Holocaust Survivor Reunites with Rescuer's Grandson 80 Years Later

At 94 years old, David Danieli walked into the Israeli President's Residence with two generations of his family by his side, about to meet the grandson of the man who saved his life eight decades ago.

In August 1946, young David Danielski joined over 500 other Jewish orphans at a railway station in Katowice, Poland. They had survived the Holocaust but lost their parents, hidden in monasteries, convents, and Christian homes across Europe.

Chief Rabbi Isaac Halevi Herzog had established a special rescue committee to find these children and bring them home. His team traveled across Europe, often reciting the Shema prayer to identify Jewish children who had been forced to hide their identity.

Danieli's survival story reads like an impossible journey. When Germans invaded his region, his parents sent him to work on a farm, hoping he'd be safe. When that became too dangerous, he returned home to find a Gestapo banner on his door and his parents gone.

A Christian neighbor named Martha Kapitza had promised his mother to protect him. She kept that promise, welcoming him into her home, getting him baptized, and even enrolling him in school where he became part of the Hitler Youth to maintain his cover.

After the war, a stranger in a market asked if he was Jewish and directed him to an orphanage where he could learn about his heritage. From there, he joined Rabbi Herzog's rescue train, traveling through Prague and eventually boarding the SS Exodus in 1947 with over 4,500 Holocaust survivors.

British authorities intercepted the ship and sent passengers back to Europe. Danieli persevered, sailing again in 1948 and finally reaching Israel, where he became an engineer, married, and spent 42 years building a life in Beersheba.

Why This Inspires

This meeting represents something powerful beyond one man's survival. President Herzog, whose grandfather rescued hundreds of children, keeps detailed records and books about the rescue operation in his study, ensuring these stories never fade.

Danieli arrived at the residence walking with a cane but moving at a fast pace, his white hair and hearty laugh showing the fullness of the life he built from unimaginable loss. Two generations of his family stood beside him, living proof that hope survives.

The president called meeting one of his grandfather's rescued children "a very moving experience" and an honor. For Danieli, it closed a circle that began on a train platform 80 years ago, when strangers risked everything to bring lost children home.