Lebanon bans Steven Spielberg’s ‘The Post’ due to his ‘ties with Israel’
The acclaimed movie about the publication of the Pentagon Papers stars Meryl Streep and Tom Hanks.
Steven Spielberg’s acclaimed newsroom drama The Post has been banned in Lebanon, according to media reports.
An anonymous source associated with the film’s international distribution told The Hollywood Reporter that the Lebanese censor board banned the film ahead of its premiere in Beirut, claiming that Spielberg was a part of its “boycott Israel” list.
The movie, which explores the publication of the Pentagon Papers concerning the Vietnam War in the Washington Post newspaper, was initially cleared by the government, but was later banned after pressure from the Campaign to Boycott Supporters of Israel-Lebanon, a source told the Arabic newspaper Annahar.
The noted filmmaker, who is Jewish, was blacklisted by the Arab League’s Central Boycott Office after he made a $1 million donation to Israel’s relief fund in 2006. Spielberg’s earlier films have been released in Lebanon without any problems. The Meryl Streep-Tom Hanks starrer was supposed to have been released in Lebanon on January 18.
“Lebanon is officially at war with Israel and has a decades-old law that boycotts Israeli products and bars Lebanese citizens from traveling or having contacts with Israelis,” Annahar reported.
In 2017, Patty Jenkins’s Wonder Woman was banned in Lebanon because it stars Gal Gadot, who is Israeli. Gadot served as a combat trainer with the Israeli Defence Force.
