Maya Levina was six years old when Geman troops occupied Minsk in June 1941. She and her family had to move into the ghetto. After the murder of her parents Isaak and Sima Levin and other relatives, a neighbor took care of her from the end of 1942. However, the neighbor was soon also murdered, leaving Maya Levina all alone. She fell severely ill due to cold and hunger in the ghetto. Her brother Yosif Levin, who had joined a partisan group, could only pay her occasional visits in secret.
In October 1943 her brother smuggled Maya Levina and forty other children out of the ghetto. After three days on foot, the exhausted group reached Porechye, sixty miles (100 kilometers) away. The children were taken in by villagers and protected by the partisans. Maya Levina found refuge with Anastasiya Khurs and her mother-in-law Vera, and stayed with them until their liberation in July 1944.
The only other survivors from Maya Levina’s family were her sister Valya and her brother Yosif. Maya Levina later became a successful gymnast.