Ofarim annoyed by statements on the Leipzig trial

In retrospect, Gil Ofarim is annoyed that he hinted at alleged inconsistencies in his Leipzig court case during the RTL jungle camp. "I was annoyed about it afterwards. I was annoyed that I said anything at all about the content of the trial," the musician told the German Press Agency. However, it wasn't about "internal matters" - it had all been discussed before. "So I didn't want to relativize anything," said the 43-year-old. However, his plan had actually been to simply say nothing at all about the trial.

Ofarim was voted the so-called jungle king in the RTL format "Ich bin ein Star - Holt mich hier raus!" on Sunday. During the show, his handling of the events from 2021 and a later trial took up a lot of space. The musician made headlines at the time when he portrayed himself on Instagram as the victim of anti-Semitic remarks made by a Leipzig hotel employee. These accusations later turned out to be false. Ofarim retracted his account in a defamation lawsuit against him and apologized.

In the jungle camp, however, Ofarim hardly said anything about the case for a long time, which was heavily criticized by his fellow campers, among others. In one edition, he then went into surprisingly more detail about the trial - but his statements irritated many observers. In one sequence, the musician suggested that there may have been something wrong with the camera footage from the hotel, which was one of the reasons for the hotel employee's exoneration in court. In an interview with Die Zeit, the falsely accused hotel employee expressed his bewilderment. "He is acting like a victim, even though I am one, and that is difficult for me," he said.

Statement by the public prosecutor

The Leipzig public prosecutor has now also made a statement. It spoke of "mere repetitions of assumptions and insinuations of alleged manipulation of recordings that were ultimately not relevant to the proceedings." The district court had no doubts about the probative value of the video recordings or the statements of the witnesses heard up to that point.

In light of this and other controversies, Ofarim's election as jungle king came as a surprise. According to him, he himself had not expected to receive so many votes. "The response wasn't exactly exhilarating before I went in there," he told dpa. "That seems to have changed now, at least that's how I interpret the result." It's unclear whether his former fellow campers will begrudge him his success. "I can't say, you'd have to ask them," he said. "What I can say: My fellow campers were very warm to me, even after the final."

He himself remained so calm in camp - whether during criticism or complicated tests - because he worked with his breathing, he explained. "I only learned this myself over the years. I do yoga. That has helped me a lot."

Plans for the future

He does not yet know what will happen next. There is "no secret deal with RTL" and no finished music album in the pipeline. "Sure, I've written a lot of music in recent years. But there's no record that's finished and ready somewhere. There are also no plans for a documentary or anything like that," said Ofarim. "That also shows that I didn't expect to win at all."

Of course, he wishes he could work as a musician, actor and voice actor again - "like I did all those years before the crisis".

What he doesn't want to become, however, is a reality star. He doesn't watch reality TV at all, he said. "I don't quite understand the differences either - reality TV, trash TV and whatnot." Nor is that the direction he wants to take now. "I'm not going to be a reality star," Ofarim assured.

He had also only watched the jungle camp once before his own participation - during the first season in 2004, when pop singer Costa Cordalis emerged as the winner of the format. He is Ofarim's predecessor as king of the jungle.

"He was clever, he had a guitar with him - I would have liked to have had that too," said Ofarim. "Then I would have just played guitar in camp for two weeks."