Hundreds of Jewish actors, producers and others involved within the film industry have signed a letter condemning critical remarks against Israel made by director Jonathan Glazer while accepting an Oscar for his Holocaust film “Streamed Zone.”
Described as “a statement by Jewish Hollywood professionals.” letter it was signed by actors Debra Messing and Julianna Margulies; producers Lawrence Bender and Amy Pascal; and author and showrunner Amy Sherman-Palladino, in keeping with Variety, which first reported the news on Monday night.
The signatories were confirmed Tuesday by Allison Josephs, an activist who has promoted Jewish representation in film and tv and who helped distribute the letter. She said it had nearly a thousand signatures as of Tuesday morning.
The letter criticized a speech Glazer gave earlier this month on the Academy Awards while accepting the feature film Oscar for “Strife,” which tells the story of the Nazi commandant in command of Auschwitz and his family living a quiet home life just outside Auschwitz’s borders. camp partitions.
“All our choices were intended to reflect and confront the present,” Glazer, who’s Jewish, said when accepting the Oscar. “It’s not about saying, ‘Look what they did then,’ rather, ‘Look what we’re doing now.’ Our film shows where dehumanization at its worst leads.”
“At this moment, we stand here as people who reject their Jewishness and the Holocaust hijacked by an occupation that led to conflict for so many innocent people,” he said. “Whether it’s the victims of October 7 in Israel or the ongoing attack on Gaza, all the victims of this dehumanization, how can we stand up?”
The letter condemning his speech, he said: “We reject the hijacking of our Jewishness in order to draw a moral equivalence between the Nazi regime, which sought to exterminate the human race, and the nation of Israel, which seeks to prevent its own extermination.”
It went on to say: “Israel does not attack civilians. Its target is Hamas. The moment Hamas releases the hostages and surrenders is the moment this heartbreaking war ends.”
He accused Glazer’s speech of “giving credence to a modern-day blood libel that is fueling growing anti-Jewish hatred around the world, in the United States and in Hollywood.”
Glazer’s remarks, a rare mention of the conflict on the awards ceremony, drew applause on the ceremony and subsequent criticism. Some early reports appeared to misquote Glazer in a way that made it appear as if he was denying his Jewishness, somewhat than denying what he described because the “hijacking of his Jewishness by the occupation.”
The term “occupation” is usually used to explain Israel’s control of the West Bank and the blockade of Gaza. Monday’s open letter appeared to suggest that Glazer described all of Israel as an occupation; stated that “the use of words such as ‘occupation’ to describe the indigenous Jewish people defending a homeland that dates back thousands of years and has been recognized as a state by the United Nations distorts history.”
Glazer’s representatives didn’t reply to a request for comment.
“Business Zone” with Sandra Hüller and Christian Friedel was nominated for five Oscars, including best picture. It was the primary film entered by the UK to win a global feature award.
