Artists for Palestine UK (APUK) hit out at cancel culture being applied by Oxford University against ken Loach.

We are deeply troubled to learn of a McCarthyite campaign demanding Oxford University cancel a public event with director Ken Loach discussing his distinguished career in film. 

The campaign to silence a world-renowned artist, which has been active behind the scenes and which became public at the last minute, is using the controversial IHRA definition of antisemitism to try to prevent a cultural event from taking place. 

If any further evidence were needed to demonstrate how a vaguely worded definition is being deployed to silence critics of Israeli policy towards Palestinians — then this is it. 

We have been warned by respected Palestinian academics, Israeli scholars, leading experts on antisemitism, dozens of progressive Jewish groups, and others that this definition is being used as a political weapon. 

We cannot fight racism, including antisemitism, by demonising and silencing supporters of Palestinian rights.”

Signed:

Hany Abu-Assad, filmmaker

Raed Andoni, filmmaker

Hanan Ashrawi, Palestinian parliamentarian, scholar and civil society leader

Nahed Awwad, filmmaker

Victoria Brittain, journalist, author, playwright

Judith Butler, philosopher and gender theorist

David Calder, actor

Dame Carmen Callil, publisher, editor

Julie Christie, actor

Caryl Churchill, playwright

Steve Coogan, actor, comedian, producer

Dror Dayan, filmmaker, senior lecturer

Raymond Deane, composer, author

Esther Ruth Elliott, actor, director

Brian Eno, musician, producer

Peter Gabriel, musician, founder Womad music festival

Tony Graham, theatre director

Ohal Grietzer, composer and mixed-media performer

Barbara Harvey, civil rights and labor lawyer

Trevor Hoyle, novelist and radio dramatist

Ronnie Kasrils, former South African Government Minister

Mike Leigh, screenwriter, director

Zwelivelile “Mandla” Mandela, South African Parliamentarian

Jean Said Makdissi, writer

Samir Makdissi, Professor Emeritus of Economics, AUB

Kika Markham, actor

Mai Masri, filmmaker

Thurston Moore, musician

David Morrisey, actor

Rebecca O’Brien, producer

Ruth Padel, poet

Maxine Peake, actor

Mark Rylance, actor

Alexei Sayle, comedian

Eyal Sivan, filmmaker

Rosemary Sayigh, journalist and scholar

Ahdaf Soueif, author, founder PalFest

Rima Tarazi, Palestinian pianist, composer and social activist

Harriet Walter, actor

Roger Waters, musician

Samuel West, actor, director

Rabbi Alissa Wise, deputy director of Jewish Voice for Peace

Artists Stand With Ken Loach And Against McCarthyism

Artists for Palestine UK (APUK) hit out at cancel culture being applied by Oxford University against ken Loach.

We are deeply troubled to learn of a McCarthyite campaign demanding Oxford University cancel a public event with director Ken Loach discussing his distinguished career in film. 

The campaign to silence a world-renowned artist, which has been active behind the scenes and which became public at the last minute, is using the controversial IHRA definition of antisemitism to try to prevent a cultural event from taking place. 

If any further evidence were needed to demonstrate how a vaguely worded definition is being deployed to silence critics of Israeli policy towards Palestinians — then this is it. 

We have been warned by respected Palestinian academics, Israeli scholars, leading experts on antisemitism, dozens of progressive Jewish groups, and others that this definition is being used as a political weapon. 

We cannot fight racism, including antisemitism, by demonising and silencing supporters of Palestinian rights.”

Signed:

Hany Abu-Assad, filmmaker

Raed Andoni, filmmaker

Hanan Ashrawi, Palestinian parliamentarian, scholar and civil society leader

Nahed Awwad, filmmaker

Victoria Brittain, journalist, author, playwright

Judith Butler, philosopher and gender theorist

David Calder, actor

Dame Carmen Callil, publisher, editor

Julie Christie, actor

Caryl Churchill, playwright

Steve Coogan, actor, comedian, producer

Dror Dayan, filmmaker, senior lecturer

Raymond Deane, composer, author

Esther Ruth Elliott, actor, director

Brian Eno, musician, producer

Peter Gabriel, musician, founder Womad music festival

Tony Graham, theatre director

Ohal Grietzer, composer and mixed-media performer

Barbara Harvey, civil rights and labor lawyer

Trevor Hoyle, novelist and radio dramatist

Ronnie Kasrils, former South African Government Minister

Mike Leigh, screenwriter, director

Zwelivelile “Mandla” Mandela, South African Parliamentarian

Jean Said Makdissi, writer

Samir Makdissi, Professor Emeritus of Economics, AUB

Kika Markham, actor

Mai Masri, filmmaker

Thurston Moore, musician

David Morrisey, actor

Rebecca O’Brien, producer

Ruth Padel, poet

Maxine Peake, actor

Mark Rylance, actor

Alexei Sayle, comedian

Eyal Sivan, filmmaker

Rosemary Sayigh, journalist and scholar

Ahdaf Soueif, author, founder PalFest

Rima Tarazi, Palestinian pianist, composer and social activist

Harriet Walter, actor

Roger Waters, musician

Samuel West, actor, director

Rabbi Alissa Wise, deputy director of Jewish Voice for Peace

17 comments:

  1. Oxford University did not cancel this event nor should it ever have so complaints of the chilling effect of the IHRA (which has no statutory or law enforcement application whatsoever) are so wide of the mark.

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  2. I can't get over these people, agitating for civil rights for Arabs? Antisemitic bastards.

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    1. right on - how dare they. Next we will we told that Arabs deserve human rights and their children not mere targets for Israeli killers to practice on.

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  3. The protest specifically related to Ken Loach and statements he has made about Israeli actions being responsible for the upsurge in antisemitism in Europe; appearing to say that it is permissible to deny the Holocaust ("history is there for all of us to discuss") at a fringe meeting at the Labour Party conference in 2017 and, most of all, his authorship of the play Perdition in 1987 which ran with the claim that Zionists in Hungary colluded with Adolf Eichmann in the deportation of 500,000 Jews to Auschwitz in order to ensure that a proportion of Jews (about 2,000) go to Palestine. The play was withdrawn from the Royal Court by its director Max Stafford-Smith because of the poor historiography that it was based on and the outrage caused to Holocaust survivors.

    Loach's record has been criticised not just by the British Board of Deputies for Jews but by the left-wing Socialists Against Antisemitism and the antiracist charity Hope Not Hate.

    I have always been a fan of Ken Loach films despite my disagreements with his antizionism but I think he is less concerned with Palestinian Arab rights than with hatred of the State of Israel (one can be a zionist and also a supporter of Palestinian self-determination).

    I also remember him disparaging on Radio 4 Today programme the campaign for justice for Robert McCartney by his family in the aftermath of his murder.

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    1. I have no doubt that Loach is right in thinking Israeli atrocity is the motive for some to go Jew Bashing. That does nothing to mitigate the bashing of Jewish people. But it allows us to think about ways of preventing some of it where we can.
      People should be free to deny the Holocaust much as they should be free to deny Israeli atrocity - but they should pay the price in ridicule and ruined reputation.
      If he was disparaging of the McCartney family (and I do not recall that despite writing regularly on the matter - but I don't doubt you) he deserves criticism.

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  4. The gall of some people. Having opinions that don't align with the state of Israel. The sooner these non conformist, troublemakers are rounded up the better

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    1. Frankly old bean it is frightful. Uppity Arabs demanding equal rights with Good Jewish folk. It is absolutely anti-Semitic to think people can be equal. There is the chosen people and there is the rest - end of. Equality and human rights are Aryan concepts.

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  5. From Tony Greenstein's Blog:

    "The Dishonesty of Oxford’s Zionist Students

    The Oxford Student in its coverage simply assumes that Ken Loach is anti-Semitic because the Zionist students says he is. I don’t know if any of these students have ever studied law, but one of the first things I was taught was that the British justice system rested on a presumption of innocence. Innocent until proven guilty. Ken Loach is entitled to be considered innocent of the charge of anti-Semitism until his detractors prove otherwise.

    But such ideas are alien to Zionists. After all they support a society, Israel, where if you are a Palestinian you are assumed to be guilty. Dissidents are subject to administrative detention without trial on the say so of a bureaucrat or military official.

    The Zionist Jewish Society at St Peters complained that being they were being asked to substantiate their allegations that Ken Loach was anti-Semitic. They complained that this “put the burden of proving Loach’s antisemitism onto Jewish Peterites.” Well yes it did! Or are they saying we should adopt the Israeli system that they love so much whereby you are guilty by virtue of being Arab?"

    The whole article.

    https://azvsas.blogspot.com/search?q=Ken+loach

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  6. Breaking news from Haaretz is that the International Criminal Court is going ahead with a formal investigation into War Crimes in Palestinian territories. Not before time. It will be an amazing turnaround if the Israelis are found found guilty of Nazi-like atrocities. The usual suspects will be howling anti-Semite at the court

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  7. They launched a pre-emptive strike in that regard. Netanyahu already called it blatant antisemitism in early February. C'mon now Anthony everybody knows that if you have intelligence that a enemy combatant is hiding in a school, then you naturally target the children to get at him. Anybody who disagrees with that, is obvious in his hatred for Jewish people.
    I said on here years back that Israel was the most racist country on earth. That upset some people. People pointed out other countries that have deplorable records. Fair enough, but it certainly seems the most racist liberal democracy in the world. I can't think of another one who targets schools, hospitals, shoots kids, journalists while blaming the leaders of the community they target. I can't think of another one who's columnist in a major newspaper argued for genocide.
    Over to you Barry expose the fact I'm writing this under a Nazi flag. Rational people can't criticise Israel and not have an antisemitic undercurrent. There's got to be something wrong with me, there is no way I could just be outraged with the assassination of children.

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    1. David - the more they shout anti-Semite the more they sound like Trump shouting Fake news.

      Because of their Nazi-like slaughter of Palestinian children Sam Harris pointed out a few years back (and he is an ardent supporter of them) that they are losing the PR battle and labelled what they are doing as war crimes.

      Not just their columnists but their politicians too have called for genocide - although they have met with strong criticism for it. Nevertheless, Ayelet Shaked became Justice Minister after she made the call.

      I find it so easy to conceive of Netanyahu building gas chambers and shouting anti-Semite at anyone objecting.

      It is impossible to read a book like Ordinary Men: Reserve Police Battalion 101 and the Final Solution in Poland and not be enraged by the horror inflicted on Jewish men, women and children. And it would be hypocritical were that same sense of horror not evoked upon observing Israel's atrocities against Palestinians.

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    2. David

      For the record, I do not believe that you are writing your comment under a Nazi flag. Rational criticism of Israeli governments and policies in relation to the Occupation is not and never be construed as antisemitic. Nor is support for Israel's referral (and that of Hamas) to the ICC for war crimes.

      Please do not attribute sentiments and attitudes to me that I do not hold no matter how much you think to the contrary.

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  8. Anthony,
    Reading about the holocaust turns your stomach. It's disappointing that Palestinians don't merit equal empathy.
    Barry,
    I'm pulling your leg, bit of levity, lightens the load. I don't engage in serious conversation on this subject with you anymore, I don't see the point, we're miles apart.

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    1. this is so true - people can look at atrocity in places like Jasenovac and wax horrified but mumble their qualifications and mitigations when it comes to Sabra and Shatila.

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  9. And some people who are so vocal about Israel's treatment of the Palestinian (David Miller of Bristol University is a case in point) seem to lose their voices when it comes to the 3,000 Palestinians massacred by the Assad regime after the uprising in Yarmouk refugee camp.

    And Sabra and Shatila was unequivocally a Nazi-type atrocity perpetrated by a genuinely fascist group, the Lebanese Falange.

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  10. Yes, it is hypocritical to oppose the murderous acts of a war criminal like Netanyahu and not to oppose the murderous acts of a war criminal like Assad.

    Jasenovac was carried out by Croat forces under Nazi control just like Sabra and Shatila was carried out by Lebanese forces under the control of the Israelis.


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  11. People seem to forget that Isreal had no problem jumping into bed with the Apartheid regime in South Africa, even going so far as to have a cosy little clandestine nuclear weapons program were they both collaborated in detonating Nukes in the Southern Indian Ocean. Anti-semetic my arse, opposing that mob is just plain commonsense. (Vela incident if anyone is interested).

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