Jewish War Veterans in South Africa Protest “desert Fox” Showing

Jewish veterans of South Africa’s armed forces demonstrated here last night in front of a motion picture theatre where the American-made film “The Desert Fox,” which glorifies the late Nazi Field Marshal Erwin Rommel, opened its South African run.

The veterans paraded around the theatre carrying signs reading: “Rommel Killed Our Boys” “Is This The Road to Peace?” and “Rommel’s Friends Brought Buchenwald.” In the midst of the demonstration Robby Leibrandt, South African convicted of pro-Nazi activities during the war and pardoned after the end of the conflict, started to address the crowd with anti-Semitic remarks. When it became apparent that some of the demonstrators were about to turn on him, the police hustled him into a squad car and drove away.

Additional protests against “The Desert Fox,” are scheduled to be made this week. The Board of Deputies of South African Jews has made public its correspondence with the South African offices of Twentieth Century-Fox, producers of the movie, in which the Board cited the “opposition which this film evoked in the ranks of both Jews and non-Jews in other parts of the world.” The Board said that its request for a preview of the film had been turned down by the company. “In the absence of evidence to the contrary.” the Board added, “we must assume that objections overseas have validity and accordingly we feel that Jews, who have been the chief victims of Nazism, will not go to see this film.”

In their sermons this week-end, South African rabbis urged a boycott of the film. Sarah Gertrude Millin, distinguished South African Jewish writer, who attended the Nuremberg war crimes trials, told the Jewish Telegraphic Agency that the motion picture should never have been made. She said she regards “The Desert Fox” as a “glorification of a Nazi who only turned against Hitler when his military measures failed. For the rest, he was a Nazi like all other Nazis.”