In fact, the Iranians HELPED the JEWS ESCAPE!!!!
"Tuesday, October 9, 2007 Iran helped Jews escape Nazis
"I stumbled upon books and papers about the efforts by Iranians in embassies in countries like France and Romania who helped thousands of Jews escape the racist Nazi forces"
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‘Holocaust’ TV serial captivates Iran
(AFP)
9 October 2007
TEHERAN - A love story set against the backdrop of the Holocaust is a familiar film theme, but its appearance in an Iranian television series has captivated audiences in the Islamic republic.
The epic 30-part drama, from a country whose president has called for the destruction of Israel and openly questioned the Holocaust, tells the story of a Jewish woman who is saved from the death camps by an Iranian.
It is marked by a high-quality attention to historical detail both in its evocation of wartime Europe — mostly shot on location in Budapest and Paris — and painstaking recreation of 1940s imperial Iran under shah Reza Pahlavi.
Director and scriptwriter Hassan Fathi told AFP the idea for the series came to him when he was researching a previous hit serial.
“I stumbled upon books and papers about the efforts by Iranians in embassies in countries like France and Romania who helped thousands of Jews escape the racist Nazi forces.
“The idea captivated me and I decided to base my love story on such a theme.”
The 25 episodes broadcast so far have been shown on Iran’s flagship national channel in a primetime slot after the news every Monday evening, partly over the fasting month of Ramadan that is traditionally a boom time for serials.
The reaction from Iran’s film-mad viewers has been ecstatic.
“It is a well-crafted serial because the atmosphere and the characters are so convincing, especially the depiction of Iran under the first Pahlavi,” said Mahmoud, 52, an engineer.
“Zero Degree Turn” portrays the relationship between young half-Iranian half-Palestinian Habib Parsa and French Jew Sarah Struck, who meet at university in Paris before the Nazi invasion of France.
Habib woos Sarah by attracting her with his knowledge of eastern mystic poetry and philosophy.
Contradiction
But when the Nazis occupy Paris, Sarah is forced into hiding. She and her mother are saved by Habib, who works at Iran’s embassy in Paris and sends her to Iran with an Iranian passport.
How could such a project come to be made in the Islamic republic?
President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad provoked an international outcry when he said Israel should be “wiped from the map” and then generated yet more controversy by saying the Holocaust was a ”myth.”
But Ahmadinejad’s stance on the Holocaust has been rarely repeated by top Iranian officials and, on occasion, even flatly contradicted.
Iran also remains home to the largest Jewish population in the Middle East outside Israel. The 25,000-strong community has its own MP and is granted religious freedom under the constitution.
“When I worked on the script between 2002-2004, the issue (the Holocaust) was not controversial in the Iranian political arena,” said Fathi.
“In “Zero Degree Turn’, we sympathized equally with the innocent Jews — the victims of the Nazi crimes in World War II — as much with Palestinians falling victim to Zionist oppressions.”
No scenes are shot inside the Nazi death camps, but one passage shows Jews being told to wear yellow stars of David to identify themselves.
Equally enthralling as its depiction of wartime Europe has been the serial’s portrayal of Iran under the shah Reza Pahlavi, the father of shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, who was deposed by the Islamic revolution in 1979.
Open discussion of life under the Pahlavis is rare on Iranian television but “Zero Degree Turn” has gone to great lengths to ensure the atmosphere of 1940s Iran is recreated, right down to police uniforms and the now frowned-upon neckties.
“My paying meticulous attention to details emanates from my sense of duty as an artist. This serial is like a novel — one has to pay attention to every minute detail,” said Fathi.
Fathi is hopeful the production will be able to cross borders to be shown in Europe and other countries.
It has been shot using Iranian and foreign actors (French actress Nathalie Matti plays Sarah) speaking Persian, Hungarian, French, Arabic and English.
Islamic dress rules are adhered to — in the scenes set in Europe Matti is shown with her head uncovered but when the action shifts to Iran she is wears a headscarf. Iranian actresses are veiled throughout.
The version being broadcast in Iran involves plenty of dubbing into Persian, which will be retained and subtitled if the series travels abroad.
“There are two main characters in the Zero Degree Turn, ’history,’ and “memory’,” said Fathi.
“The dialogue between them is one of the important ways of solving misunderstandings between cultures, religions, and races
[You got that, AMURKA?!]
