Joseph Harmatz, Leader of Jewish ‘Avengers’ of Nazis, Dies at 91

By Josefin Dolsten September 27, 2016

— Joseph Harmatz, a Holocaust survivor who led a group of Jews seeking to kill Germans in revenge for the Holocaust, died.

Harmatz’ death was confirmed on Monday by his son, Ronel, according to the Associated Press. Harmatz was 91.

He was a leader of the Jewish “Avengers,” or “HaNokmim” in Hebrew, a group of approximately 50 Holocaust survivors founded by Israeli poet Abba Kovner in order to take revenge on Germans for World War II.

Harmatz, who was born in Lithuania, was one of the last surviving group members who carried out a poisoning of Nazi SS officers in an American prisoner-of-war camp in 1946.

Over 2,200 Nazis fell sick, but no one is known to have died from the poisoning. When Harmatz proposed to Jewish leaders in pre-State Israel a plan to kill as many Germans as Jews who died in the Holocaust, figures like David Ben-Gurion were said to be appalled.

“We didn’t understand why it shouldn’t be paid back,” he told the AP last month about the group’s motivation. Harmatz, who lost most of his family in the Holocaust, added that his goal had been to kill “as many [Germans] as possible.”

After World War II, Harmatz immigrated to Israel, where he worked for the Jewish Agency for Israel and served as director general of World ORT, the network of Jewish-sponsored vocational institutions.

Josefin Dolsten is a New York-based writer who has reported for the Forward, Jewish Telegraphic Agency, The Times of Israel and other Jewish publications. She currently works as an account director at Fenton Communications, supporting organizations that work to advance racial justice, LGBTQ+ equality, reproductive rights and more. Dolsten earned her B.A. in government from Cornell University and her M.A. in comparative religion and Jewish studies from the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

A message from our CEO & publisher Rachel Fishman Feddersen

I hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, I’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s award-winning, nonprofit journalism during this critical time.

The coming year promises to be filled with more complex and historic developments. We are entering an era where independent, fact-based Jewish journalism will be more important than ever. We need to be ready for whatever 2025 will bring, and with your help, we can be.

We’ve set a goal to raise $260,000 by December 31. That’s an ambitious goal, but one that will give us the resources we need to invest in the high quality news, opinion, analysis and cultural coverage that isn’t available anywhere else.

If you feel inspired to make an impact, now is the time to give something back. Join us as a member at your most generous level.

— Rachel Fishman Feddersen, Publisher and CEO