Protesters Demand That Met Opera Cancel Show Some Call Anti-Semitic
Protesters demonstrate against a production of ‘The Death of KIinghoffer’ at the Metropolitan Opera House. (Credit: Marla Diamond/WCBS 880)
NEW YORK (CBSNewYork/AP) — Jewish groups this week were trying to get the Metropolitan Opera to cancel an opera based on the cruise ship murder of a Jewish businessman by pro-Palestinian terrorists.
As WCBS 880’s Marla Diamond reported, the protesters were escorted away from the entrance to Lincoln Center Monday night. But they said they would be back every week until the director cancels the fall performance of “The Death of Klinghoffer.”
One protester, Miriam, is a Holocaust survivor.
“This is an outrage, in the middle of New York City, to idolize murders,” she said.
Protesters Demand That Met Opera Cancel Show Some Call Anti-Semitic
The John Adams opera is based on the 1985 hijacking of the Italian cruise ship Achille Lauro and the murder of disabled Jewish-American passenger Leon Klinghoffer.
The Met has said it does not plan to cancel the performance.
Last month, the Met did, in fact, cancel plans for a simulcast of the opera around the world, which had been scheduled for Nov. 15.
The Met’s general manager Peter Gelb said last month that the show is not anti-Semitic and the Anti-Defamation League’s Ken Jacobsen agreed, but added that it’s very biased.
“They take the issue of a horrible act of terrorism and there’s a rationalization — a kind of equivalence, more equivalence,” Jacobsen said last month.
Adams blasted the decision to cancel the simulcast, saying the opera “in no form condones or promotes violence, terrorism or anti-Semitism.”
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