(JTA) — A French watchdog group filed a complaint against a rap artist it accuses of glorifying Mohammed Merah, who killed four at a Jewish school in Toulouse.
The National Bureau for Vigilance against Anti-Semitism, or BNVCA, filed the complaint with police this week against Elie Yaffa, better known in France by his stage name Booba, in connection with the lyrics of a song titled “Porsche Panamera.”
The video was removed from Booba’s official YouTube channel on Wednesday, the day BNVCA published a statement condemning the video.
Merah, who killed three children and a rabbi in March 2012, is mentioned twice in the song, which Booba performed with the rap group S.D.H.S Family.
“We’ll shoot anyone for a cause, Mohammed Merah,” the group sings. “Bang bang in your head, we’ll blow you away, we’re angry like Merah.”
Later they sing: “Allah Yerahmo [Arabic for ‘May Allah have mercy on him’], because only crime pays off.”
“Booba’s lyrics amount to endorsing the anti-Jewish and anti-French killer of Toulouse, who is clearly referenced,” Sammy Ghozlan of BNVCA told JTA.
Booba, the son of a Muslim father from Senegal, last year drew anti-Semitic social media attacks when a song he released called for vengeance for the victims of slavery and the Holocaust.
Booba has sold more than 1 million albums in France.
