MONTREAL (JTA) — After being barred from entering Canada, the controversial French comic Dieudonne M’bala M’bala presented a show in Montreal via video link.
Some 600 fans paid $40 a ticket to see Dieudonne on a big screen in a reception hall on Monday.
The comic has been convicted multiple times in France and Belgium for hate speech, anti-Semitism, Holocaust denial and defending terrorism. His latest conviction was May 10 in France for using material that included accusations of Jewish involvement in the slave trade and deriding the Holocaust.
That was the same day the Canadian Border Services Agency informed him he could not enter Canada and must return to France.
Promoter Louis Tall said Dieudonne’s show, called “In Peace,” was part of a sincere effort to rehabilitate his image.
“We are trying to promote something about peace, about love, not about racism and anti-Semitism,” Tall was quoted as saying by CJAD radio.
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