Wilkomirski syndrome
Wilkomirski syndrome (German: Wilkomirski-Syndrom) is a public phenomenon when non-Jews present themselves as Jewish Holocaust survivors or Jews with a Holocaust trauma in the family. It is considered fraudulent and is particularly common as a form of literary fraud in the Holocaust memoir circuit. The term is a reference to the Munchausen syndrome and is named after Binjamin Wilkomirski, the pseudonym used by the author of Fragments: Memories of a Wartime Childhood (1995), a false memoir which initially received positive publicity and several awards. The 1998 revelation that the book was based on fabrications initiated public discussions in Germany, and in 2001 the Moses Mendelssohn Center for European Jewish Studies hosted a conference on "Das Wilkomirski-Syndrom".
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