five of his siblings were also murdered at Auschwitz and Sobibor.
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The post Holocaust gravesites identified in Latvia and Netherlands using contemporary technology appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.
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Security Warning to Israelis Vacationing Abroad Ahead of holidays
A passenger arrives to a terminal at Ben Gurion international airport before Israel bans international flights, January 25, 2021. REUTERS/Ronen Zvulun
i24 News – Ahead of the Jewish High Holidays, Israel’s National Security Council (NSC) published the latest threat assessment to Israelis abroad from terrorist groups to the public on Sunday, in order to increase the Israeli public’s awareness of the existing terrorist threats around the world and encourage individuals to take preventive action accordingly.
The NSC specified that the warning is an up-to-date reflection of the main trends in the activities of terrorist groups around the world and their impact on the level of threat posed to Israelis abroad during these times, but the travel warnings and restrictions themselves are not new.
“As the Gaza war continues and in parallel with the increasing threat of terrorism, the National Security Headquarters stated it has recognized a trend of worsening and increasing violent antisemitic incidents and escalating steps by anti-Israel groups, to the point of physically harming Israelis and Jews abroad. This is in light of, among other things, the anti-Israel narrative and the negative media campaign by pro-Palestinian elements — a trend that may encourage and motivate extremist elements to carry out terrorist activities against Israelis or Jews abroad,” the statement read.
“Therefore, the National Security Bureau is reinforcing its recommendation to the Israeli public to act with responsibility during this time when traveling abroad, to check the status of the National Security Bureau’s travel warnings (before purchasing tickets to the destination,) and to act in accordance with the travel warning recommendations and the level of risk in the country they are visiting,” it listed, adding that, as illustrated in the past year, these warnings are well-founded and reflect a tangible and valid threat potential.
The statement also emphasized the risk of sharing content on social media networks indicating current or past service in the Israeli security forces, as these posts increase the risk of being marked by various parties as a target. “Therefore, the National Security Council recommends that you do not upload to social networks, in any way, content that indicates service in the security forces, operational activity, or similar content, as well as real-time locations.”
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Israel Intensifies Gaza City Bombing as Rubio Arrives
Displaced Palestinians, fleeing northern Gaza due to an Israeli military operation, move southward after Israeli forces ordered residents of Gaza City to evacuate to the south, in the central Gaza Strip September 14, 2025. Photo: REUTERS/Mahmoud Issa
Israeli forces destroyed at least 30 residential buildings in Gaza City and forced thousands of people from their homes, Palestinian officials said, as US Secretary of State Marco Rubio arrived on Sunday to discuss the future of the conflict.
Israel has said it plans to seize the city, where about a million Palestinians have been sheltering, as part of its declared aim of eliminating the terrorist group Hamas, and has intensified attacks on what it has called Hamas’ last bastion.
The group’s political leadership, which has engaged in on-and-off negotiations on a possible ceasefire and hostage release deal, was targeted by Israel in an airstrike in Doha on Tuesday in an attack that drew widespread condemnation.
Qatar will host an emergency Arab-Islamic summit on Monday to discuss the next moves. Rubio said Washington wanted to talk about how to free the 48 hostages – of whom 20 are believed to be still alive – still held by Hamas in Gaza and rebuild the coastal strip.
“What’s happened, has happened,” he said. “We’re gonna meet with them (the Israeli leadership). We’re gonna talk about what the future holds,” Rubio said before heading to Israel where he will stay until Tuesday.
ABRAHAM ACCORDS AT RISK
He was expected to visit the Western Wall Jewish prayer site in Jerusalem on Sunday with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and hold talks with him during the visit.
US officials described Tuesday’s strike on the territory of a close US ally as a unilateral escalation that did not serve American or Israeli interests. Rubio and US President Donald Trump both met Qatar’s Prime Minister Mohammed bin Abdulrahman Al-Thani on Friday.
Netanyahu signed an agreement on Thursday to push ahead with a settlement expansion plan that would cut across West Bank land that the Palestinians seek for a state – a move the United Arab Emirates warned would undermine the US-brokered Abraham accords that normalized UAE relations with Israel.
Israel, which blocked all food from entering Gaza for 11 weeks earlier this year, has been allowing more aid into the enclave since late July to prevent further food shortages, though the United Nations says far more is needed.
It says it wants civilians to leave Gaza City before it sends more ground forces in. Tens of thousands of people are estimated to have left but hundreds of thousands remain in the area. Hamas has called on people not to leave.
Israeli army forces have been operating inside at least four eastern suburbs for weeks, turning most of at least three of them into wastelands. It is closing in on the center and the western areas of the territory, where most of the displaced people are taking shelter.
Many are reluctant to leave, saying there is not enough space or safety in the south, where Israel has told them to go to what it has designated as a humanitarian zone.
Some say they cannot afford to leave while others say they were hoping the Arab leaders meeting on Monday in Qatar would pressure Israel to scrap its planned offensive.
“The bombardment intensified everywhere and we took down the tents, more than twenty families, we do not know where to go,” said Musbah Al-Kafarna, displaced in Gaza City.
Israel said it had completed five waves of air strikes on Gaza City over the past week, targeting more than 500 sites, including Hamas reconnaissance and sniper sites, buildings containing tunnel openings and weapons depots.
Local officials, who do not distinguish between militant and civilian casualties, say at least 40 people were killed by Israeli fire across the enclave, a least 28 in Gaza City alone.
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Turkey Warns of Escalation as Israel Expands Strikes Beyond Gaza
Turkey’s President Tayyip Erdogan speaks during a press conference with Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis (not seen) at the Presidential Palace in Ankara, Turkey, May 13, 2024. Photo: REUTERS/Umit Bektas
i24 News – An Israeli strike targeting Hamas officials in Qatar has sparked unease among several Middle Eastern countries that host leaders of the group, with Turkey among the most alarmed.
Officials in Ankara are increasingly worried about how far Israel might go in pursuing those it holds responsible for the October 7 attacks.
Israel’s prime minister effectively acknowledged that the Qatar operation failed to eliminate the Hamas leadership, while stressing the broader point the strike was meant to make: “They enjoy no immunity,” the government said.
On X, Prime Minister Netanyahu went further, writing that “the elimination of Hamas leaders would put an end to the war.”
A senior Turkish official, speaking on condition of anonymity, summed up Ankara’s reaction: “The attack in Qatar showed that the Israeli government is ready to do anything.”
Legally and diplomatically, Turkey occupies a delicate position. As a NATO member, any military operation or targeted killing on its soil could inflame tensions within the alliance and challenge mutual security commitments.
Analysts caution, however, that Israel could opt for covert measures, operations carried out without public acknowledgement, a prospect that has increased anxiety in governments across the region.
Israeli officials remain defiant. In an interview with Ynet, Minister Ze’ev Elkin said: “As long as we have not stopped them, we will pursue them everywhere in the world and settle our accounts with them.” The episode underscores growing fears that efforts to hunt Hamas figures beyond Gaza could widen regional friction and complicate diplomatic relationships.