Israel and Gaza: Tricycle Theatre cancels Jewish Film Festival

This blog concentrates on American politics but I don’t want to be restricted. I want to comment on an apparently small issue that has arisen as a result of the Israel-Gaza conflict.

Not many American readers will have heard of the Tricycle Theatre. It is in Kilburn, a suburb in the north west of London. For many years, the Tricycle has been responsible for many excellent theatrical productions. Also, for almost a decade, it has hosted a Jewish Film Festival, funded in partly by the Israeli Embassy. It has also hosted the London Asian Film Festival, funded in part by the Indian government. Hitherto, the Tricycle has kept an open mind and not been side-tracked by human rights conflicts.

Recently, as a result of Israel’s actions in Gaza, the Tricycle decided to cancel this year’s Jewish Film Festival, on short notice. This was not an isolated incident in the British arts world. For example, the Edinburgh Festival organizers cancelled the performances of a theatre company from Jerusalem. Now, I can understand protests against the delivery of arms manufactured in the UK being sold to the combatants. Why ban film and theatrical performances? What humbug!

Why should I be prevented from attending a Jewish film festival just because the Board of Directors of a theatre choose to discriminate? The Tricycle benefits from public funds, namely a substantial annual grant from the British Arts Council. I hope this year’s grant is clawed back as a result of the Board’s ill-judged and shabby decision to ban showing films on grounds of race or religion.

The first casualty in any war is truth. I find it odd that Israel’s declared casualties in the current conflict are invariably soldiers, whereas no Hamas soldiers have died, according to the Arab press. I believe Hamas continually breaks the cease-fires in the knowledge that Israel will retaliate and be condemned for its pains but this isn’t reported. If I’m right, then surely Hamas must bear equal responsibility for deaths and injuries that ensue from its breach. What does the Tricycle say about this? Nothing, of course.

I live in a liberal society, one where free speech is practised. Why is it assumed by the Tricycle Board that, as a Jew, I would take the Israeli side in this conflict? If I were a Muslim, why would I automatically give my support to Hamas? Therefore, I ask why the Tricycle board should make assumptions about me and have the right to prevent me from viewing films whose performance has already been advertised. While I would not purposely boycott the Tricycle Festival, I do not agree with the Israeli government in its war on innocent Palestinians and their children. Likewise, how can the Hamas position be acceptable on any view when it rejects Israel’s very existence? However, neither position is cause for an arts organisation to decide for its public, on political grounds.

This war is awful and there is no end in sight. Even if the present cease-fire holds, what chances are there for any peace when one side wants the other exterminated? What the Tricycle did was unthinking, stupid and unhelpful. It looks to me as if it was a knee-jerk reaction by asinine lefties seeking to pander. Let me remind the Tricycle Board that in British society, we let people make up their own minds. Interestingly, so do the Israelis. I doubt that the people of Gaza get the same choice.