JERUSALEM (AP) — Researchers excavating the remains of one of the most notorious Nazi death camps have uncovered a pendant that appears identical to one belonging to Anne Frank, Israel's Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial said Sunday. 
 
 Yad Vashem says it has ascertained the pendant belonged to Karoline Cohn — a Jewish girl who perished at Sobibor and may have been connected to the famous diarist. Both were born in Frankfurt in 1929, and historians have found no other pendants like theirs. 
 
 The triangular piece found has the words "Mazal Tov" written in Hebrew on one side along with Cohn's date of birth. The other side has the Hebrew letter "heh," an initial for God, as well as three Stars of David. 
 
 Researchers are now trying to reach out to any remaining relatives of the two to confirm whether they were related. 
 
 Since 2007, the Israel Antiquities Authority, together with Yad Vashem, has been conducting excavations at the former camp in Poland in a novel approach to Holocaust research. The camp was destroyed after an October 1943 uprising, with the Nazis leveling it and planting over it to cover up their crimes. Yet, archeologists have managed to uncover the gas chamber foundations and the original train platform. 
 
 More than 250,000 Jews were killed in Sobibor, in eastern Poland, one of the most extreme examples of the Nazi "Final Solution" to eradicate European Jewry. Frank died at the Bergen-Belsen camp, in northern Germany, in 1945. 
 
 Unlike other facilities that had at least a facade of being prison or labor camps, Sobibor and the neighboring camps Belzec and Treblinka were designed specifically for exterminating Jews. Victims were transported there in cattle cars and gassed to death almost immediately. 
 
 "These recent findings from the excavations at Sobibor constitute an important contribution to the documentation and commemoration of the Holocaust, and help us to better understand what happened at Sobibor, both in terms of the camp's function and also from the point of view of the victims," said Havi Dreifuss, of Yad Vashem's International Institute for Holocaust Research. ||||| An archaeological dig at site of the Sobibor death camp in what was once Nazi-occupied Poland has uncovered several personal items from victims that were apparently dropped as their owners were forced to undress before being sent to the gas chambers. 
 
 Among the articles found in foundations where a building once stood was a pendant bearing the date of birth and hometown of a girl who would have been a teenager at the time, the Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial museum said in a statement Sunday. 
 
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 The piece of jewelry bears a close resemblance to a pendant owned by Holocaust diarist Anne Frank, who was murdered by the Germans at the Bergen-Belsen concentration in Germany, some time in early 1945, when she was 15 years old. 
 
 In another link tying the girls together, they were both born in Frankfurt, Germany. 
 
 The dig was carried out at the site where victims were made to undress and their heads were shaved before being forced to walk along the so-called “Road to Heaven” — the grim name given to the path that led to the gas chambers where they were murdered. 
 
 Researchers believe items dropped at that point slipped through the floorboards into the foundations below, where they were discovered over 70 years later. 
 
 Among other things found were a Star of David necklace, a woman’s watch, and a metal charm covered in glass with an etching of the biblical figure Moses holding the Ten Commandments. 
 
 “On the reverse side of the charm is the inscription of the essential Jewish prayer ‘Shema,'” the statement said. 
 
 The Frankfurt pendant has the inscription Mazel Tov in Hebrew with the date July 3, 1929, on one side and on the other, the Hebrew letter hey — used to symbolize God’s name — along with three stars of David. 
 
 Frank was born on June 12, 1929. 
 
 After searching a database of Holocaust victims, researchers came to the conclusion the pendant might have belonged to a girl by the name of Karoline Cohn, who was born on July 3, 1929, in Frankfurt and then deported to the Minsk ghetto on November 11, 1941. 
 
 Cohn’s fate from there is not known. She may have died in the ghetto. The pendant is believed to have reached Sobibor some time between November 1941 and September 1943, when the ghetto was shut down and 2,000 Jewish prisoners inside were sent to death camp. 
 
 If she was still alive and in possession of the piece, it was there that 14-year-old Cohn dropped the pendant. 
 
 “This pendant demonstrates once again the importance of archaeological research of former Nazi death camp sites,” Israel Antiquities Authority archaeologist Yoram Haimi said. “The moving story of Karoline Cohn is symbolic of the shared fate of the Jews murdered in the camp. It is important to tell the story, so that we never forget.” 
 
 Digs have been going on at the Sobibor site for 10 years and in the past researchers have found the foundations of the gas chambers, the train platform, and personal artifacts from victims. 
 
 As both Frank and Cohn were born in Frankfurt, researchers are now looking for relatives who may be able to shed light on any connection between the girls. 
 
 “Relatives of Karoline Cohn, or any member of the public who can assist with details regarding her family or Sophie Kollmann, who filled out Pages of Testimony in April 1978 for Richard Else Cohn and Karoline Cohn, are requested to contact Yoram Haimi via email yoramhi@israntique.org.il,” Yad Vashem said in the statement. 
 
 Polish archaeologist Wojciech Mazurek, Haimi, and their Dutch associate, archaeologist Ivar Schute, led the excavations at the site of the Nazi-operated death camp, where as many as 300,000 people, mostly Jews, were murdered during the Holocaust.
– Researchers excavating the remains of one of the most notorious Nazi death camps have uncovered a pendant that appears identical to one belonging to Anne Frank, Israel's Yad Vashem Holocaust memorial said Sunday. Yad Vashem says it has ascertained the pendant belonged to Karoline Cohn—a Jewish girl who perished at Sobibor and may have been connected to the famous diarist. Both were born in Frankfurt in 1929, and historians have found no other pendants like theirs. The triangular piece found has the words "Mazal Tov" written in Hebrew on one side along with Karoline's date of birth. The other side has the Hebrew letter "heh," an initial for God, as well as three Stars of David. Researchers are trying to reach out to remaining relatives of the two to confirm whether they were related, reports the AP. Since 2007, the Israel Antiquities Authority, together with Yad Vashem, has been conducting excavations at the former camp in Poland in a novel approach to Holocaust research. The pendant was found along with numerous other personal effects in the area of the destroyed camp where victims were forced to undress before being sent along the "road to Heaven," the Times of Israel reports, or the path to the gas chambers. It's believed the pendant fell through the floorboards. Anne died at the Bergen-Belsen camp, in northern Germany, in 1945. "This pendant demonstrates once again the importance of archaeological research of former Nazi death camp sites," an Israel Antiquities Authority archaeologist tells the Times. "The moving story of Karoline Cohn is symbolic of the shared fate of the Jews murdered in the camp. It is important to tell the story, so that we never forget."