TheEU parliament has refused delivery of Will Eisner’s THE PLOT a graphic novel discussing the long running anti-Semitic tract “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion.”
The European Parliament has refused to distribute to MEPs a book denouncing the “Protocols of the Elders of Zion”, an anti-Semitic literary forgery.
Produced by the Okhrana, the Russian Czar’s secret police, in 1905, the Protocols accuse the Jews of plotting to rule the world.
Last month, the Transatlantic Institute, a Brussels-based think-tank fostering ties among the EU, Israel and the US, sent copies of “The Plot: The Secret Story of the Protocols of the Elders of Zion” written by American Will Eisner in a comic-book form, to the 785 members of the European Parliament and their staff.
A MEP is a member of the European parliament. The book was refused “due to the nature of its content” and because “the parliament don’t allow advertisement and that the book had no relevance with the parliament’s legislative agenda.”
Just to clarify, essentially a lobbyist sent a bunch of the books to the EU Parliament, which refused to distribute them to members. This has nothing to do with the book’s sale or distribution throughout Europe.
I’m glad they did. It really has nothing to do with their legislative agenda and for all I know these people are drowning in spam as it is.
The end of the article was interesting (and a little frightening):
Three months ago, the President of the European Parliament, Hans-Gert Poettering, had personally ordered bookshops in the parliament in Brussels to remove from sales copies of a novel version in French of the “Protocols of Elders of Zion.”
“Why would the Protocols be easily available in the Parliament, but the refutation of the Protocols would not be allowed to reach MEPs?,” Ottolenghi [the head of the think-tank that donated the copies of “The Plot”] asked.
“Why would the Protocols be easily available in the Parliament, but the refutation of the Protocols would not be allowed to reach MEPs?,” Ottolenghi [the head of the think-tank that donated the copies of “The Plot”] asked.
How about: because he’s a bit of a cunt and not above creating a bit of fake outrage to get his organisation into the paper? Why else would he conflate the permission to directly mail MEPs with the availability in bookstores? That the Protocols’ removal from bookstores makes them “easily available” in his world OTOH strongly suggests that Ottolenghi is operating from a different space-time-continuum.
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The quotes, in combination with the fact that a Brussels based advocacy group would know what sort of mass mailings to MEPs are permissible and what not, IMO strongly suggest this was a planed PR move. The EP is damned if the do distribute the stuff since they open the door to everyone under the sun sending them books on their pet causes however remotely related to their work and if they refuse the “Transatlantic Institute” gets to pose as brave people spreading the good word despite adversity.
There is no precedent for rejecting distribution of information material at the EU parliament. The book was sent in sealed envelopes. The fact that the distribution service of parliament chose to censor Eisner’s book ‘due to the nature of its content’ means they opened sealed envelopes and inspected them. Had they done so for security reasons or for spam reasons, they should have said nothing of the content. This is not filtering spam or advertisement – the book was not advertising anything, aside from historical truth. This was plain censorship. It could have happened to any other book. As for the agenda of parliament: human rights, the middle east conflict, combating prejudice are three items on the agenda currently. the book addresses all three. It is quite smug, and plain ignorant to assume this claim was anything but an excuse. besides, the officer in charge did not reject the package on the ground of its irrelevance to the agenda – he rejected it on the ground that he objected to its content. Finally, MARKUS’ suggestion that this was a pre-planned PR move reflects the same conspiratorial mindset Eisner’s book exposes and stems out of lack of knowledge about the facts of this affair. the Transatlantic Institute spoke quietly to parliament and appealed the decision before speaking to the press. However, the distribution service made it clear it did not intend to hold the envelopes in its premises while the matter was pending and the MEP Quaestor in charge of the matter only considered the appeal after representations were made by other MEPs and the media. It was pressure that forced otherwise unaccountable officials to begin to recognize their mistake. Otherwise, the book would most likely be in a recycling bin right now. There was no PR move here – only an attempt to allow a harmless and entirely allowed publication to reach the decision makers to educate themselves about a subject that is sadly still very relevant to their work.
” Finally, MARKUS’ suggestion that this was a pre-planned PR move reflects the same conspiratorial mindset Eisner’s book exposes…”
Hold on a second. Markus thinks that a lobbying group might be engaged in a publicity stunt. But the lobbying group in question is Jewish, therefore he’s an anti-semite, rather than just somebody who’s cynical about lobbying groups. Am I understanding you correctly?