{"id":512495,"date":"2026-01-13T05:47:09","date_gmt":"2026-01-13T05:47:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/512495\/"},"modified":"2026-01-13T05:47:09","modified_gmt":"2026-01-13T05:47:09","slug":"australian-writers-festival-cancelled-after-palestinian-author-axed-arts-and-culture-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/512495\/","title":{"rendered":"Australian writers\u2019 festival cancelled after Palestinian author axed | Arts and Culture News"},"content":{"rendered":"

A top writers\u2019 festival in Australia has been called off amid controversy over the cancellation of a scheduled appearance by a prominent Australian-Palestinian activist and author.<\/p>\n

The organisers of Adelaide Writers\u2019 Week said on Tuesday that the event could no longer go ahead following a wave of speaker withdrawals and board resignations prompted by the removal of Randa Abdel-Fattah from the lineup.<\/p>\n

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In a statement, the festival\u2019s board said while it had disinvited Abdel-Fattah out of respect for the Jewish community in the wake of the Bondi Beach mass shooting, the decision had created \u201cmore division\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe recognise and deeply regret the distress this decision has caused to our audience, artists and writers, donors, corporate partners, the government and our own staff and people,\u201d the board said.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe also apologise to Dr Randa Abdel-Fattah for how the decision was represented and reiterate this is not about identity or dissent but rather a continuing rapid shift in the national discourse around the breadth of freedom of expression in our nation following Australia\u2019s worst terror attack in history.\u201d<\/p>\n

The announcement came hours after Louise Adler, the director of the event, said in an op-ed that Abdel-Fattah had been disinvited by the festival\u2019s board despite her \u201cstrongest opposition\u201d.<\/p>\n

Writing in The Guardian, Adler called Abdel-Fattah\u2019s removal from the festival lineup a blow to free expression and a \u201charbinger of a less free nation\u201d.<\/p>\n

\u201cNow religious leaders are to be policed, universities monitored, the public broadcaster\u00a0scrutinised\u00a0and the arts starved,\u201d Adler wrote.<\/p>\n

\u201cAre you or have you ever been a critic of Israel? Joe McCarthy would be cheering on the inheritors of his tactics,\u201d she added, citing a figure in Cold War history commonly associated with censorship.<\/p>\n

The festival\u2019s board announced last week that it had decided to disinvite Abdel-Fattah, a well-known Palestinian advocate and vocal critic of Israel, after determining that her appearance would not be \u201cculturally sensitive\u201d in the wake of the December 14 mass shooting<\/a> at Sydney\u2019s iconic Bondi Beach.<\/p>\n

Fifteen people were killed in the attack, which targeted a beachside Hanukkah celebration. Authorities have said the two gunmen were inspired by ISIL (ISIS).<\/p>\n

Abdel-Fattah had called her removal \u201ca blatant and shameless act of anti-Palestinian racism\u201d and a \u201cdespicable attempt to associate me with the Bondi massacre\u201d.<\/p>\n

On Monday, New Zealand\u2019s former Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern announced that she would not go ahead with her scheduled appearance at the festival, adding her name to a boycott that swelled to some 180 writers, including former Greek Finance Minister Yanis Varoufakis and award-winning novelist Zadie Smith.<\/p>\n

Peter Malinauskas, the premier of the state of South Australia, as well as several federal politicians and a number of Jewish groups, had backed the revocation of Abdel-Fattah\u2019s invitation.<\/p>\n

Abdel-Fattah\u2019s critics pointed to statements critical of Israel to argue that her views were beyond the pale, including that \u201cthe goal is decolonisation and the end of this murderous Zionist colony\u201d, and that Zionists \u201chave no claim or right to cultural safety\u201d.<\/p>\n

In her op-ed on Tuesday, Adler accused pro-Israel lobbyists of using \u201cincreasingly extreme and repressive\u201d tactics, resulting in a chilling effect on speech in Australia.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe new mantra \u2018Bondi changed everything\u2019 has offered this lobby, its stenographers in the media and a spineless political class yet another coercive weapon,\u201d she wrote.<\/p>\n

\u201cHence, in 2026, the board, in an atmosphere of intense political pressure, has issued an edict that an author is to be cancelled.\u201d<\/p>\n

Separately on Tuesday, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said Australia would hold a national day of mourning on January 22 to honour the victims of the Bondi Beach attack.<\/p>\n

He said the day would be a \u201cgathering of unity and remembrance\u201d, with flags to be flown at half-mast on all Commonwealth buildings.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A top writers\u2019 festival in Australia has been called off amid controversy over the cancellation of a scheduled…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":512496,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[12043,13214,4740,15528,70,99,13191,50],"class_list":{"0":"post-512495","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-news","8":"tag-arts-and-culture","9":"tag-asia-pacific","10":"tag-australia","11":"tag-freedom-of-the-press","12":"tag-gaza","13":"tag-israel","14":"tag-israel-palestine-conflict","15":"tag-news"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/115886217282056416","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/512495","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=512495"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/512495\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/512496"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=512495"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=512495"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=512495"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}