Who is Sam Bacile? Does he even exist?
WHEN the US ambassador Chris Stevens and three other US diplomats were murdered at the American consulate in Benghazi, Libya and riots broke out in Egypt, we were introduced to Sam Bacile, an (it says here) Israeli-American who calls Islam as a “cancer” and made a film about it. It’s called Innocence of Muslims. You can see it on YouTube. Libyans did. They took offence at the Prophet Muhammad being portrayed as a child abuser, rapists, homosexual and womaniser. The film helped drive them to murder.
But then, if the Islamists want to find a Westerner doping down Islam, do they need to look far?
HISTORIAN Tom Holland is bravely shrugging off Twitter threats this week following broadcast of his Channel 4 documentary Islam: the Untold Story…Now Channel 4 have cancelled the screening party due to be held next week.
The Telegraph reports:
One message sent to Holland read: “You might be a target in the streets. You may recruit some bodyguards, for your own safety.”
The programme is still accessible from the 4OD site.
Innocence of Muslims was produced in 2011. You might have missed its screening. It played in one Hollywood theatre. Few people were there, maybe not even the 60-odd actors and 45 crew, some of whom procured the comedy beards. Well, so it says. The film’s 13-minute trailer was posted on the internet by Terry Jones. No, not the Monty Python chap. The monocular, fundamentalist Christian pastor from Florida, who planned a public burning of the koran.
Other than being supported by utter pillocks like Jones, what do we know about Mr (Im) Becile?
Sam Bacile is 52, says the AP. The Indy says he’s 56. He’s a property developer, who told The Wall Street Journal that he was responsible for the film. He says the pisspoor film cost $5 million to make. The money came from 100 Jewish supporters. They are anonymous. Well, none have been named.
Only, Bacile is not listed on California’s Department of Real Estate’s database.
Bacile tells the Washington Post:
“Islam is a cancer. The movie is a political movie. It’s not a religious movie.”
Bacile tells the Times of Israel:
“The main problem is I am the first one to put on the screen someone who is (portraying) Muhammad. It makes them mad,” Bacile said. “But we have to open the door. After 9/11 everybody should be in front of the judge, even Jesus, even Muhammad.”
Even Jesus? Why mention Jesus?
The AP reports:
..the man who says he directed and wrote it has little or no record of existing, has made other claims that appear false and says he has gone into hiding.
He identified himself in a telephone interview with The Associated Press as Sam Bacile. He said he was an Israeli-born Jewish writer and the director of “Innocence of Muslims.” Bacile was the name used to publish excerpts of the movie online as early as July 2.
But his background came under growing doubt Wednesday. A Christian activist who said he was a consultant on the film told The Atlantic that Bacile was a pseudonym and that the man was not Jewish or Israeli. Israeli officials said there was no record of him being a citizen.
Israeli Foreign Ministry spokesman Yigal Palmor tells the New York Times that Bacile is “totally unknown in filmmaking circles in Israel…a complete loose cannon and an unspeakable idiot.”
The Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg contacted Steve Klein, who says:
“I don’t know that much about him. I met him, I spoke to him for an hour. He’s not Israeli, no. I can tell you this for sure, the State of Israel is not involved, Terry Jones (the radical Christian Quran-burning pastor) is not involved. His name is a pseudonym. All these Middle Eastern folks I work with have pseudonyms. I doubt he’s Jewish. I would suspect this is a disinformation campaign.”
Klein… That’s a Jewish name. But not in this case:
Steve Klein, a self-described militant Christian activist in Riverside, California (whose actual business, he said, is in selling “hard-to-place home insurance”), who has been described in multiple media accounts as a consultant to the film.
The Guardian reports that Sam Bacile is in hiding.
A 2007 interview with Klein, a self-styled terrorism expert and former Marine Corps Vietnam vet, mentions his ties to the Copt diaspora community.
Klein’s author biography in a self-published work, “Is Islam compatible with democracy,” states: “With 9/11 2001, I immersed myself with Islam in America; went to every major Mosque in SoCal with Arabic speaking Christians as translators and uncovered useful information about many Mosques being the head quarters of terrorism in America.
Posted: 12th, September 2012 | In: Key Posts, Reviews Comment | TrackBack | Permalink
