In early 1959, Otto Frank brought legal action against the German teacher Lothar Stielau. This right-wing extremist had written in his school’s newsletter that Anne Frank's diary was a forgery. After an investigation into the authenticity of the diary, the court ruled that the diary was genuine. Stielau retracted his remarks and came to a settlement with Otto Frank.
This was the first, but by no means the last time Otto had to go to court to defend Anne's diary against similar accusations.
There are several reasons why people claim that the diary is not real. One of the main reasons is that they are trying to prove that the Holocaust never took place. By casting doubt on the testimonies, they hope to show that the Nazis were not as bad as they are portrayed. They often use seemingly scientific arguments that are difficult to check for lay people. However, historians have no doubts about the reality of the murder of six million Jews during the Second World War.
