Does anyone have a contact person and phone number or email for the Galil Genealogical Society in Israel?

Tali B. Hadar z"l, who passed away approx. 20 years ago was in charge of this society and sometimes posted to this group. She occasionally tried to contact me about my ZIANTS family - but because of a "tale" in my family from my paternal grandparents that the original name of ZIANTS was ZENETSKY, which I had no reason to disbelieve, I every time told her this and that there was no point in researching my family name ZIANTS beyond my great-grandparents. Thus, I missed out on collaborating with her because I didn't think I had reason to.

I was born in the UK, and my grandfather Morris (Moshe) ZIANTS came as a baby with his parents, Marks (Mordechai) and Alice (Alka)  at the beginning of the 20th century from Narewka near Bialystok and Bielsk. (My grandfather identified himself as a Bialystoker.) 

I apologise, as I know I have repeated my story here or maybe parts of this story before on this discussion group and on other forums - and I thank people who have helped me in the past with this - but I don't think that I have presented this specific direction yet.

A number of years later, after Tali passed away, I found out from a cousin that this was just a tale and of course my great-grandmother Alice (Alka) ZENETSKY  changed her family name to her husbands when she married my great-grandfather Marks (Mordechai) ZIANTS. (All family names of course have variant spellings as is usually the case of names from Eastern Europe.) So ZIANTS was always my paternal family name, and I received at the time an extensive hand-written tree of the other side from a ZENETSKY cousin whom I never knew about previously. I have documented this tree clearly on geni.com .

Exactly fourteen years ago, I was put in email contact with Tali's father and I just now revisited and examined the email thread which did not last long. I wish to continue this "conversation" with him, but I don't know whether her father is still going strong. The email of then (and also the email of the person who put me in contact) no longer works. He was very explicit that the UK ZIANTS family and his family were the same family. This does not necessarily mean that it was my ZIANTS family that he was referring to because there was another ZIANTS family in the UK and so far these two families cannot be traced as being connected. 

What he did write to me is that his father was very upset and broke contact with the UK family (again don't know whether my family or the other - or maybe even both) because they did not want to pay for passage of his family. (It is known, that in my family that the two oldest of my great aunts came to England a number of years before my great-grandparents and the rest of the children and earned money to bring the others over - as this was quite often done.) He sent me the address of Yad Vashem, and told me to write to them. I did not, but now they have an online search engine - but because of quite a large number of  ZAJAC / ZIONTS entries, also with the names of Tali's ancestors (see below) and could not find Tali as a Page of Testimony submitter - I am not able to progress well, but possibly if someone of this genealogy society is holding Tali's personal genealogy files, or she has a relative who has this - maybe this can help me. 

I want to mention that Tali's ancestry was (as given to me by her father whose name I don't want to mention at this stage) Morris ZIONTZ (grandfather) and Joseph ZIONTZ (great-grandfather). On searching online trees, I find a few trees with the combination but none seem to resonate also where I see the name of Tali's father appearing as a son of Morris. The closest is where Morris has a daughter but no son is documented. Also, Tali had once posted a request to identify a Morris ZIONTZ, and nowadays with enhanced search facilities, I was just now able to answer this, but sadly she is no longer with us to see. That Morris does not resonate with her family. (Concerning the trees, I try and validate them from government records, etc, and add the documentation to the "about" of the profile on Geni and also have likewise created a few small trees, if I could not find am already existing matching tree). Also it is a bit vague from the email exactly who of the family perished and who survived. There was David ZIONTZ the trumpeter, among his list of a previous generation. (But nothing to do with my name David - as this is a name my parents liked and not after an explicit relative.)

Concerning my own family, I have reason to believe that my paternal ancestry of my family have originated in Brest (Brisk) as I located what seems to be my 3rd great-grandfather Moshe's grave stone in Bialystok, and on the transcript it is mentioned that he was from Brisk. A link to the gravestone photo with transcript is:-

https://sztetl.org.pl/en/towns/b/397-bialystok/115-memory-in-stone/7074-jewish-cemetery-in-wschodnia-street/93482-zajac

The patronymic on that stone, according to the transcript, is Gavriel.

My online tree is (focusing on Marks):-
https://www.geni.com/family-tree/index/6000000000061280213
where Baruch Leib is the patronymic on my Marks's grave stone. His siblings and mother's name were deduced from Eastern European records that I found on Jewishgen.org and JRI Poland databases. This includes what seems to be this family in Bransk (also in Bielsk region).

So, knowing about Tali's ZIONTZ family and having a contact in that direction - in addition to any other help and suggestions that I might receive in light of what I have told now, might help me further in my research of my family. Again, thank you for the help I have received in the past from this group.

Searching on my paternal side, family names: ZIANTS, ZENETSKY (became SCHOLSBERG), ISMACH (became DAVIDSON and OSMAN), ALPERT, FRIEDMAN; all from Bilaystok, Bielsk, Narewka, Brest (Brisk), Bransk, Warsaw, Lomza, Lodz and possibly other towns in these parts of Eastern Europe.

Ma'aleh Adumim, Israel

I already can update the forum a little bit of progress that I have made here with regards to researching the ZIONTZ family who is the subject of this thread.

First of all, have already been informed by email that the Galil Genealogical Society in Israel no longer exists.

The name of the man with whom I briefly corresponded with 14 years ago can be exposed and is Samuel (Sam) ZIONTZ - he sadly passed away in 2014 (born 9th June 1926), and I found the death announcement at:- https://www.dignitymemorial.com/obituaries/dix-hills-ny/samuel-ziontz-5876384

The names of both Tali's parents appear, in Hebrew, on Tali's memorial at:- 

https://www.mizra.org.il/memorials/%d7%94%d7%93%d7%a8-%d7%98%d7%9c%d7%99/

(also can be accessed as: https://www.mizra.org.il/memorials/טלי-הדר ) 

On the memorial is also listed the names of her children and two grandsons - so I might try and locating some of these and contacting for more information - hoping that they might be able to help.

This is where I am now stuck.

In addition to his death index, I have found Samuel's marriage index as well as mention on public records. I do not, though find his birth record in New York (I have a subscription to MyHeritage records' search) nor do I find him nor his father, Morris, on 1930 USA census nor 1940 USA census. Samuel explicitly wrote that his "father, Morris Ziontz, came from Communitz Litovsk north of Warsaw Poland in 1923 to New York". (I think he means Kamenetz.) Does anyone have some new direction here, that I can try? (I also have tried looking him up on ship manifests of that year period, but could not find.) One can find in census, a few children with name Samuel ZIANTZ (in it's various spellings) with father Morris - but none of these correlate with Samuel born 1926.

Many thanks in advance, if you are able to offer me help or advice.

--
David Ziants

Ma'aleh Adumim, Israel

1) As a continuation of this thread, I want to first mention that someone emailed me privately with the information that New York birth records are not publicly available. I see that there is an organisation:-

https://www.reclaimtherecords.org/

and I see a link to New york that they succeeded to have these records online. Does anyone know whether there is a search engine or how does one locate a particular record or name?

2) I tried contacting Kibbutz Mizra, to see if they can put me in touch with Tali's family, but have yet to receive a response. I also could not reach any of the phone numbers I found in the Israeli white pages. 

3) Regarding having relatives in the USA and Canada, a second cousin of mine very recently told me that his grandmother mentioned when she was alive that there were cousins who migrated to the USA and Canada - but he does not know the names. There is a story that one of these was killed in a lift (elevator) accident sometime during the 20th century.

4) I want to share publically part of my correspondece with the late Samuel ZIONTS in 2007 (this was a number of years after his daughter Tali passed away). The caps are his, and part of my original posting above is a summary from this. As I already mentioned, what he says COMMUNITZ is no doubt Kamenetz.  There is also no proof that he is specifically referring to my great-grandparents because there was also another ZIANTS family in the UK who we do not know as our relatives and they did not know us, when we inquired. On the other hand, he might be, and am not bothered to find out this, despite the family rift that is described. 

I tried searching Yad Vashem archives (can now be done via JRI-Poland), but could not find any ZIONTS/ZAJAC entries that correlate with the names Samuel gave, but with no success.

Maybe  I missed something so is there anyone here who doesn't mind having a quick search as one never knows. I assume that the relatives he mentioned who perished were Morris's siblings and parents but this is also a bit ambiguous. 

Thank you in advance.

David

       MY FATHER, MORRIS ZIONTZ, CAME FROM COMMUNITZ LITOVSK, NORTH OF WARSAW POLAND IN 1923

TO NEW YORK. HE HAD RELATIVES THAT WENT TO ENGLAND. HE WANTED TO GO TO ENGLAND BUT THEY COULD NOT AFFORD HIS FARES. HE BECAME VERY ANGRY AND AS FAR AS I KNOW HE HAD NO MORE DEALINGS WITH THEM.

HIS FATHER'S NAME WAS JOSEPH. THERE WAS A BROTHER DAVID ZIONTZ WHO PLAYED A TRUMPET.

THE FAMILY WERE FIVE SISTERS AND TWO BROTHERS

TWO SISTERS WERE KILLED IN LODZ AND THE OTHERS IN AUSHWITZ CONCENTRATION CAMP, INCLUDING HIS MOTHER AND FATHER.
        I REMEMBER BIALISTOCK BECAUSE HE ENJOYED HIMSELF WHEN HE WAS YOUNG AND SPOKE ABOUT THE

SHTETEL.

--
David Ziants

Ma'aleh Adumim, Israel