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Daubed word 'Jew' made my stomach
turn .
DAUBING: Uri with the antisemitic graffiti outside his home
CONTROVERSY is the cornerstone of my career. I built my reputation
on the debates and arguments I provoked, and I learned early
that it was far better for me if I revelled in the contradictions
and lies my enemies spread.
Every time someone claimed that they knew how I bent metal
or read minds, my bank account grew.
Every time I was dismissed as a charlatan, a fake fakir,
a liar or a conjuror, more people bought my books and tuned
in to my TV shows to see if they could catch me out.
It sounds cynical when I spell it out so bluntly, but I was
always happy to stir up my detractors.
There would be plenty of witnesses who had been convinced
by my demonstrations at point-blank range, and the see-saw
shouting match between the two sides fuelled my fame.
After all, I've always been an entertainer. That's how I
make my money, how I provide for my family.
I could have shunned the limelight and devoted myself to
being the subject of endless scientific research, but there
isn't much money in that. Ask any lab rat.
For 30 years or more I've taken a love-me-or-hate-me stance.
I've got a pretty thick skin, and a close family, with a lot
of good friends to back me up.
There are plenty of people who can't stand the sight or sound
of me, but that's fine - let's face it, I set myself up for
it.
Nothing in my showbiz career could have prepared me, however,
for the hatred that assaulted my senses as I walked the dogs
in the fields around my home, just a couple of days before
I was due to enter the Back To Reality house.
A wooden fence runs along part of my land. It's hard to reach,
and originally we put up the fence to shield us from prying
eyes on the river, rather than to keep out trespassers.
The Thames is a more effective barrier to intruders than
the fence itself. But someone had evidently taken the trouble
to find this fence - and desecrate it.
In huge letters of red spray-paint, one word was spelled
out: 'JEW'.
I stood and gazed at it in rising anger. My first thought
was to run to the gardener's shed, grab a tin of woodstain
and blot the word out.
But I quickly changed my mind - the graffiti was evidence.
The police might need to see it. And anyhow, the harm had
already been done: I'd seen the word and been shaken to the
marrow, and that surely was what the vandals wanted.
Instead, I photographed the fence and called a journalist
friend at Reuters, who was as shocked as I had been.
''That is terrifying,'' he told me. ''Terrifying because
it shows that Britain is becoming a racist country. People
here have always taken a deep pride in being open to all religions
and societies.
''That's why fascism never took hold -that's why ordinary
people faced up to Oswald Mosley and his thugs in the streets
of London before the war.''
He interviewed me swiftly, and within hours the story was
all over the world. If antisemitic crime is truly beginning
to take hold in the UK, I don't want it to go unreported.
My main concern at this point was to tell my wife Hanna about
the attack on our property, and to arrange for security procedures
to be overhauled.
Last year, following a series of silent phone calls in the
dead of night, and sightings of lurkers beyond our grounds,
I invested in a surveillance system which records video footage
of every inch of our land.
The pictures are military grade, the cameras ubiquitous.
But they don't yet take pictures of what is going on beyond
the fences and walls - and that is a fact I am sure my vandal-stalker
knew.
With the help of the police, who were prompt, courteous and
well-informed as they invariably are, we made some adjustments
to the security set-up.
Hanna pronounced herself fully confident that she would be
safe while I was away.
''The people who do such a pathetic thing must be cowards
anyhow,'' she insisted. One thing is for sure: My wife is
no coward. I am lucky to be married to such a defiant and
courageous woman.
If she had not been 100 per cent happy, I could not have
left my home to live in a TV studio for three weeks.
It's some consolation to know that the CCTV set-up around
my home is a match for the Back To Reality spy camera network.
I will never understand what drives race hatred.
If the graffiti had read 'Fake' or 'Fraud', I would have
laughed. I'm a performer who needs to provoke extreme reactions.
But my religion and my Jewish identity have nothing to do
with my act. I have never invited anyone to admire or despise
me because I'm a 'Jewish' psychic or an 'Israeli' spoonbender.
I've had plenty of bad reviews down the years, and I've faced
down hundreds of hecklers. It's meat and drink to me. But
this other kind of hatred simply turns my stomach..
Email
him at uri@urigeller.com
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