Holocaust survivor Lily Ebert has committed to preserving the true story of the horrific experience amid denials and attempts at rewriting history. Her 18-year-old great-grandson Dov Forman helped push her message to TikTok, garnering a fan base of over 1.7 million followers.
Lily lost over 100 relatives to the Holocaust, including her sibling and her mother, and she herself was imprisoned for four months at Auschwitz. The Nazis tattooed a number on her arm for identification, and Lily has refused to get rid of it ever since, unlike most survivors.
Why this holocaust survivor will never remove her Auschwitz tattoo
During an appearance on Good Morning Britain with Dov, Lily addressed the Nazi tattoo on her arm, noting that she is keeping it to show the world and as evidence of the dehumanization millions experienced at Auschwitz. She added that her voice represents those who, unlike her, did not survive to tell their story.
On International Holocaust Remembrance Day in January, she shared a speech recounting her time at Auschwitz-Birkenau and urging social media to become co-witnesses with her. “It is horrible what happened. Most people do not know about the Holocaust. They don’t teach it in schools anymore,” one of her fans replied.
Lily Ebert and Dov Forman wrote about the Holocaust
The attention from TikTok led Lily to co-author a book with her great-grandson titled Lily’s Promise: How I Survived Auschwitz and Found the Strength to Live, which she released in May. The 98-year-old had the honor of having Prince Charles write the foreword and was selected as a part of the Prince of Wales’s initiative to mark Holocaust Memorial Day.
The monarch commissioned seven artists to make portraits of the seven survivors, including Lily, for display at an exhibition at Buckingham Palace and then the Palace of Holyroodhouse in Edinburgh until July. Lily had promised herself amid the suffering that she would speak up about the Holocaust should she make it out.