:: They Do It Too ::

JERUSALEM QUARTET:

Please join the protest - this Friday 13 November

Dear All

We need as many of you as possible to join us in protesting the appearance in Adelaide of the Jerusalem Quartet, which will be performing at the Town Hall this Friday night 13 November.

We will be standing in silent protest outside the Adelaide Town Hall with placards and we will be handing out some of the leaflets produced for the occasion, asking people to boycott—or stay away from — the concert (For handout please see link to AFOPA website below).

We are gathering at 6.45pm that evening (Friday 13 November) outside Anthony Mason Chambers, 201 Victoria Square, Adelaide (western side). From there, we will walk across the intersection to the Town Hall, to start our protest from about 7.00pm. We envisage finishing about 7.50 or 7.55pm, just before the scheduled start for the concert at 8.00pm.

If you are intending to come, please contact David Smith (assistant secretary on the AFOPA executive) who is coordinating the protest. David can be contacted by phone on 08 8362 4465 or be email at d.david.smith@gmail.com.

If you would like to read something more on the reasons for AFOPA asking the public to boycott the concert, see the attached article “Cultural Boycotts”. You can also check out the AFOPA flyer on the reasons for the boycott (click here to see the pdf).

Please demonstrate your support for this cause, and stay away from the Jerusalem Quartet’s performance in November.

Regards

Jeanie Lucas

For the Executive Committee of the

Australian Friends of Palestine Association

CULTURAL BOYCOTTS

Adelaide is a proud supporter of the arts. The city successfully has established one of the world’s most respected international arts festivals—which next year celebrates its 50th anniversary. State governments, city authorities, local businesses and enlightened citizens consistently, over several decades, have invested substantial time, effort and funds into encouraging and developing a thriving arts community.

In these endeavours, all parties have been inspired and rewarded by the presentation of outstanding and stimulating performances by leading international and Australian players, writers, artists and musicians.

In these circumstances, the question of boycotting the performance of one such outstanding group of performers comes as something of a surprise and even as a shock. But that question is what many classical music devotees currently are considering.

One of the world’s most respected string quartets is scheduled to perform in Adelaide on November 13, to play music by Haydn, Schubert and Australia’s own Carl Vine. The problem posed by the performance, however, is that the players are from a country which has institutionalised violence against life and livelihood and which consistently defies international calls for this behaviour to stop.

The performing group is the Jerusalem Quartet, and the country it represents, as cultural ambassadors, is Israel. Examples of Israeli aggression and destruction are reported almost daily in our news media. Israel’s refusal to adopt United Nations resolutions to withdraw from its illegal occupation of Palestinian territories, and its concomitant mistreatment of Palestinian people, is well-known and widely abhorred.

Because the prominent national governments in the world so far have failed to persuade Israel to reverse this intransigence, many of the world’s citizens, most numerically in western countries, have resorted in the past 2-3 years to adopting programs of action directed against the Israeli state itself.

In particular, those citizens have instigated, and continue to expand, a program of boycott and sanctions against Israeli companies and organisations, and against international companies and organisations doing business with Israel.

Adopting a model similar to that so successfully targeted against the apartheid regime in South Africa in the 1980s, the aim of the boycott and sanctions campaign is to demonstrate citizens’ disfavour with Israeli policies, as one means, eventually, of forcing the Israeli state to recognise its international obligations.

This is the context in which many Adelaide music lovers already have decided to stay away from the November concert of the Jerusalem Quartet, and many others are considering whether they should or not. To boycott the performance is only a small gesture in a small city, and hence may be considered by some as being insignificant and unimportant. But similar gestures are being made in many other small, and often large, cities around the world. Cumulatively, the impact is certain to be forceful.

The promotion, in this way, of a peaceful outcome to the intolerable and deadly conflict in the middle east will be welcomed by most people. But some audiencemembers question the appropriateness of boycotting a group of musicians—even for such a worthy cause as middle eastern peace—on the grounds that music itself is a medium for the promotion of peace, and that musicians, generally, are not active participants in inter-communal conflicts.

In the particular case of the Jerusalem Quartet, however, the Jewish News has referred to the players as “Distinguished Musicians, performing for [Israeli] troops” and has reported that “for three [of the players], carrying a rifle in one hand and a violin in the other is the ultimate Zionist statement”.

Even if the players were not complicit in the military ambitions of the Israeli state in this way, the boycott of their Adelaide concert would be justified on the basis that they represent the state of Israel in Australia, that they are promoted by Israel as its cultural ambassadors, and that a statement of disapproval of Israel’s implacability needs to be made by peace-loving individuals. By avoiding taking even moderate action against Israel, the danger persists that such abstinence will demonstrate approval for the country’s actions.

Perhaps some Adelaidians will want to offer such support. Entitled as they are so to do, a worthier action would be for them to seek to persuade music authorities to bring to Adelaide the West-Eastern Divan orchestra. Founded by the Israeli conductor, Daniel Barenboim, this well-regarded youth orchestra comprises musicians from a range of middle eastern countries, including Israelis and Palestinians. Barenboim has said that the orchestra “was conceived as a project against ignorance” and as a “platform where the two sides can disagree and not resort to knives”.

With its laudable aims and talented performers, this orchestra, which includes two players from the Jerusalem Quartet, would be warmly welcomed by Adelaide audiences. By contrast, a performance by the Jerusalem Quartet will not be so welcomed, representing, as it does, an oppressive state, with disreputable and unjust ambitions.

Accordingly, all peace-loving admirers of quality music should stay away from November’s concert in Adelaide. Similar demonstrations of disapproval were invoked against the Quartet in London in August this year and at the Edinburgh Festival last year. Adelaide audiences have an immediate opportunity to join the international movement of protest.

*David Smith is a former international management consultant. He is a member of the executive of The Australian Friends of Palestine Association.

^^just a little something...while revising for the exam^^

- They boycott the performance (and Adelaide's the State of Festivals!)..

- They even boycott Israeli products..

Do U??

If you're still eating McD and Maggi, drinking Coca-Cola and Fanta, using Johnson & Johnson, shopping at Carrefour and Tesco!! Then you're a supporter of the Israeli Apartheid!! (so no.. I definitely won't say congratulations!!)

I have so many things to say to you... but I think that'll be a waste of time.. I might as well just leave you be (but I hope you feel ashamed of yourself and STOP being a supporter; n only then will I salute you) and go back to my study....

Take care and have a wonderful life~

(i.e. for me; with lots of books and people to deal with)

Writing from,

the Barr Smith Library, Adelaide Uni...

Boycott Israeli Goods website: http://www.bigcampaign.org/