Emma-Etel Katz, later Emma-Etel Awerbuch, was born in 1899 in Vilnius, a daughter of Chonon Katz and Judes Telz. She married Nochem Awerbuch in Vilnius on 2 December 1923, and they had a son, Isaak. She was murdered in the Holocaust, recorded on the list of Jews of Vilna killed between 24 June 1941 and 13 July 1944.