Don’t Mess With Jewish Porn King Michael Lucas
As Forward readers know, Michael Lucas is the Russian-born, New York-based gay adult-film producer whose fervent Zionism inspired production of the first gay porn film made in Israel with an all-Israeli cast.
And yesterday, Lucas emerged victorious in a battle with Manhattan’s Lesbian Gay Bisexual and Transgender Community Center over its support for an “anti-Semitic” group.
On Tuesday morning, Lucas — ne Andrei Bregman — issued a press release calling for a boycott of the Center over its hosting “a party by Israeli Apartheid Week (IAW), scheduled for March 5th.”
Lucas went on the attack. “I’m preparing to organize a boycott that would certainly involve some of the Center’s most generous donors,” he said in the release. “It was an inexcusable decision on the Center’s part to associate itself with a hate group like Israeli Apartheid Week.”
Less than eight hours after Lucas drew his line in the sand, the Center relented. “We prevailed!” Lucas crowed in an e-mail to supporters at 8:34pm. “According to an e-mail I just received personally from Glennda Testone, executive director of New York’s LGBT Center, it has been determined that ‘this event is not appropriate to be held at our LGBT Community Center.’”
Israel “is a tiny island of democracy in the jungle of the Middle East and Israeli democracy greatly needs our support. It is something that is important to preserve,” Lucas wrote.
IAW’s website describes it as “an annual international series of events held in cities and campuses across the globe. The aim of IAW is to educate people about the nature of Israel as an apartheid system and to build Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions (BDS) campaigns as part of a growing global BDS movement. Last year, Israeli Apartheid Week (IAW) took place in more than 40 cities across the globe.”
As of last night, its web site still listed a “Party to End Apartheid” scheduled for Sunday, March 5, with “DJ sets, guest performances, and great company.”
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