Ousted Troll of the Month: Dieudonné M’bala M’bala - November

The Ousted Troll of the Month is an episode we choose every month to show positive outcomes in the fight against antisemitism in Europe.

The French comedian Dieudonne has been sentenced for two months in jail by a Belgian court for making racist and antisemitic comments he made during a show in Liege (Belgium) in 2012.

During the show he was, among other things, questioning the existence of gas chambers and qualifying Hitler of being a 'nice boy' [gentil garcon]. In the same show he also mentioned that Jesus should have been judged in Nuremberg, next to Hitler.

The Belgian court's judgement said that 'all the accusations againt Dieudonne were established - both incitement to hatred and hate speech but also Holocaust denial'.

Even though Dieudonne insists he is not antisemitic, he already has several convictions for antisemitism and hate speech.

After the Charlie Hebdo and kosher supermarket attacks in Paris in January 2015, he asserted on soclal media that he feels like 'Charlie Coulibaly', using a perverse word game between the viral #jesuischarlie that was used in solidarity with the victims, and the name of the killer in the kosher supermarket.

Dieudonne has become more known - on a European level - for inventing the 'quenelle' an inverted Nazi salute, and for mocking the Shoah and Jews in his shows. One of the stricking examples is his song 'Shoahnanas' in which he takes a catchy French TV kids song and puts together the word 'Shoah' and 'pineapple' [ananas]. In the videoclip one can see that the pineapple juice is made out of 'Zyklon B', which was one of the killing methods during the Shoah.

Even though Dieudonne cannot be considered as definitely 'ousted' yet, his sentencing to two months jail by a Belgian count for his racist and antisemitic comments is a clear progress in the European recognition of an antisemitic comic whose words and gestures had until lately been banalised under cover of homour and freedom of speech.