Adelaide Festival backs booking of controversial Writers Week guests

The SA opposition has demanded the premier “use his power” after Writers Week booked two speakers accused of spreading “propaganda” against Israel and Ukraine.

The opposition has called on the premier to intervene in the state government-funded Writers Week event after controversy erupted over two scheduled guests.

The call comes after Adelaide Festival said it would not remove two controversial authors from its Writers Week program, despite outrage from Jewish and Ukrainian community groups.

Writers Week director Louise Adler defended its decision to include Palestinian poet Mohammed El-Kurd, whose tweets have been called anti-Semitic, and Palestinian-American writer Susan Abulhawa, who has openly supported Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

“We cannot accede to the idea that we should disinvite people or cancel writers because someone or some group might object to their views,” Ms Adler said on Thursday.

“I don’t want us to be party to cancel culture.”

Palestinian-American writer Susan Abulhawa, who will take part in two sessions in Writers Week, has been an outspoken critic of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and defended Russian President Vladimir Putin.

READ MORE: Penbo – Festival’s ‘brave’ booking choice is a backwards step

On Thursday, Abulhawa tweeted her response to those who had called for her attendance at Writers Week to be cancelled.

“You know you’re headed to a great festival when the director isn’t afraid to stand up to bullies,” she wrote.

Abulhawa has previously called Zelensky a “depraved Zionist with a house on stolen Palestinian land”.

She has also said “This clown is trying to ignite World War III” and written on Twitter that he is “mad and far more dangerous than Putin”.

Controversial Palestinian poet Mohammed El-Kurd’s tweets have been denounced as anti-Semitic by the Jewish Anti-Defamation League.

He will not be attending in person but is scheduled to take part in a group discussion by video streaming from New York.

Palestinian-American writer Susan Abulhawa. Picture: Chase Burkett

Palestinian activist, poet, and journalist Mohammed el-Kurd. Picture: Supplied

El-Kurd has described Zionists on Twitter as being “sadistic” for setting fires in Palestine, and accused Zionists of having “an unquenchable thirst for Palestinian blood & land”.

According to The Australian, the New York-based Anti-Defamation League wrote to the festival saying: “His rhetoric goes well beyond criticism of Israeli policies and actions …”

In response, Adelaide Festival chief executive Kath Mainland wrote the festival had “a zero-tolerance policy” regarding racism towards its staff, artists, audiences and the communities it serves.

“We would not permit commentary during our festival that is racist or anti-Semitic,” she wrote.

“Mohammed El-Kurd’s views are political, challenging and formed from his own lived experience, and we know that writing about and discussing this subject is difficult but necessary.”

Writers Week director Louise Adler, one of Australia’s most successful publishers, is herself Jewish and the daughter of Holocaust survivors.

Ms Mainland said the Festival had not received any direct correspondence about Writers Week from the Ukrainian community.

Russian President Vladimir Putin. Picture: Mikhail Metzel/SPUTNIK/AFP

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky taking part in a ceremony in Kyiv, to commemorate the 105th anniversary of the Battle of Kruty against Bolshevik Red Army. Picture: AFP

Association of Ukrainians in SA president Frank Fursenko was concerned not only about Abulhawa but also other speakers at Writers Week.

“She (Abulhawa) is really saying that the war is Ukraine’s fault. We all know that Russia has for many years specialised in propaganda. They have got a huge machine, it is very well resourced,” he said.

“They are very adept at spreading misinformation … something that is often done through social media.

“There are other communities that will talk about her particular books – I am talking about the tweets and the comments she has made about Ukraine and about the Ukrainian president.

“This is a sensitive topic. There’s a war going on, and there’s upheaval in Israel. Best that these people are not invited to stir up the flames.”

However, Ms Adler said the Writers Week program also included three Ukrainian writers, as well as journalist and Nobel Laureate Svetlana Alexievich and two other exiled Belarusian authors.

There is also a session with Bill Browder, the US businessman who was black-listed by Russia after exposing widespread corruption.

“To suggest that we are ‘Kremlin propagandists’ as I think the Ukrainian representative said … is ludicrous,” Ms Adler said.

El-Kurd is set to take part via streaming in a talk titled The Poetry of Dispossession on March 7, with exiled Belarusian poet Julia Cimafiejeva, Melbourne-based Lebanese-Palestinian writer Hasib Hourani and NSW Wiradjuri poet and academic Jeanine Leane.

The wider Festival program also features two productions which take a critical look at Russian politics.

Belarus Free Theatre, which operates in exile from its homeland, will perform Dogs of Europe, which is set in a near future where Russia has taken over several countries to form a new superstate. It is based on the novel by Alhierd Bacharevic, one of the exiled Belarusian authors who will also attend Writers Week.

Revisor, by Canadian dance theatre company Kidd Pivot, reinterprets Ukrainian-born Russian writer Nikolai Gogol’s classic 1836 play The Government Inspector, which satirised political corruption in contemporary Russia.

The SA opposition called for the premier to step in.

“Peter Malinauskas has previously talked the talk on Russia and anti-Semitism – now it is time for him to use his position as Premier to act,” deputy opposition leader John Gardner said.

Premier Peter Malinauskas. Picture: Dean Martin

Deputy opposition leader John Gardner. Picture: Matt Loxton

“There is no way he can stand mute while these authors use the publicly funded forum of Writers’ Week to spread their abhorrent views.

“South Australian taxpayers are rightly appalled as they find out their money is supporting forums at our Festival for these views to be spread.”

Mr Malinauskas said he was appalled by the comments, but did not say whether the government would consider any funding cut to the Adelaide Festival, which passes on funding to Writers’ Week.

“If I’m going to be frank. I’m surprised that they’re being facilitated at Adelaide’s Writers Week, but that’s an independent organisation for its own decisions to be made,” he said.

“The state government and I personally completely reject the remarks from this particular author. And I don’t think they’re consistent with what most people believe is right.

“I wouldn’t be going along. I don’t know if that actually going is adding anything for constructive or a considered debate.”

Federal opposition foreign affairs spokesman Simon Birmingham said: “I’m all for free speech but taxpayers shouldn’t be subsidising the promotion of racist opinions or commentary that may incite hatred.

“The Albanese Government should, at the very least, be taking a close look at a visa application from someone so provocative in their promotion of Russia’s illegal and immoral invasion of Ukraine.”

Asked if there were grounds to consider cancelling Ms Abulhawa’s visa, a spokeswoman for federal Immigration Minister Andrew Giles said: “The Minister is unable to comment on individual cases due to privacy.”

Originally published as Adelaide Festival backs booking of controversial Writers Week guests