A popular game show in Sweden caused a stir in the nordic country after it published a map of the State of Israel with the inscription "State of Palestine" next to the flag of Palestine. Only Arab, mixed or biblical cities were noted on the map such as Jerusalem, Jaffa, Acre, Haifa, Nazareth, Ramallah, Gaza, Khan Yunis, and others. Tel Aviv, for example, was not present on the map.
As part of a segment on the show which was aired Monday on Swedish Channel 5, a quiz was published that dealt with Swedish singer Laila Baga Wahlgren 50, the daughter of a Swedish mother and a Palestinian father. The show then put up a slide of the singer next to a map of the State of Israel with "Palestine" written on it, with a Palestinian flag added. The question at hand was what is the country of birth of the father of the famous singer?
The Israeli embassy in Sweden hastened to publish another question and four possible answers in response: "What should Channel 5 and the producer of the program do when they show a map where there is no trace of Israel? A. Check the graphics. B. Invest more time in research. C. Apologize. D. All of the above."
Vad bör @kanal5sverige och @fwikingsson göra när de använt en karta från Pinterest som suddat bort Staten Israel?#allamotalla
— Israel i Sverige (@IsraelinSweden) December 13, 2022
In response to the Israeli playful tweet, the show's producer responded to the tweet with an apology and wrote that the mistake would be corrected as soon as possible. The Swedish press was also quick to cover the show’s most likely deliberate political stunt, largely condemning it.
The Jewish Youth Organization in Sweden tweeted in response: "The map you published is wrong for several reasons - if it was supposed to symbolize the territory before 1948 it would mean Mandatory Palestine and Transjordan, and the flag is wrong. The map is wrong from both a historical and a contemporary point of view. It is clearly a modern map where Israeli cities were erased and removed. According to the IHRA definition, antisemitism is to deny the Jews the right to self-determination and for Israel to cease to exist."
Sweden – Quiz show on Swedish TV: “The State of Palestine” on the map of Israel https://t.co/hcRKlWxFl0
— The Coordination Forum for Countering Antisemitism (@cfcantisemitism) December 14, 2022
Israel's ambassador to Sweden, Ziv Nevo Kolman, said that the embassy "was amazed to see the map in the popular entertainment, in which the state of Israel was erased. We chose to challenge the producers of the game show with an interactive response that attracted the producer's attention and resulted in sympathetic coverage in the Swedish press."
