Aussie's blast ABC for 'anti-Semitic' comments

Film critic in youth radio show mentions that ‘Jews used to be oppressed, now they are oppressors’

Reuters | Published: 06.08.06, 20:24

Jewish communal leaders in Australia have slammed the Australian Broadcasting Corporation over allegedly anti-Semitic remarks that were made on its youth radio station, Triple J.

In her live-to-air review of "X-Men: The Last Stand last week," Triple J's resident film critic Megan Spencer said Jews - represented in the film by the mutant character Magneto, a Holocaust survivor - "used to be oppressed and now they are the oppressors."

Spencer also used the review of the film, which she dubbed a "great parable for our times," to criticize the US-led war in Iraq.

Melbourne Ports MP Michael Danby, in a letter to Triple J's station manager, said that while Spencer was free to criticize US and Israeli Government policies, "she is not entitled to refer to the 'the Jews' as though all people of Jewish faith or ethnicity were responsible for Israel's policies, or to suggest that 'the Jews' are a single entity who act together in a malign and conspiratorial way."

'Disturbing overtones of ethnic bigotry'

Danby's letter demanded an on-air apology for the "careless and ignorant comments," which risk "undermining" efforts to combat anti-Semitism and racism, particularly among young Australians.

Australia/Israel & Jewish Affairs Council director of policy analysis Ted Lapkin said Spencer's comments "bespeak an embarrassing ignorance of history. The remarks ascribed to her about Jewish 'oppressors' have disturbing overtones of ethnic bigotry. I would suggest that Ms Spencer should stick to commentary on Tinseltown, and leave political analysis to those who can conduct it with intelligence and decency."

A Triple J spokesman confirmed to that it had received a number of complaints following the segment which would be processed according to the ABC's complaints procedure.