Echoes Across Generations: Questioning Meeting a Nazi Executioner’s Heir

Dec 1, 2025, 7:37 PM

Please note that the posts on The Blogs are contributed by third parties. The opinions, facts and any media content in them are presented solely by the authors, and neither The Times of Israel nor its partners assume any responsibility for them. Please contact us in case of abuse. In case of abuse,
Report this post.

“I hope I am not making a mistake” I said to myself out loud an hour before a scheduled video call.

Three months ago I received an email from a dear friend in Poland. One of the things she wrote about was this:

“A glimmer of hope comes from contact with the nephew of Heinrich Hamann, the executioner of Mszana Dolna and the surrounding areas (one of the major childhood towns where my mother was raised) who ordered and commanded the murder of Jews. His nephew, the son of this bandit’s youngest brother, together with his cousin are coming to Poland to follow in the footsteps of their uncle’s murders, with a message of reconciliation and remembrance. We have not met yet, but he is supposed to visit us in September.

I told him about your extraordinary gesture towards the German Consul during the 80th Anniversary Memorial Commemoration in Mszana Dolna during 2022. He was very moved and is interested in meeting you….”

It took me two weeks to respond to my lantzman’s request. Intellectually, I knew that accepting this meeting may be positive, but I had many emotional reservations.

I was thinking of my mother who passed away two years ago. I could imagine how she would react if I was to meet with the nephew of the Nazi commander in charge and participating in the brutal murder of nearly every Jew in that Galician region and its environs, including members of my mother’s family. It didn’t matter that this was the nephew. “The son shall not bear the guilt of the of the father (Yehezkel 18:20)” be damned. Yehezkel, despite being a Prophet, knew nothing of the impending Shoah.

Of course, it is unhealthy to allow the superego to dictate our every move in life. If I did, I would never have journeyed to Poland and Ukraine as many times as I since that initial visit with Mom in 2001. My mother could never understand my constant returning to those lands. Interestingly enough, as the years went on, she was more supportive, despite her continuing to express her doubts.

Which brings me back to the possible encounter with the nephew. In weighing the positives and negatives, the only thing holding me back was pure emotion-a knee jerk reaction born of pain.

It reminded me of forty years earlier. I was involved in Second Generation and presenting workshops at their conferences. During the late 1980’s a second-generation group from West Germany approached us asking if we could partake in some joint projects and dialogue.

I was vehemently against it. The timing was wrong. The West German second generation consisted of the children of Nazi perpetrators. I thought they should deal with their own issues without involving us. Their struggles are not our struggles. The American second generation was developing its own identity, both as a group and individually, during that post war period, a mere forty years since the Holocaust.

Here we are today, forty years later, or rather eighty years since the end of the Holocaust. The era of the postwar years has concluded. The survivors, who are also the witnesses, are few in their numbers and fading in time. The world is forgetting, rather the world has not learned from the lessons of the Holocaust. We see that in the rising antisemitism today. Jews are again in a precarious position, just as they have been during their 2,000 years of exile prior to The War.

I concluded that since this nephew is seeking “reconciliation and remembrance” then I must meet with him. There, of course, will be no reconciliation. That is up to the victims, and not the survivors, of the Holocaust, and not me or anyone else.

However, something more meaningful may result from this. Charles Krauthammer Z”L, the outspoken conservative commenter once remarked that we, as Jews, must embrace anyone who would befriend us. Jews are very much alone in this world. We have a scant number of friends. Therefore, I concluded, to accept this nephew’s request to meet.

And so I did. We exchanged several emails, and finally met via a video call this past Armistice Day- appropriately enough.

My expectations were low. I did not expect any relationship to develop past one meeting. I approached the meeting out of decency, out of respect for my friend’s wishes, and of course, my curiosity.

This essay will not talk specifically as to what transpired, but the conversation exceeded all expectations.

The nephew was very sincere and articulate during the conversation. He was well educated, retired, affable, handsome and distinctively Germanic in appearance.

Like me, he was wrestling with conflicting emotions. His own superego was at work—many of his cousins know nothing about his quiet efforts to confront their family’s past.

He opened up and expressed his motivations allowing me to lower my guard. and to also open up.

The nephew and I will continue this dialogue. We do not know what the end result will be, or where it will lead but it is important to take advantage of this moment.

Post note: As we were hanging up, the nephew noted that all the letters of my first name, and initial of my last name are contained in his first name. That was a good way to sign off. It was a lesson in Gematria.

About the Author

Saul Chapnick was raised in an Orthodox home with deep familial Hasidic roots. Educated in yeshiva and later earning a Master of Social Work degree from Yeshiva University's Wurzweiler School of Social Work, Saul has continued throughout his life to embrace Jewish learning in many settings—from studying at Hebrew Union College–Jewish Institute of Religion to maintaining a weekly chavruta for ongoing Torah study. His lifelong journey has given him a deep appreciation for richness of Jewish tradition across the spectrum of Jewish life. For more than thirty-five years, Saul has devoted himself to the study of Jewish history, with a particular focus on Jewish life in interwar Eastern Europe. Inspired by the mitzvah of Zachor (to remember), he has explored both the extraordinary vibrancy of the Jewish world that was destroyed in the Shoah and the enduring questions of Jewish memory, continuity, and identity. Through extensive travel, archival research, and conversations with survivors, scholars, communal leaders, and public figures, he has sought to understand not only what was lost, but also what those vanished communities continue to teach us today. His writing explores the intersection of Jewish history, personal memory, Israel, and contemporary Jewish life, seeking to connect the voices of the past with the challenges of the present. A gifted storyteller and engaging speaker, Saul has lectured throughout the United States and abroad on Jewish history, Yiddish language and culture, modern Poland, Israel, and post-Holocaust Jewish identity. His presentations blend scholarship with personal experience, inviting audiences to explore the enduring relevance of Jewish history to contemporary Jewish life. He has also prepared adult participants of the March of the Living by providing historical and cultural context that deepens their understanding of both Poland's Jewish past and its emerging Jewish present. Saul is the author of a widely read weekly Substack newsletter and a contributor to The Times of Israel, where he reflects on Jewish life, history, Israel, memory, and current events. His essays weave together personal experience, historical research, and contemporary issues, encouraging readers to reflect on the challenges and opportunities facing the Jewish people today. For the past thirteen years, Saul has served as the Substitute Chaplain through the Greater Miami Jewish Federation Chaplaincy Program at Miami Jewish Health. During rabbinic transitions, he has served as the community's interim spiritual leader, leading Shabbat and holiday services, reading Torah, delivering Divrei Torah, teaching adult education classes and study groups, and providing pastoral care to residents and their families. Professionally, Saul brings more than two decades of executive leadership in healthcare and human services. He specialized in turning around distressed assisted living and memory care communities by rebuilding staff morale, restoring occupancy, improving quality of care, ensuring regulatory compliance, and returning organizations to financial stability. Today, he draws upon that experience as an expert witness in legal matters involving senior care, assisted living, and long-term care communities. Whether teaching Torah, leading prayer, writing, or speaking, Saul believes that Judaism is best experienced through learning, storytelling, meaningful relationships, and a deep respect for every individual's Jewish journey. At the same time, Chapnick has witnessed a limited reawakening of Jewish life in his family’s ancestral homeland of Poland. He has spoken at numerous venues on the contemporary relevance of Yiddish and Yiddish culture, the significance of the 19th- and 20th-century Jewish world to modern life, and the shaping of post-Holocaust Jewish identity. He also prepares adult participants of the March of the Living to engage meaningfully with modern-day Jewish Poland. Chapnick shares his insights and reflections in weekly blogs on https://saulchapnick.substack.com, where readers are welcome to subscribe.