Israeli court stops auction of kit supposedly used at Auschwitz camp to stamp Jews

An Israeli court on Wednesday suspended auction of a partial tattoo kit which was supposedly used on inmates at the Aushwitz death camp. The auction was suspended after an outcry from Holocaust survivors.

The eight fingernail sized steel dies, each lined with pins to form numerals, were pressed into prisoners' flesh with ink to brand their serial numbers, according to auctioneer Meir Tzolman.

His website touted the tools to be "the most shocking of Holocaust items". It was projected that the pins would be sold for $30,000 to 40,000

Bidding reached $3,400 by Wednesday, when Tel Aviv District Court granted a request by survivors to order the auction halted pending a November16 hearing on whether it should proceed. Tzolman's website was amended to show the sale had been suspended.

More than 1.1 million people, most of them Jews, were killed at Auschwitz, among a number of camps run by Nazi Germany on occupied Polish soil during World War Two. It was the only facility that tattooed inmates.

Israel has no law against private sales of Holocaust relics. A court spokesman's statement did not specify the legal basis for Wednesday's injunction.

Yad Vashem, the world Holocaust remembrance centre in Jerusalem, said it should have possession of items like the auctioned dies.

"The trade of these items is morally unacceptable and only encourages the proliferation of counterfeits," said Dani Dayan, chairman of Yad Vashem.

Interviewed before the court injunction, Tzolman said he was the grandson of Holocaust survivors who had been tattooed. He defended the auction - from which he would take a 25% commission - as a means of ensuring the dies reached "the right hands".

"The seller is determined to sell any way necessary," he said. "We received calls from tens of people who want to bid on this item and donate it. Each one noted a name of a different museum related to the Holocaust."

Tzolman said the dies had been certified as having come from Auschwitz. He did not share such documentation with Reuters.

The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum's website says some Auschwitz tattoos were applied by stylus and others using "a special metal stamp, holding interchangeable numbers made up of needles approximately one centimeter long".

The Auschwitz Memorial in Poland said photographs of the dies appeared similar to those in its collection.

(With inputs from agencies)