Harry Potter star Miriam Margolyes says 'I'm not anti-Jewish' over Gaza stance
Harry Potter star Miriam Margolyes has defended her pleas for peace in Gaza after calls she should be stripped of her OBE.
The Campaign Against Antisemitism group claims the actress, who is Jewish, should lose a gong she received in 2002 and a Bafta she won in 1993.
The group accused her of spreading 'racist bilge' after she compared the Israeli occupation of Gaza to the Nazi Holocaust.
The actress, who is performing at the Edinburgh Fringe, said: "I have every right to be an OBE.
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"It's nonsense.
"I'm very proud of my OBE and I think I deserved it, and I'd be sad if it was taken away.
"But I don't think it's seriously going to happen.
'I would not like to have it taken away because it would imply the government agrees that I shouldn't be an OBE.'
Margoyles, 84, has been an outspoken critic of the Israeli government and its role in the humanitarian disaster in Gaza.
She added: 'I'm not anti-Semitic, I'm anti-killing children.
"But I am also criticising the Jewish people in the UK, the community that I belong to, which is not coming out in support of me.
"I just want people not to kill each other.'
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