The SBS-TV report on Monnara

Here's my translation of the SBS transcript, seemingly the meatier one. The more I think about it the angrier I get:

Anchor: Jews in America claim that the ten million-selling educational comic book 'Monnara Iunnara' deprecates the Jews and distorts their history and a Jewish group demanding it be revised.

In Los Angeles, O Dong-heon reporting

Reporter: In part of educational comic Monnara Iunnara, it is
written that the Jews are the real power behind the scenes in America and control Hollywood movies and portray themselves positively as victims while lumping together the Arabs as a barbaric violent group.

The book also says that Koreans living in America can go far with hard work but can never surmount the wall of Jews.

North Korean human rights group the Defense Forum's director Susan Scholte wrote a letter to Korean politicians saying that this comic could hurt Korean-Jewish relations and demanding that the book be revised.

[Michelle Park/ California Tax Equity Comittee: [We] interpreted the letter as a request that [Korean American groups and Jewish groups] come out with the same position on the issue]

Some say the reaction to the part of the book about the Jews taken out of context was overly sensitive (일부에서는 전체적인 맥락과는 관계없이 유대인에 대한 일부의 인식을 묘사한 데 대해 지나치게 민감한 반응을 보인다는 지적을 하고 있습니다).

I would argue that, when placed in context, these passages that people are reacting to are much more shocking.

But there are many indications that merely this situation could pour cold water on the relation between Koreans and Jews and that this situation needs to be dealt with prudently.

Overreaction indeed! I'm quite shocked by this report, actually.

Special thanks to Robert Koehler for setting my hasty and awful translation of this article straight.