London: Nazi leader Adolf Hitler possibly had Jewish as well as African ancestors - communities whom he had pledged to exterminate, new DNA tests have revealed.
Daily Express Tuesday reported that samples taken from Hitler's relatives link him to both the ¬Jewish community and people from North Africa.
Jean-Paul Mulders, a journalist, was able to investigate Hitler's DNA after he managed to lay his hands on a serviette dropped by the dictator's great-nephew Alexander Stuart-Houston who lives in New York. A serviette is a small square of cloth or paper used while eating to protect the clothes, wipe the mouth and hand.
He got a second sample from an Austrian cousin of Hitler, a farmer known as Norbert H, the media report said.
The DNA tests threw up a startling result.
It revealed a form of the Y-chromosome that is rare in Germany and the rest of Western Europe, but common among Jewish and North African groups.
Experts now think that Hitler had migrant relatives who settled in his homeland.
Mulders said both the test samples had a form of genetic material known as Haplopgroup E1b1b, proving an "irrefutable link" to the Nazi leader.
Mulders said both the test samples had a form of genetic material known as Haplopgroup E1b1b, proving an "irrefutable link" to the Nazi leader.
"It is most commonly found in the Berbers of Morocco, in Algeria, Libya and Tunisia, as well as among Ashkenazi and Sephardic Jews. One can from this postulate that Hitler was related to people whom he despised," the Belgian journalist was quoted as saying.
Ronny Decorte, a genetic specialist in Belgium, said: "Hitler would not have been pleased about this.
"Race and blood was central in the world of the Nazis. Hitler's concern over his descent was not unjustified. He was apparently not 'pure' or 'Aryan'."
IANS
First Published: Tuesday, August 24, 2010, 17:38