Posted on 03/26/2004 4:32:58 PM PST by MegaSilver
PARIS (Reuters) - Three Jewish brothers urged a Paris court on Friday to ban Mel Gibson's "The Passion of The Christ" from French cinemas as anti-Semitic only days before the U.S. box office hit is due to open in France. The brothers -- Patrick, Jean-Marc and Gerard Benlolo -- said at a hastily-arranged hearing that they as Jews felt insulted by the film, which they had not seen, and were sure it would provoke anti-Semitic violence.
Jewish critics in the United States, where the movie opened last month, have charged the film about Jesus Christ's suffering and death unjustly portrayed Jews as his killers, but this appeared to be the first attempt anywhere to ban it.
"There is so much violent anti-Semitism in Europe that we cannot let this happen," said Patrick Benlolo, referring to rising anti-Jewish violence, especially in France.
The brothers, lawyers for distributor Quinta Communications and the judge interrupted the hearing to see the film in a private showing at a nearby cinema. The Passion is due to open in France next Wednesday.
The distributor urged the judge to throw out the case because the brothers could not use their religion as the basis for a complaint. Its lawyer also argued they did not show how the film could cause public disorder.
The dossier the brothers submitted to support their request contained several legal errors and 15 of its 36 pages were quotes from U.S. movie reviews and an American book in English, which the judge said the court could not accept.
"Everybody speaks English, don't they?" Patrick Benlolo replied.
The court was due to issue its ruling on Monday.
This is the most revealing part of the article. These Foxman-type feel insulted by the mere existence of Christianity.
No, just the opposite is true: it is they who are entitled to be worried. It was in Europe that the Jewish mothers could not let their chidren out to play on Easter.
It is here , in this country, that the Jews are wrong, because we did not have pogroms like in Europe, and we do not have Muslims harassing Jews in the streets (not yet, they do that on college campuses, however).
Isn't up to you. Isn't freedom wonderful? If you think whatever message you ascribe to the film is bad, why not speak out against whatever you think that message is, rather than trying to silence the original message? That would be up to you. You are allowed to tell us what you think, and invite us to think it ourselves. You aren't allowed to tell us what we must think.
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