Speaking on LBC television,
Lebanese parliamentary deputy Sami Gemayel strongly condemned Hezbollah's call
for the censorship of the Diary and said, "Schools in Lebanon must have the
right to teach the Diary of Anne Frank."
Gemayel was one of several prominent Lebanese politicians, intellectuals and journalists who publicly condemned Hezbollah's bid to ban Anne Frank's Diary in Lebanon. In an interview with AFP, Lebanese journalist Omar Nashabeh, legal affairs editor for the daily Al-Akhbar, denounced Hezbollah's campaign against what he called "a book that belongs to the world body of literature" and said banning the book was futile, as it could be downloaded online.
Famous Lebanese journalist Hazem Saghieh criticized Hezbollah's action in his column in the pan-Arab newspaper Al-Hayat: "Anne Frank was a young German girl who died in a Nazi extermination camp, after living for months in hiding, for reasons that were unrelated to the conflict in Palestine. Her Jewish family fled Germany when Hitler rose to power in 1933, and took refuge in the Netherlands. But the Nazis later occupied the Netherlands and the girl of fifteen had no choice but to go into hiding with his family in an apartment in Amsterdam. She wrote her diary at a time when fear was everywhere. The story of Anne Frank and her Diary are now, at least in Europe, a symbol of human suffering and a witness to the brutal oppression that targets the innocent. Some countries have incorporated the book into their textbooks to teach young people a sense of tolerance ..."