I must have missed a few subtle literary points in college when I was taking a Charles Dickens seminar.
I missed the spot where Fagin, in Oliver Twist, is wearing a gigoondo yarmulke.
Also, blasting right by yours truly–alas, never the best of students–is the part where Fagin abstains from eating pork chops because they’re not kosher.
Who knew that Fagin was an observant Jew?
And I must have skipped the part where Fagin–going all bi-polar–talks to himself in fractured Hebrew and intones: “Never trust the goyim.”
Timothy Spall as Fagin: “Never trust
the goyim.” Gotta check the Cliff notes.
Fagin’s thick as lard accent–whoops, forgot Fagin is religious, let’s make that syrup–eastern European accent pegs him as an immigrant street rat, a dirty foreigner seducing and corrupting young British manhood.
Last night I was flipping through my 150 channels–you can get obese watching all the cooking shows–when I stumbled on this new adaptation of Oliver Twist.
What a surprise, I didn’t know I had access to Al Jazeera. It was kind of scary, I mean, I know the Arab world is a sewer of Jew-hatred, but this Fagin is pretty darn close to the image of the evil Jew pushed by the Nazi propaganda machine.
He’s not just the Jew, he’s the devil.
This Fagin is such a leering, salivating monster that I wouldn’t be surprised if, in next week’s exciting installment, he molests a few doe-eyed kids then slaughters them so he can use their blood to bake matzo.
The Blood Libel is alive and well in the Arab Muslim world and making headway, once again, in oh-so-civilized Europe.
Imagine my surprise when the station ID popped up and I discovered that this was not Al Jazeera, but PBS.
Okay, I really wasn’t surprised.
Just as I wasn’t surprised that this grotesquely anti-Semitic Oliver Twist is a British production. Most sane people recognize that Britain, in about 25 years, will be ruled by Sharia and cheerily Judenrein.
Say hello to the happy-go-lucky 7th century.
In truth, early editions of Oliver Twist were tainted by Jew hatred. But Dickens bravely confronted this bigotry and eliminated anti-Semitism from all subsequent editions. He knew it was wrong. He knew it was poison.
Not so for this BBC productions. They have departed from the standard text and and defaulted to the Jew-hatred that Dickens rejected.
Next PBS Jane Austen adaptation, be prepared for the slick, bad boy Jew who steals fortunes from unsuspecting fine ladies and seduces and abandons Christian virgins.
My fainting couch is positioned right in front of the TV.
European Jew-hatred is so common, so darn fashionable that Charles Dickens’ Oliver Twist is now part of the arsenal to make Jew-hatred acceptable.
Director Coky Giedroyc and writer Sarah Phelps are the chief criminals in this vile exercise in sophisticated Jew-hatred. They will, no doubt, argue that they are restoring a fresh perspective to Fagin’s Jewishness. This is the corrupt academic language of deconstruction, where “texts” have no real meaning, where all interpretations are equally valid.
Naturally, it’s a one-way deconstructionist street.
You can bet your bottom dollar that no Muslim would ever appear in such a dark light in a BBC production. Because the Islamists would issue a fatwa and Giedroyc and Phelps would be living under 24/7 protection.
No doubt, this dynamic Jew-hating duo would hunker down with The Koran and deconstruct it in order to prove that beheading is not terribly sporting.
But it’s open season on Jews because, well, what are we going to do but protest in print, be dismissed as right wing nut jobs, or y’know, pushy Jooz.
Question: why does PBS exist?
Oh right, desperately needed government support for people–and by people, I mean losers–who can’t make a living in the business.
Your tax dollars at work.
Copyright Robert J. Avrech