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France offers 'hate TV' reprieve
Friday, 20 August, 2004, 22:48 GMT 23:48 UK France's top administrative court has given a Lebanese TV channel until 1 October to put behind it charges of anti-Semitism or face a broadcast ban. Al-Manar TV stands to lose its right to beam programmes into France if it does not sign up to France's code of conduct for media by that date. It caused a storm last October by showing a drama which depicted a Zionist plot to take over the world. A lawyer for the channel said it agreed the drama had been "inadmissible". So, what about making reparations in the form of broadcasting some pro-Jewish documentaries? France has seen a rise in anti-Semitic attacks in recent years, linked by many commentators to unrest in the Middle East. And taking a year to bring al-Manar to an accounting hasn't exactly helped, now has it? Arabic satellite TV is widely watched in urban areas where most of the country's five-million-strong Muslim community are concentrated. Warning The French broadcasting authority (CSA) took al-Manar to court over the drama,The Diaspora, which it described as "intolerable". "There will have to be a strong commitment that there will not be any anti-Semitic programming," said Sylvie Clement-Cuzin, the CSA's legal director, after Friday's ruling by the State Council. The State Council ruled that if al-Manar failed to satisfy the CSA's demands, its broadcaster, Eutelsat, would have to stop airing the channel via its satellites within a period of two months. Denis Garreau, lawyer for al-Manar, told the State Council's hearing that the broadcast of the drama had been "unfortunate" and asked for a chance to demonstrate that such airings would not be repeated. "The entire management was agreed in acknowledging that it was inadmissible," the channel's defence said in a statement. Horsesh!t. Everyone at the station knew full well ahead of time what was involved. These crocodile tears fool no one, save the French. 'Political pressure' Al-Manar Foreign Editor Ibrahim Mousawi told BBC News Online that the proposed ban resulted from "political pressure by the Jewish lobby". "We are not anti-Semites and did not incite hatred," he said. I repeat, "Horsesh!t! The Lebanese authorities have criticised action against al-Manar. A letter from the Lebanese foreign ministry to the French government argued that the broadcast was a criticism of "Zionist ideology and practices at the core of the Arab-Israeli conflict", not an attack on Jews. I didn't know the Nile flowed through Lebanon. Correspondents who have viewed The Diaspora note that it quotes extensively from the Protocols of the Elders of Zion, a notorious 19th Century publication used by the Nazis among others to fuel race hatred. From the linked site: It is a classic in paranoid, racist literature. Taken by the gullible as the confidential minutes of a Jewish conclave convened in the last years of the nineteenth century, it has been heralded by anti-Semites as proof that Jews are plotting to take over the world. Since its contrivance around the turn of the century by the Russian Okhrana, or Czarist secret police, "The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion" has taken root in bigoted, frightened minds around the world. The booklet's twenty-four sections spell out the alleged secret plans of Jewish leaders seeking to attain world domination. They represent the most notorious political forgery of modern times. Although thoroughly discredited, the document is still being used to stir up anti-Semitic hatred. Posted by: Zenster 2004-08-22 |
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