March 1999

On the face of it, it is difficult to see what anyone could object to in the new animated film from Steven Spielberg’s Dreamworks Studio, The Prince of Egypt. The film tells the story of Moses and follows the biblical story closely, contains no sex, and the violence in the biblical tale is handled carefully to keep the film suitable for children. The film is also careful to respect religious sensibilities, avoiding cheapening the narrative with either the sort of Hollywood love story inserted in the other famous Moses film, The Ten Commandments, or the typical "light relief" comic sidekicks and dancing animals which are generally standard fare in other animated movies.

Yet somehow Malaysian censors have found reason to ban the movie. After initially refusing to give any reason at all for the ban, the Chairman of the Film Censorship Board announced that the film had been banned because, "We ban films that don’t serve the interest of the people. We found it insensitive for religious and moral reasons. Because of the many races in Malaysia, religion is a very sensitive issue."

Despite this explanation, things are not much clearer. It is difficult to see in what way this movie could be religiously "insensitive." After all, the Muslim Koran tells much the same story about Moses and the exodus of the Israelites that the Jewish and Christian bible does.

One potential area of sensitivity that could be responsible for the Malaysian ban has been cited in the case of another predominantly Muslim nation which also has banned the film, The Maldives. There, the reason given was that all "prophets and messengers of God are revered in Islam and therefore cannot be portrayed." However, this has never been the reason cited by Malaysian authorities, and there are differences between the Maldives and Malaysia, as Dr. Greg Barton, a Deakin University expert on Islam in Malaysia and Indonesia, pointed out. The Maldives, he said, had suffered a resurgence of a "rather narrow" version of Islam, bought back by students who had studied in the Middle East. The Maldives had already banned films like The Ten Commandments and Ben Hur, which includes a portrayal of Jesus. However, these films have never been banned in Malaysia and videos of them are freely available. Additionally, Dr. Barton argued that "Most Malaysian Muslims would not have a problem, I don’t think, with a cartoon movie with Moses."

That leaves us with basically two explanations for the censor’s decision. Either we have an entirely new adoption of a hard-line Islamic interpretation that all "portrayals of prophets" are unacceptable. Or, more likely, we have the re-application of something which has been all too traditional in Malaysia. That is a policy, rooted in anti-Semitic beliefs, against allowing Malaysians to be exposed to anything seen to be culturally "Jewish."

In the wake of the current ban, it is difficult not to recall a similar controversy over another Spielberg movie in 1994. At the time, the movie in question was "Schindler’s List", Spielberg’s masterpiece on the Holocaust, which Malaysian authorities decided to ban "because it is propaganda with the purpose of asking for sympathy for one race [meaning, apparently, Jews], as well as to tarnish another race [meaning, apparently, the German Nazis]. " At that time, the results seemed like a watershed, because the ban was initially backed by Malaysian Prime Minister Dr. Mahathir Mohamed, but later partially reversed after the intervention of a prominent Malaysian politician, who argued the ban should be reviewed, saying "The Nazis were brutal and cruel and if their victims, be they Jews or non-Jews, were victims, our sympathies should be with them."

The comparison to the 1994 case seems particularly revealing because the man who intervened on behalf of Schindler’s List was Malaysia’s then Deputy Prime Minister, Anwar Ibrahim.

In 1994, Anwar’s influence on the matter of Schindler’s List seemed a sign of his growing power in the ruling UMNO party, and the potential for democratic and liberalising reforms in Malaysia after the departure of Mahathir. Today, it is Anwar’s replacement as Deputy Prime Minister, Datuk Seri Abdullah, who is in charge of the film censorship board in the country, and presumably oversaw the decision to ban Prince of Egypt. It is clear that Mahathir, however, was involved in the decision; with a representative of the Prime Minister’s Department, Datuk Dr. Abdul Hamid Othman, announcing that "it is fair that the movie is banned" because "it might be very sensitive to people in the country."

It seems likely that the current ban is tied into the ongoing Malaysia political struggles. As Dr. Barton argued, in Malaysia, "When a decision is made to censor something or ban something, very often there’s a political issue going on. It can’t easily be explained on straightforward rational lines; there’s normally some more to the story behind it."

It would not be surprising if the Malaysian Prime Minister, rocked by public support for Anwar, has again taken to exploiting "anti-Zionist" sentiments, often spilling over into outright anti-Semitism, in Malaysia to shore up support. It is certainly true that in October 1997, as Malaysia was falling into the current Asian economic downturn, Mahathir gave speeches arguing that Malaysia’s economic problems might be the work of "the Jews" who have an "agenda" to harm Muslims, and that speculation on the Malaysian currency might be the work of these groups deliberately trying to harm Malaysia. He specifically accused a Jewish financier, George Soros, of being responsible and demanded the US arrest him as a "criminal." In the furore that erupted afterwards, Mahathir denied the original remarks, but didn’t back away from his basic conspiratorial premises, saying that Malaysians cannot make "wild accusations" or "they [the Jews] will twist our arms," and that the "Jews are a very strong race...they are the strongest race in the world."

Such statements about a Jewish conspiracy have been a staple for Mahathir for many years. As long ago as his 1969 book, The Malay Dilemma, which set out the basis of his policy in government of creating laws discriminating in favour of Malaysia’s Malay majority by creating racially based restrictions on Chinese Malaysians, Mahathir had some choice words to say about Jews. He described them as "hook-nosed, but they understand money instinctively" and claimed that "their stinginess and financial wizardry gained them commercial control of Europe."

Since gaining power, Mahathir has often alleged Zionist or Jewish "plots" against Malaysia and often claimed that both the foreign press and foreign governments are under the control of Zionists. In 1986, Mahathir said, that "some countries under Jewish control were using the foreign press to try and topple the Malaysian government." He made similar comments again in 1993, when he said "a very few people in the West control all the international media" and "It is clear the foreign press is more under Zionist power than the Malaysia press which is under the control of the government." In 1991, the Malaysian Defence Minister claimed that the Gillespie case, a row over that erupted when a Malaysian prince illegally spirited his children out of Australia in defiance of court-ordered custody arrangements, was in fact a "Zionist" plot "to humiliate Islam and the Malaysian government."

One element of the conspiratorial anti-Jewish beliefs of the Malaysian government under Mahathir, generally tied to fervent support for the Palestinian cause, has been a suspicion of "Jewish" cultural products. This was most clear in a 1984 dispute over a visit to Malaysia by the New York Philharmonic Orchestra. The Malaysian government objected when the Orchestra proposed to play the piece, "Shlomo" (Solomon) by Jewish composer, Ernest Bloch. At the time, in justification of their position, the Malaysian Minister of Information cited an official government policy banning the "screening, portrayal, or musical presentation of works of Jewish origin." The orchestra cancelled its trip.

It seems likely from the more recent film cases that this policy still remains in place, though the justifications offered have gotten more polished and plausible. In 1984, there was simply a policy against Jewish works. In the 1994 Schindler’s List case, an absurd and frightening attempt was made to argue that the movie did not fairly attempt to portray the views of both sides of the Holocaust, the Nazi and the Jewish. Now, the Malaysian censors have learned to say simply that they wish to avoid offending religious sensibilities.

Dr. Barton agrees that it is this tradition of anti-Semitism that is most likely to be responsible for the ban of Prince of Egypt. "Some people might sincerely raise the issue of depicting prophets as a question, but serious political players, I think, are much more into anti-Zionism and antisemitism often," he told the Review, "I think it’s one of the ways they prove their credentials as Muslim politicians...it’s the low-cost option...Malaysian politicians have experienced the fact that this a good way of getting particularly lower middle class and working class Malays to rally around and see them as champions of the faith."

The Malaysian desire to avoid any exposure to Israelis or Jews has often bordered on the pathological. In 1985, the Malaysian Paralympics team was forced to pull out of competition when the govern-ment ordered it not to participate in any events in which there were Israelis. Until a couple of years ago, Malaysia has also barred Israelis from visiting Malaysia not only as individuals but also as parts of conferences or sporting events in which they are normally entitled to participate. And this ban did not extend solely to Israelis, but occasionally encompassed non-Israeli Jews as well. In 1989, the Australian Jewish coach of a Melbourne soccer team, Miron Bleiberg, was unable to accompany his team to a tournament in Malaysia after he was unable to get a visa because he was Jewish.

Still, the banning of the film clearly is not popular among many of the Malaysian middle class, eager for more freedom, and often supportive of Anwar. This is especially true since the film had been much anticipated by Malaysian cinema-goers, who had seen trailers and posters for the movie for several weeks.

Mahathir is not Suharto, and, barring a sudden heart attack, is unlikely to be dislodged anytime soon. And that means racist and antisemitic policies and rhetoric in Malaysia are probably here to stay, both because it serves the interests of the current government, and because, in all probability, the current Prime Minister believes it.

Copyright © AIJAC
Last Updated 12 November, 2004