A book to be burned: The other face of Israel, Israel Adam
Shamir
File http://quibla.net , 3 November 2005
‘What demon is annoying you and leading
you to slander?
So a book displeases you; who is
forcing you to read it?’
Boileau
Israel Shamir’s Parisian publisher sentenced
to pay €23,500 and given a three-month suspended prison
sentence.
It was an absolutely staggering piece of news
that came down on the wires of the Agence France-Presse at
5.34pm on the 2nd of November. We reproduce it below
as is.
On Wednesday, the court in Nanterre sentenced
the manager of the publishing house Al Qalam to three months in
prison, suspended, and to a fine of €10,000 for having published
Israel Shamir’s anti-Semitic work, L’autre visage d’Israël
(The Other Face of Israel); furthermore, the sale of he book has
been prohibited.
The court found Abdelila Cherifi Alaoui, the
manager of the publishing house, Al Qalam, guilty of ‘incitement
to discrimination, exhortation to hatred and violence’ towards
the membership of a religion.
In addition to the suspended three-month
prison sentence and the fine of €10,000, Al Qalam will also have
to pay €12,000 in damages and €1,500 in court expenses on behalf
of the plaintiff, the International League Against Racism and
Anti-Semitism (LICRA). Lastly, the publisher has 30 days to
withdraw the book from all bookshops, under a €100 penalty for
every copy remaining on the shelves at the end of that period.
The court justified its judgement by the fact
that ‘the expression “juifs”(Jews) is always used in the plural’
in the book, and they are portrayed as ‘dominating the world’,
within an overall framework of a ‘third world war’ currently
being carried out, according to the author. As well, the court
finds that ‘the author reveals himself to be a rather
old-fashioned anti-Semite, particularly where he quotes from
The Protocols of the Elders of Zion.’
First published in 1905 in Russia, The
Protocols of the Elders of Zion, a book announcing how the
Jews intended to satisfy their hatred, destroy Christian
civilisation and seize world power, went round the world,
selling millions of copies.
Recognised as an obvious forgery since 1921
(it had apparently been conjured up by the secret service of the
Tsar, who was opposed to any liberalisation of his rule of
Russia and thus attempted to use it as proof of an alleged
Zionist plot against him); it continues, however, to be widely
used and presented as authentic by those wishing to justify
their anti-Semitic claims. The Nazis, in particular, claimed it
being authentic. In The Other Face of Israel, Israel
Shamir says on page 282: “the Protocols ought to be regarded as
a political pamphlet”.
Editor’s note from Quibla: This is an
extremely worrisome sentence. It goes against judicial precedent
with regards to criticism of religions, whatever they are. It is
enough to read Shamir’s book to realise that the charges of
‘anti-Semitism’ are clearly unfounded. In the Elders of Zion and
the Masters of Discourse, in 2002, Shamir tries to analyse why,
one century after their first publication, the Protocols of the
Elders of Zion continue to have such a success throughout the
world. He concludes that it is because the Zionists behave from
day to day as if they were applying the programme of domination
described in this book. The publisher has been the victim of
this iniquitous condemnation and will appeal. This matter is far
from at an end.
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