CRIF, the umbrella representative group of French Jewish organizations, slammed French theaters for presenting anti-Semitic comedian Dieudonne's new shown titled ‘’The Impure Beast.”
The show, among other anti-Semitic references, features dirty jokes about Ilan Halimi, a French Jew who was tortured and murdered in 2006 because he was Jewish.
“CRIF deplores the many theaters that chose to offer him a podium to disseminate to an instrumentalized audience his hatred of Jews and of those who dare criticize him,” the Jewish group said in a statement about Dieudonne’s six-month tour, which is due to begin on December 27 at Zenith Nantes Metropole, one of the largest event halls in western France.
CRIF in particular criticized the Fimalac event hall operator, which owns Zenith. Some one third of Dieudonne’s 20 bookings across France are in theaters owned by Fimalac, CRIF said, and called on French Culture Minister Fleur Pellerin to “remind the firms of their obligations, moral and otherwise.”
Several French mayors banned Dieudonne’s previous tour in their municipalities, at the request of then-Interior Minister Manuel Vals, who is now France’s Prime Minister.
Dieudonne is the inventor of the quenelle gesture, a reverse Nazi salute which has become extremely popular in anti-Semitic and extremist circles across the French-speaking world and worldwide.
He has been convicted ten times in France for inciting racial hatred against Jews.