Via NPR:
As a young boy, Polish-born Yisrael Kristal looked forward to turning 13 when he could celebrate his bar mitzvah, the Jewish coming-of-age ritual. But that was 1916 and World War I crushed that hope. Little did he know that he would wait a century for that ceremony.
Kristal barely survived the next world war as a prisoner in Auschwitz. After WWII, he rebuilt his life in Israel, raising a family and opening a business. Earlier this year, he was recognized by Guinness World Records as the world’s oldest man.
But the milestone event that marks a Jewish boy’s passage to adulthood eluded Kristal until this week when he finally celebrated his bar mitzvah, at the age of 113, surrounded by two children, nine grandchildren and 30 great-grandchildren in Haifa, Israel.