Dutch Jews, whose vigorous protests prevented the presentation of a reputedly anti-Semitic play by Rainer Werner Fassbinder here last week, are concerned that they may have unleashed an anti-Semitic backlash in Holland.
The play, titled “Garbage, the City and Death,” was withdrawn, reluctantly, by its sponsor, the Amsterdam Theatrical Academy, five days after its scheduled premier performance on the night of Nov. 18 was aborted when Jewish demonstrators occupied the stage at the Lantern Theater. The play’s tour of theaters in Arnhem, Utrecht and Haarlem was also canceled.
But the controversy, which had raged for two months and enlisted many non-Jews on the side of the protestors, has aroused great public interest and some strong opinions. The weekly Haagse Post published a Dutch translation of the play late last week and was sold out almost as soon as it hit the newsstands.
Local dailies are filled with letters to the editors, most of which express the view that the Jews who suffered so much themselves should not have resorted to “Nazi methods” to prevent freedom of expression.
The prestigious daily NRC Handelsblad, published a long article by Milo Amstadt, a former television producer of Jewish origin, who defended the play’s depiction of one of its main characters, an exploiter, as “the rich Jew.”
According to Amstadt, who was once a communist but later joined the Labor Party, it was only natural to portray a Jew as rich since most of the German Jews who survived the Nazi era were rich, while the Jewish proletariat was left to its fate, he said.
Lody Van De Kamp, an Orthodox rabbi from The Hague, warned in the Dutch-Jewish weekly NIW that the atmosphere in Holland has suddenly become so anti-Jewish that Jews should consider emigrating and settling in Israel.
Meanwhile, the Theatrical Company Amsterdam has announced plans to screen two Nazi films early next year–the notoriously anti-Semitic “Jew Suess” and Leni Riefenstahl’s “Triumph of the Will.” They will be shown in the framework of the Karl Kraus Project.
Kraus, an Austrian Jewish author, revived the films to show to what depths the Austrian people sank under the influence of Nazi propaganda. His project is subsidized in Holland by the Amsterdam municipality, the Austrian Embassy and the Netherlands Ministry of Culture.
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