More than 450 Jewish creatives, executives and Hollywood professionals on Monday signed an open letter denouncing British Jewish director Jonathan Glazer’s anti-Israel remarks at his victory speech at the Oscars, Variety reported.
The list of co-signees includes actors Debra Messing and Tovah Feldshuh, executives Gary Barber and Gail Berman, creator Amy Sherman-Palladino, directors Eli Roth and Rod Lurie), producers Lawrence Bender, Amy Pascal, Hawk Koch and Sherry Lansing and many others.
Other co-signees include Jennifer Jason Leigh, “La La Land” producer Gary Gilbert and “The Americans” creators Joel Fields and Joe Weisberg, according to Variety.
“We refute our Jewishness being hijacked for the purpose of drawing a moral equivalence between a Nazi regime that sought to exterminate a race of people, and an Israeli nation that seeks to avert its own extermination,” the letter read.
“The use of words like ‘occupation’ to describe an 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. It gives credence to the modern blood libel that fuels a growing anti-Jewish hatred around the world, in the United States, and in Hollywood,” it added.
Glazer declined to comment.
The writer and director took the stage last Sunday after winning who won the Academy Award for best international feature for “The Zone of Interest”, and asserted that Israel “weaponized” the Holocaust to commit “genocide” against Palestinian Arabs.
“Our film shows where dehumanization leads, at its worst,” Glazer said. “Zone of Interest” tells the story of the commandant of Auschwitz and his wife who strive to build a dream life for their family in a house and garden next to the camp.
“Right now we stand here as men who refute their Jewishness and the Holocaust being hijacked by an occupation which has led to conflict for so many innocent people, whether the victims of October the 7th in Israel, or the ongoing attack on Gaza, all the victims, this humanization, how do we resist?” he added.