A few hours before the night of the Oscars, with Italy cheering for Io Capitano, the Ceccherini case broke out.
The Tuscan actor, who is one of the screenwriters of Matteo Garrone's film, nominated for the statuette for best international film, was Francesca Fialdini's guest in the afternoon on Da noi freewheel, broadcast on Rai1.
"I am very proud to have worked with Garrone who made a fabulous film," said Ceccherini.
"Know that Garrone's film is the best of the five, except that it won't win because the Jews will win. They always win", he added, evidently referring to Jonathan Glazer's film, 'The Zone of Interest', considered the favorite in the same category, which tells the life of the commander of Auschwitz and his family a stone's throw from the concentration camp.
A phrase that created embarrassment in the studio, while the presenter tried to shift the focus of the conversation, quoting Glazer herself, "a very beautiful film".
Ceccherini's words aroused the wrath of the Jewish community: "It is very serious and unacceptable", underlined Noemi Di Segni, president of the Union of Italian Jewish Communities, Victor Fadlun, president of the Jewish Community of Rome, and Walker Meghnagi, president of the Jewish Community of Milan, that Ceccherini "has relaunched one of the saddest and most abused anti-Semitic stereotypes".
"Racist statements like these cannot fall into silence, because silence and indifference are the precursor to anti-Semitic violence, especially inadmissible on Rai".
For Di Segni, Fadlun and Meghnagi, it is the "usual allusion to the Jewish lobbies, conceptually no different from the propaganda that in any historical period and at any latitude preceded persecution and violence against our communities. We hope that the presenter, Francesca Fialdini , did not 'understand' the words spoken by Ceccherini only because he was asking a second question. If instead he had heard them and decided not to intervene, it would be doubly serious".
Even Ugei, the Union of young Jews of Italy, "strongly condemns the anti-Semitic statements made by #Ceccherini on @RaiUno, in the total indifference of the presenter. Episodes of this kind on the public network, we therefore hope that the appropriate measures will be taken by the competent authorities".
The case is also taking center stage on social media: several users have stigmatized the words of the actor, who is no stranger to provocations, and criticized the presenter's attitude: "she pretends nothing happened".
Reproduction reserved © Copyright ANSA