Czech Terezín survivor uses TikTok to shed light on Holocaust

Representatives of European Jewish communities and politicians from European countries met Tuesday in Terezín, the former wartime Jewish ghetto to the north of the country, to remember victims of the Holocaust and vow to fight against anti-Semitism.

Among the speakers at the commemorative event was Gidon Lev, a Czechoslovak native and one of the few child survivors of the Terezín ghetto. Lev is also widely known for his TikTok channel in which he delivers straight talk about his time at Terezín to the social media generation.

The commemorative meeting took place during the two-day conference of the European Jewish Association (EJA), which started Monday.

Lev, 87, was born to a Jewish family in Karlovy Vary, West Bohemia, in 1935. He was transported to Terezín, also called Theresienstadt, at the age of six and spent four years there.

He lost 26 members of his family to the Holocaust, including his father. At present, he lives in Israel and focuses on educating young people about the history of the Holocaust via social networks.

On the opening day of the conference, Julie Gray, Lev's biographer and the author The True Adventures of Gidon Lev (2020), said that social networks present a huge opportunity in fighting anti-Semitism as well as modernizing the approach to Holocaust education in the classroom.

Grey and Lev's TikTok channel "The True Adventures" shares videos that create awareness among young people about the realities of the Holocaust and life in the camps.

The account currently has 413,000 followers. According to Grey, the number of people who have viewed their videos in the past 60 days has exceeded that of people visiting the Museum of the Holocaust in Washington, D.C. in the past four years.

One of their latest projects focuses on former concentration camps in Europe. In one-minute videos, young guides describe what happened in certain places associated with the war, including Terezín.

EJA chairman Menachem Margolin said this year's EJA conference has been staged in Prague and Terezín because under the term Holocaust, many people imagine the Auschwitz extermination camp, although Jews faced evil all over Europe.

The participants were also addressed by Michel Gourary, head of the European March of the Living.

He said the participants have met to fight against anti-Semitism, against Holocaust denial and against delegitimization of Israel.

The inmates of the ghetto included over 10,500 children, 400 of whom died in Theresienstadt and 7,500 fell victims to the "final solution to the Jewish issue".

The Nazis also imprisoned and executed their opponents at the Gestapo prison in Terezín's Small Fortress, where a total of 32,000 people were jailed and 2,600 of them perished.

Dutch Chief Rabbi Binyomin Jacobs said a prayer for the dead at Tuesday's memorial and the participants lit candles and laid wreaths at the stone menorah at the Jewish cemetery in Terezín.

Friday, Jan. 27, marks the International Day of Commemoration in memory of the victims of the Holocaust.