Despite a few rumors and some press reports to the contrary, Moshe Holtzberg, the two-year-old orphan of Rabbi Gavriel and Rivka Holtzberg – who were murdered last week by terrorists inside their Mumbai, India, Chabad-Lubavitch center – will be raised by his family. A fund established by Merkos L’Inyonei Chinuch, the educational arm of Chabad-Lubavitch, will provide financial support for the boy through his childhood years. Funds can be donated online via chabad.org/supportmumbai.
At this point in time, young Moishele, as he’s affectionately known by his family, is staying at an undisclosed location with Sandra Samuel, the Indian nanny who heroically saved him from the Chabad House in the middle of the crisis. He will be reunited with his grandparents, Rabbi Shimon and Yehudit Rosenberg, after they conclude the week-long mourning period following last Tuesday night’s burial of their daughter and son-in-law. The grandparents traveled to India last week before Shabbat to be with Moshe and returned on Monday.
“Immediately after the family completes the seven days of mourning, he will be with his grandparents here in Afulah,” said Rabbi Yehuda Dunin, one of the boy’s many uncles.
The nanny, meanwhile, has indicated she intends to stay in Israel as long as Moshe needs her.
Yehuda Holtzberg, a cousin of the slain rabbi, emphatically quashed any rumors of the boy ever being sent to an orphanage. Final discussions still need to be concluded as to where exactly Moshe will spend his formative years, but there are many family members worldwide, he said, who are happy to take Moshe in.
“Gabi has seven siblings, of which five are married,” said Holtzberg. “The family is very loving, and very close with each other. Every single one of us would be honored to take Moshe into our homes, if need be.”
“For sure, he is going to stay with family” for the rest of his childhood, said Shmuel Shpilman, who is married to one of Gavriel Holtzberg’s sisters. “It can’t be any other way.”
Dunin, co-director of the Chabad House in Haifa’s Achuzat Karmel section, then extended the family’s thanks for the work undertaken by Chabad-Lubavitch officials in New York and Israel during the crisis and the days following its conclusion. He specifically thanked Rabbi Moshe Kotlarksy, vice chairman of Merkos L’Inyonei Chinuch and a friend of Gavriel Holtzberg. Kotlarsky last spoke to Holtzberg the Tuesday prior to the attacks to discuss final arrangements for a new team of Chabad-Lubavitch emissaries to India.
Speaking at a memorial service for the Holtzbergs attended by more than 10,000 people in the central Israeli village of Kfar Chabad, Kotlarsky said that the orphaned Moshe would not only grow up in the care of a loving family; he would have the support of an extended family of Chabad-Lubavitch emissaries and Chasidim, as well.
“We will take care of all the needs of Moshe, from A to Z,” said Kotlarsky.
“We thank them for all they did in the past and for all that they will do in the future,” said Dunin. “Merkos worried about all of Gavriel’s needs. They cared for him from the first moment he went [to India] and until he breathed his last.”
Regarding the Chabad House in Mumbai, a beautiful six-story edifice in the city’s Colaba neighborhood that was heavily damaged in the attacks and the Indian military’s response, Kotlarsky reiterated a pledge made last week that it would be rebuilt quickly. Officials, including Rabbi Yosef Kantor, co-director of the Bankgok-based Jewish Association of Thailand, are already evaluating potential couples to move to Mumbai to continue the Holtzbergs’ holy work.
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