'Innocence of Muslims' filmmaker duped Christian charity, leader says
The maker of the film "Innocence of Muslims" duped a Christian charity into providing its Duarte headquarters for the movie, the charity's leader said.
Joseph Nassralla, president of Media for Christ, said he offered the charity's broadcast studio for 10 days of
filming but had nothing further to do with the movie, which depicted the
prophet Muhammad as a buffoon and sexual deviant. The low-budget anti-Islam film has stirred anti-American protests throughout the Arab world.
"The final product ... bore no resemblance to the film I thought he was
making," Nassralla wrote. "Nakoula altered the film without anyone's
knowledge, changing its entire focus and dubbing in new dialogue."
PHOTOS: Protests over anti-Islam film spread
Nassralla made the assertion in a
statement posted on the website of anti-Muslim blogger and activist
Pamela Geller.
Nassralla wrote that a fellow
Egyptian immigrant named Nakoula B. Nakoula had approached him last year
for help making a movie about Christian persecution and said "it would
examine the culture of the desert and how it is related to what is going
on right now."
Nassralla, who said he was in hiding after receiving death threats, was drawn into the firestorm over the film because his charity's name was listed on permits for the movie. In his statement, Nassralla said he was unaware that Nakoula had listed his organization on the government documents.
TIMELINE: 'Innocence of Muslims' unrest
His charity runs a satellite television network,
The Way TV, which airs sermons and hymns alongside anti-Islamic
rhetoric. The host of one such program is Steve Klein, a militant
evangelical Christian from Riverside County who worked as a script
consultant for "Innocence of Muslims."
Even as Nassralla distanced himself from the movie, he wrote that blame
for the worldwide violence triggered by the film's trailer that was
posted on YouTube lay not with the filmmakers but "those who are rioting and murdering."
His account of the movie's origins heightened the focus
on Nakoula, a convicted felon and acolyte of Zakaria Botros Henein, an
Orange County-based televangelist known for scorning the prophet
Muhammad.
Nakoula, an operator of service stations in Hawaiian Gardens, spent
most of the year before the film shoot in federal custody on bank fraud
charges. A fellow inmate told The Times that Nakoula obsessively read
the Koran for ammunition against Islam and said he had been
"enlightened" by Botros, a Coptic priest disavowed by the mainstream
church.
Two months after his release, Nakoula arranged the film shoot, telling
the cast and crew his name was Sam Bacile. He used that name last week
in media interviews in which he identified himself as an Israeli
American director backed by 100 Jewish donors. He subsequently
acknowledged he was a Christian, but told the Associated Press he was a
logistics manager for Bacile. The Times found no evidence of a Bacile
with any involvement in the film.
Later Nakoula called Bishop Serapion of the Coptic Orthodox Diocese of Los Angeles to deny any involvement with the film. He and his family left their Cerritos home last weekend and are in hiding. Attempts to reach Nakoula, Nassralla and Botros were unsuccessful.
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