Israel crowns Miss Holocaust Survivor, 86
An 86-year-old great-grandmother has been crowned “Miss Holocaust Survivor” in an annual Israeli beauty pageant designed to honour women who endured the horrors of the Nazi genocide.
Great-grandmother Salina Steinfeld, 86, has been crowned Miss Holocaust Survivor for 2021 Photo: AP
Ten contestants – ranging in age from 79 to 90 – trod the catwalk on Tuesday at a museum in Jerusalem, their hair styled and make-up applied and dressed to the nines with sashes adorning their gowns.
Organisers of the contest, which was cancelled last year due to the coronavirus pandemic, say it bestows glamour and respect on a dwindling number of Jewish women whose youth was stolen during World War II but who went on to build new lives in Israel.
“After what I went through in the Holocaust, I never dreamed that I could get to where I am, with a big family: two kids, four grandchildren and two great-grandchildren,” said contestant Kuka Palmon, who survived a pogrom in her native Romania.
“And yet here I am, at this great age, 87. It’s a godly thing, it is indescribable.”
Tuesday’s winner Salina Steinfeld, 86, was also born in Romania, where she survived Nazi attacks before moving to Israel in 1948, organisers said.
Other contestants included a woman born in Yugoslavia who survived the Rab concentration camp in modern-day Croatia.
Some commentators and survivors worry the event cheapens the memory of the six million Jews killed by the Nazis.
Dana Papo, whose grandmother Rivka competed on Tuesday, disputed that point of view, arguing that the contestants “deserve that everyone see how much beauty there is in these women who went through such horror”.
“We will show them how much we love and appreciate them. Thanks to them, we have a future and we have a country,” she said.
Story: Rami Ayyub [Reuters]
Sadly, this contest is unlikely to last more that another 5 years given WW2 ended 76 years ago. Congratulation Salina on your win.
This kind of contest (so called beauty pageant) does not bestow ‘glamour and respect’ on women of any kind. Worth does not come from it. It’s not appropriate for any one, and while I do not begrudge the good feeling Salina Steinfeld might have gained from participating and winning this event, it is not, to me, appropriate.
Respect for survivors, as women, as people, has nothing to do with beauty pageants. And glamour? Beauty itself is a fine thing. Glamour, artificial.