Celebrating beauty with a pageant like no other, Miss Holocaust Survivor is an Israeli celebration of grit, triumph and human kindness over beauty that is just “skin deep”. , a Romanian-born survivor of the Holocaust, aged 86 and a great grandmother said while accepting the prize in Jerusalem that winning the pageant was her “personal victory over the Nazis.” Organisers of the contest say it bestows glamour and respect on a dwindling number of Jewish women whose youth was lost during World War II, but still went on to build new lives in Israel. For the first time in the pageant’s history, it was broadcasted live on the website Vimeo, and viewers were able to watch ten contestants – ranging in age from 79 to 90 – trod the catwalk at a museum in Jerusalem, their hair styled and make-up applied and dressed to the nines with sashes adorning their gowns. The pageant is organized by a Haifa based charity called Yad Ezer l’Haver, which provides care and lodging for Holocaust survivors and according to their founder and CEO, Shimon Sabag, the idea for the event came to him after he heard a survivor named Shoshana Kolmer speak to psychiatrist Isabella Greenberg. Salina Steinfeld, this year’s winner was born in Romania, where she survived Nazi attacks before moving to Israel in 1948. Other contestants included a woman born in Yugoslavia who survived the Rab concentration camp in modern-day Croatia.