Ricky Gervais defends controversial childhood photo of Queen Elizabeth II

LONDON, July 19 (UPI) -- British comedian, actor and writer Ricky Gervais says he thinks it is ridiculous that people are upset over a photo published this weekend of the future Queen Elizabeth II as a young child giving the Nazi salute.

"If the Queen does another Nazi Salute let me know about it. Until then...she was 7 and it didn't even have it's eventual context. Not news," Gervais tweeted Saturday.

"Now I'm terrified someone is going to dig up a photo of me praying when I was 7," read another of Gervais' comical posts.

"Never mind The Queen, I actually looked like a tiny Hitler when I was 7," Gervais captioned a photo of himself as a boy.

"Never mind the Nazi Party, just wait till they find out the Royal Family was once connected with the British Empire," he quipped in another Twitter post.

After his tweets started catching the attention of the media, Gervais wrote: "I wish all those headlines "Ricky Gervais defends The Queen" more accurately read "Ricky Gervais defends the actions of a 7 year old child."

England's The Sun newspaper published the image Saturday. It came from a film in the royal family's personal archive and was shot around 1933, just as dictator Adolf Hitler was rising to power in Germany. The home movie shows Edward VIII, the queen's uncle who was briefly king, encouraging the then-Princess Elizabeth and her 3-year-old sister Princess Margaret to perform the salute.

Never mind The Queen, I actually looked like a tiny Hitler when I was 7. pic.twitter.com/lpyvCGvaYr

— Ricky Gervais (@rickygervais) July 18, 2015

I wish all those headlines "Ricky Gervais defends The Queen" more accurately read "Ricky Gervais defends the actions of a 7 year old child"

— Ricky Gervais (@rickygervais) July 18, 2015