Press report from the International Jewish Anti-Zionist Network:
No Israeli Funding of the Arts
Southbank, London, 5 November 2014.
A lively and colourful 50 person-strong protest outside the BFI
(British Film Institute) condemned the BFI for hosting an
Israeli-sponsored film festival only weeks after Israel committed
mass-murder, killing 2100 people, including over 500 children during its
51-day assault of Gaza.
Called by a new initiative, No Israeli Funding of the Arts
(NIFA) [1], protestors from all walks of life, including Muslim, Jewish
and Israeli, chanted and spoke out against the UK Jewish Film Festival
(UKJFF) because it had insisted on accepting Israeli funding – in the
midst of Israel’s war crimes, crimes against humanity, crimes of murder,
extermination and persecution and incitement to genocide [2] – even when offered alternative funding.
Protestors
spoke out against the presence of Secretary of State for Culture, Sajid
Javid, at this opening gala of the UKJFF – he had slandered opponents
of Israeli funding of the film festival by implying they were guilty of antisemitism. The tiny Zionist counter-protest used the same slur.
Protests
against the film festival at the Tricycle last year called for it to
reject Israeli funding, and this summer the Tricycle made its courageous
decision to reject the tainted funding. Last night’s protest publicised that over 500 artists and theatre practitioners had publicly
defended the Tricycle from the false accusation of antisemitism when it
had offered to replace Israeli funding so that the film festival could
take place there.
Public
protest had already closed down an Israeli-funded theatre company at
the Edinburgh Fringe. Besides the Tricycle, the Bristol Encounters Film
Festival and artists from Sao Paulo Art Biennial had all rejected
Israeli Embassy funding in this last period.
There will be further protests against the Israeli-funded film festival.
[1] See No Israeli Funding of the Arts letter to all the cinemas hosting the UKJFF here.
[2] Russell Tribunal on Palestine
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