cross-posted from: https://quokk.au/c/australia/p/570122/palestinian-australian-author-dropped-from-writers-festival-after-bondi
Dr Randa Abdel-Fattah has been dropped from the Adelaide Writers’ Week line-up by the Adelaide Festival Board, citing the festival’s role in “promoting community cohesion”.
How is it promoting community cohesion for barring someone based on race?
Seems like open-and-shut racial discrimination to me.
The statement from the Adelaide Festival board says that it’s because of “past statements” by Abdel-Fattah, though they don’t cite anything or even mention the nature of these statements. So it’s not explicitly because Abdel-Fattah’s ethnicity.
they don’t need to, it was pretty loud news that cost her a massive grant.
tl;dr: [Zionists] “have no claim or right to cultural safety”
She was cleared of wrongdoing and the suspension of the grant was lifted, btw:
Cheers. Can still understand why they bumped her quietly in the climate though. Not saying I agree, but I can see the politics behind it.
Well they haven’t been able to do it “quietly”. They’ve lost at least 24 speakers so far, and a sponsor: https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2026/jan/09/adelaide-festival-boycott-pro-palestine-academic-randa-abdel-fattah-ntwnfb
EDIT: That article has since been updated to reflect that 45 participants have now withdrawn.
How dumb does an arts organisation have to be to still be doing shit like this? Melbourne symphony orchestra’s reputation is still hurt (and they’re still missing out on gigs, too) from cancelling that soloist that dedicated a piece to the journalists of Gaza, and that was a good two years ago.
You want a royal commission into why we have “antisemitism”? This is why
