Merrill Eisenhower Atwater, the great-grandson of President Dwight D. Eisenhower, has cautioned that Holocaust denial is becoming increasingly prevalent, even 80 years after the end of World War II in Europe.

His comments coincided with global commemorations of the 80th anniversary of Victory in Europe Day on Thursday.

Nazi Germany’s formal surrender to the Allied powers on May 8, 1945, marked the end of the war in Europe, a conflict that resulted in approximately 40 million deaths, including the extermination of 6 million Jews.

The previous month, Eisenhower Atwater participated in the March of the Living on Holocaust Remembrance Day, joining survivors and thousands of others from around the world in a walk from Auschwitz to Birkenau, the sites of Nazi death camps in occupied Poland. The march serves as a solemn tribute to the victims and honors the survivors and their liberators.

“When you are with survivors, and you are both crying because of the significance of the moment—and they tell you, ‘Without your great-grandfather, this never would have happened’—I respond, without your bravery, this never would have happened,” Eisenhower Atwater told Digital on Wednesday.

“One person can save many lives. It wasn’t just the liberation of the camps—it was saving generations,” he stated.

Among those participating in the march was Israel Meir Lau, the former chief rabbi of Israel and a child survivor of Buchenwald, who personally met Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower, the leader of the Allied offensive against the Nazis in Europe, during the camp’s liberation.

Also commemorated was Chaim Herzog, the father of Israeli President Isaac Herzog, who was present for the march. Chaim Herzog, a British army officer during World War II, assisted in the liberation of the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp. His father, Yitzhak Isaac Halevi Herzog—who also became a chief rabbi of Israel—met with Gen. Eisenhower in 1946 to support Jewish survivors across postwar Europe.

Eisenhower Atwater called his involvement “humbling” and noted that the march allowed him to “sit and talk with unsung heroes.”

Eva Clarke, a survivor, particularly impacted him. “She’s one of the kindest people I’ve ever encountered. To learn that the gas ran out just a few days before her birth—that’s divine intervention,” he told Digital. “She paved the way. Just an incredible woman with an incredible story. She should inspire everyone.”

Clarke was born on April 29, 1945, at the gates of Mauthausen concentration camp and is one of only three known babies to have survived birth there.

Clarke’s mother, Anka Kauderova, spent three and a half years in concentration camps: Theresienstadt in what was then Czechoslovakia, Auschwitz, and the Freiberg slave labor camp and armament factory in Germany. Eventually, she was transported in open coal wagons, along with 2,000 other prisoners, on a harsh 17-day journey without adequate food or water to Mauthausen.

“My parents were in Theresienstadt for three years, an unusually long time. They were young, strong, and able to work. In some ways, it was a transit camp to a death camp,” Clarke told Digital.

“At the end of September 1944, their luck ran out. My father was sent to Auschwitz, and incredibly, my mother volunteered to follow him the next day. She didn’t know where he was going and, ever the optimist, believed it couldn’t get worse and they’d survive,” she said.

Anka never saw her husband again. An eyewitness later told her that he was shot and killed in the death march near Auschwitz on Jan. 18, 1945. The Russian army liberated Auschwitz on Jan. 27.

In 1943, Anka became pregnant. “It was dangerous, but she met my father secretly. Becoming pregnant in a concentration camp was considered a crime punishable by death,” Clarke said.

Her brother was born in February 1944 but died of pneumonia two months later. “Had my mother arrived at Auschwitz with a baby in her arms, both would have been sent to the gas chamber. Nobody knew she was pregnant again—with me.”

In April 1945, Anka was sent to Mauthausen. “It’s a beautiful village on the Danube in Austria, but the camp is on a steep hill behind it. When my mother saw the name at the train station, she was shocked—she had heard how horrific it was. That shock likely triggered her labor, and she began giving birth to me,” Clarke said.

She attributes her survival to timing. “On April 28, the Nazis ran out of gas. I was born on April 29. Hitler committed suicide on April 30. On May 5, the American 11th Armored Division liberated the camp.”

When the Americans arrived, they brought food and medicine—though many, already weakened, died after receiving them. Three weeks later, once Anka regained strength, U.S. forces repatriated her to Prague. There, Anka met her second husband, and the two left to avoid living under communism, eventually settling in the U.K.

“I feel Merrill is my new best friend,” Clarke said of Eisenhower Atwater. “It was overwhelming to meet someone whose great-grandfather played such an important role in ending the war. I was delighted to reconnect with him again in Auschwitz a few weeks ago. Everyone wanted to thank him for what his great-grandfather did.”

Clarke will return to Mauthausen this Sunday to mark the 80th anniversary of its liberation by U.S. forces. “I’ll be there with two other babies who were born under similar circumstances. We are so grateful, I can’t even express it,” she told Digital.

Reflecting on the moral clarity his great-grandfather exemplified, Eisenhower Atwater emphasized that we are all human beings first.

“We all know right from wrong. It is wrong to kill people, wrong to put babies in ovens, wrong to put people in gas chambers. That’s clear,” he said.

He acknowledged that Holocaust denial often stems from disbelief. “It’s easy to say something didn’t happen because it’s hard to comprehend the death of that many people. I get that. But it did happen. Nazi Germans killed 10,000 people a day—it’s well-documented. They documented it themselves, and the Allied forces saw it first-hand.

“Nobody really wants to talk about the death of six million people over a five-to-six-year period,” he added. “But it’s the truth.”