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The revelation that Herman Rosenblat's Holocaust memoir, "Angel at the Fence," was fabricated raised concerns among some Holocaust experts that Holocaust deniers will use the incident to undermine other survivors' testimony.

"I am very concerned that if their memories are incorrect, that it only [will] help the Holocaust deniers who, in the future, do what they can to make sure that people believe the Holocaust never happened," said Rabbi Dr. Bernhard Rosenberg, a Holocaust author and educator, and spiritual leader of Temple Beth-El, Edison.

Herman Rosenblat's touching love story, about a 9-year-old farm girl -- who later became Rosenblat's wife -- who passed apples over a fence to him throughout his experience in Schlieben, a sub-division of Buchenwald, became a children's book, a memoir published by Berkley Books, and landed Rosenblat a movie deal. He appeared on the Oprah Winfrey show twice, where she declared that the memoir was the "single greatest love story, in 22 years of doing this show, we've ever told on the air." He was featured on Hallmark Television, Lifetime Television, and CBS News.

Immediately after The New Republic reporter Gabriel Sherman published a story revealing the hoax, Oprah pulled her endorsement of "Angel at the Fence." Berkley Books dropped the memoir; the movie deal stayed intact.

"If any information [in a Holocaust memoir] is found to be incorrect, this is ammunition for Holocaust deniers," Rosenberg said. "Every time someone publishes a work that they add things like romance like Rosenblat did... that is a great disservice."

Rosenblat and his wife, Roma, were Holocaust survivors, but they met on a blind date in New York in the 1950s. Although this was acknowledged in the memoir, Rosenblat credits this blind date with reuniting him and his mysterious savior. Although romanticizing his story may not seem like a catastrophe, Rosenberg is concerned that it may give Holocaust deniers the ability to falsify the statements of other survivors.

"I am very concerned that if their memories are incorrect," Rosenberg said, "it only adds to help the Holocaust deniers who, in the future, do what they can to make sure that people believe the Holocaust never happened. By the time [survivors] die, that's when you'll really see the deniers and revisionists come out from the woodwork."

Rosenberg's concern is with details proven factually incorrect in the memoirs of survivors. Although he said that Holocaust films and historical fiction are important and crucial for preserving the memory of the Holocaust, he said that they need "to be works that are valid and cannot be challenged." His fear is that "if enough information comes out to be factually incorrect, when the next generation comes out and about, they'll have a field day in trying to disprove the Holocaust."

Dr. Alex Grobman, a Holocaust author who has written a book on denial, agreed.

"Yes, there's always a problem with some memoirs that people may forget, or include information that they learned unconsciously," Grobman said. For example, a survivor may recall that he got off a cattle car onto a platform that was not yet built. "There are these small mistakes that people make because over the years, their memories fade and they assimilated information they learned in hindsight."

However, Grobman does not believe that the fabrication of "Angel at the Fence" will have a lasting effect.

"There were a few books that have been proven to be dishonest. It's an inconvenience, a pathetic situation for the families involved, but the history will not be affected," Grobman said. "There are Holocaust deniers who will sue everything that they can to discredit Holocaust survivors. This will be another example. But the overwhelming evidence is such that they cannot succeed. It's just unfortunate that people like this can muddy the waters."

Both Rosenberg and Grobman agreed that a closer review of Holocaust books set to be published is an essential step to prevent a forged memoir from being released in the future. Both believe that better "readers," who review copies for mistakes before they are put in stores, may have prevented Rosenblat from getting away with "Angel at the Fence."

"The first mistake that publishers make is not giving it to someone who understands the field, particularly the Holocaust, because there are certain facts that would immediately raise questions about the authenticity of a particular event," Grobman said. "They should be edited properly and sometimes that doesn't happen, because editors are so excited by a new approach, or a new event, or a new story that they are taking in."

"Unlike some of the scholarly authors with real textbooks, with real bibliographies and research, Rosenblat was self-published," Rosenberg said. "If he said this was a fictionalized book based upon real life, it's fine. The minute you say this is for real, any Holocaust survivor reading this who was actually there said, 'What? Apples? How about a steak dinner?'"

Rosenberg said that as a Holocaust educator and author, he is able to spot errors in a survivors' testimony and would be willing to correct them before publication.

"Before a book like that goes on the market, it should be reviewed by someone who knows their history of the Holocaust," Rosenberg said. "If it came down to being asked to review a book professionally, then I would do that now that I know it's going out into the open public. What I'm trying to do is safeguard the reality of the Holocaust from those who would eventually try to destroy the memory of the Holocaust, and that's where it makes a difference."

Dr. Paul Winkler, executive director of the New Jersey Holocaust commission, refused to let the Rosenblat incident define Holocaust education in New Jersey.

"The Holocaust Commission is very sad to hear that the story was fabricated," Winkler said. "We will not make it a vehicle for the deniers to use."

Grobman pointed out that Rosenblat's story, and the stories of most Holocaust survivors, do not need to be embellished in order to be inspirational; Rosenblat explained that he fabricated the memoir in order to bring hope to people in dark times.

"Bringing hope to people is not his role," Grobman said. "His role as a survivor is to tell the truth. He made a tremendous error. You want to bring hope to people? You tell the story as it is and then you tell your story of your postwar experience... even in the most difficult of circumstances, you had a life, a future, kids, grandkids -- that's how you demonstrate that in the worst experience mankind can ever have, he was still able to emerge from that experience. That's a profound example of believing in the future."