Shunned anti-Semitism film shown for 24 hours only at Bild website
Germany’s biggest paper leaks pirate copy of controversial documentary that public TV channel has refused to broadcast
COLOGNE, Germany — A new much discussed documentary on European anti-Semitism has been leaked on the website of the Bild Zeitung, Germany’s biggest newspaper. The leak, whose source remains anonymous, is illegal.
Titled “Chosen and Excluded – Jew Hatred in Europe,” the film by German producers Joachim Schröder and Sophie Hafner covers the various forms of Jew hatred that prevail in contemporary Europe. Although it was approved by network editors, for the past five months it has been withheld from the public by the Franco-German public TV networks Arte, which owns its broadcasting rights.
One of the reasons given for the highly controversial decision to shun the movie, which was commissioned by the German public WDR network on behalf of its partner station Arte, was that it would include too much footage from Israel. The documentary also includes a segment on anti-Semitic Israel bashing, which, as the film strikingly shows, is often supported by tax-funded European NGOs.
The public TV channels’ refusal to broadcast the film has been harshly criticized by public figures, among them scholars, politicians and artists who acclaimed the documentary. Now Bild is leaking a web link to the film for 24 hours, beginning Monday night and ending Tuesday at midnight.
The publication of the link on the newspaper’s website is accompanied by extensive coverage about the documentary and the circumstances surrounding its suspensions, in the daily’s online and print editions.
“Germany is not the country in which anti-Semitic prejudices may be whitewashed or concealed. It is our historic duty to stand up against the awfulness exposed in this documentary. Hence we have to know what we are dealing with,” writes Bild editor in chief, Julian Reichelt in today’s edition of his newspaper, explaining why the film is being leaked.
Reichelt writes he suspects that the documentary was shunned because proving that anti-Semitism exists in large parts of society “is politically inconvenient.”
