Charlie Hebdo Fired Cartoonist For “Anti-Semitism”

H/T CofCC

In France, Charlie Hebdo was notorious for trashing Christianity and Islam in its cartoons, but in 2008 one of its cartoonists, Maurice Sinet, crossed the line when he wrote a short column which mildly suggested that Jewishness was correlated with social and economic success.

Sinet (aka Siné) was fired by Charlie Hebdo and was charged with “inciting racial hatred.” He was taken to court by an anti-racist group called Ligue Internationale Contre le Racisme et l’Antisémitisme (LICRA). Sinet won a wrongful termination suit against Charlie Hebdo and a 40,000 euro court judgment. He also won the LICRA suit.

“Maurice Sinet, 80, who works under the pen name Sine, faces charges of “inciting racial hatred” for a column he wrote last July in the satirical weekly Charlie Hebdo. The piece sparked a summer slanging match among the Parisian intelligentsia and ended in his dismissal from the magazine.

“L’affaire Sine” followed the engagement of Mr Sarkozy, 22, to Jessica Sebaoun-Darty, the Jewish heiress of an electronic goods chain. Commenting on an unfounded rumour that the president’s son planned to convert to Judaism, Sine quipped: “He’ll go a long way in life, that little lad.”

A high-profile political commentator slammed the column as linking prejudice about Jews and social success. Charlie Hebdo’s editor, Philippe Val, asked Sinet to apologise but he refused, exclaiming: “I’d rather cut my balls off.”

Mr Val’s decision to fire Sine was backed by a group of eminent intellectuals, including the philosopher Bernard-Henry Lévy, but parts of the libertarian Left defended him, citing the right to free speech.”