Ursula Haverback. (YouTube Screenshot)
(JTA) — An 87-year-old German woman dubbed the “Nazi grandma” was sentenced to 10 months in jail for Holocaust denial.
Ursula Haverbeck, of the western German town of Vlotho, told a court in Hamburg last week that the Nazis’ Auschwitz death camp is “only a belief.”
Haverbeck was charged in April with Holocaust denial after saying on television that the Holocaust was “the biggest and most sustainable lie in history.” She made the statement to reporters outside the trial of former SS guard Oskar Groning, who was found guilty for his role in the murder of 300,000 at Auschwitz.
Haverbeck challenged the court to prove that Auschwitz was a death camp, the German Deutche Welle reported. She was sentenced on Nov. 12.
Magistrate Bjoern Joensson, who issued the sentence, said it was “deplorable that this woman, who is still so active given her age, uses her energy to spread such hair-raising nonsense.”
“She is a lost cause,” he added, according to Deutche Welle.
Haverbeck already has a criminal record, including two fines and a suspended sentence for sedition. She said she will appeal the sentence.
It is illegal in Germany to deny or downplay the Holocaust.
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