On display at Germany's embassy in Israel: Portraits of Holocaust survivors that seek to reclaim their stories

TEL AVIV (JTA) — The first time Gidon Lev encountered Holocaust denial was after becoming an unwitting TikTok star at the age of 86.

“I was totally shocked. How could this be?” he told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency about receiving dozens of comments accusing him of lying about the years in a Nazi concentration camp as a child.

“If only I was a liar,” he said. “Then I would have a father, grandparents, cousins, aunts, and uncles. I would have had a childhood.”

With half a million followers on the popular social media platform and 8.3 million likes, Lev says his message, of fighting hate and sta...